The USN memo at this link < Camouflage Gray Paints - Change in Specifications for > specifies late-war neutral grays as white paint tinted with carbon soot. White Ensign Models ColourCoats product US28 accurately represents 1945 #27 neutral haze gray. It is accurate for USN camouflage measure 22 for the upperworks of USS Indianapolis on her final voyage and USS Missouri at Tokyo Bay. The last I knew, US28 was available in the US from Tom's Model Works, managed by our frequent correspondent Richard Harden.
Postwar haze gray has a blue tint that is impossible to produce by blending soot and white paint.
Simultaneously with US28, the WEM ColourCoats product for postwar haze gray erroneously continued #27 neutral haze gray, instead of implementing the FS color. ColourCoats is under another owner. I know neither the accuracy nor the availability in the US of the current product line. Previous Message
Sure sounds like a simple question. But...
First off, which Haze Gray? The purple-blue based one of most of WWII, or the late war/modern neutral gray?
Next, I must make the "standard disclaimer" that I am looking at everything on a monitor, so am not seeing actual colors.
I got ebay entries for the two colors you mention. The back of the bottle states that Pale Blue Gray is wartime 5-P. Thus, it is not wartime 5-H, and an online comparison of the two with images of the S&S chip set show it is lighter than 5-H. Compared to modern Haze Gray, it is too blue, and too light.
As for Light Sea Gray, an ebay image of the back of a bottle says it is FS 36307. Modern Haze Gray is FS 26270 making it much darker. Light Sea Gray is also not dark enough, nor blue enough to be wartime 5-H.
Neither is much of a match, but based on what I am seeing, you are better off with the Pale Blue Gray if you have absolutely no other options. It would need to be darkened some to match wartime 5-H, and will just be too blue for the modern color, but I do not know how you would change that. You would just have to live with it.
FWIW, here are the S&S chips online (and therefore only for general reference, not great accuracy since monitors distort colors.) The neutral grays of the late war equate to modern colors:
http://www.modelwarships.com/reviews/books-plans/snyder-short/usn-1/usn-1.html
http://www.modelwarships.com/reviews/books-plans/snyder-short/usn-2/usn-2.html
HTH some Previous Message
Model Master Light Sea Gray or Pale Blue Gray to Haze Gray. What is closer. Thanks....Sam
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