Acrysion - námořní modrá

The dark blue of US Navy carrier-based aircraft

The shade belongs to the trio that the US Navy introduced on its carrier-based machines during 1943. The upper surfaces of the wings and the spine of the fuselage got this saturated blue, the sides a lighter blue band and the underside white. The aim was for the machine to blend with the water from above and with the sky from below. It was worn by practically everything that took off from the decks in the Pacific: the Grumman F6F Hellcat, the Douglas SBD Dauntless, the Grumman TBF Avenger and the Vought F4U Corsair.

It has uses beyond aircraft as well. A similarly dark blue appears on the sides of American warships of the late period and it serves on naval hardware accessories, where it forms a counterweight to a light deck.

Thinning and spraying

This is a water-thinnable acrylic medium from the Acrysion line. Shake the container honestly before work, the pigment sinks to the bottom and without stirring the coat comes out uneven. It is thinned with water, or with the thinner of the same line, and a consistency close to milk proves itself in an airbrush. Several thin sprays with a short pause between them give a smoother surface than one saturated coat.

On the label, a white frame above the designation of the line holds the number of the shade, to the left of the name is the degree of gloss and to the right the field the manufacturer recommends the paint for. Close the container right after drawing paint out, an open acrylic medium thickens quickly. A dark blue benefits from letting an even base coat show through underneath it, otherwise every unevenness in the surface shows up on large areas.