Tag Archives: paint

Anyone Know a Paint Shop Around Here?

Portland International is home to a paint facility owned by Boeing and operated under contract to them. It provides additional paint capacity for their jets assembled up in the Seattle area. One of the jets landed at Portland while I was there for the ANG open house. It was a 777 freighter. It landed on the runway closest to us and turned on to the taxiway just in front of where we were standing. It then taxied back to the opposite end of the field where the paint facility is located. The only clue as to what airline it was destined for was the rudder which had a small element of the future colors. My guess is Qatar but I’m sure someone can put me straight if that is wrong.

American’s 737s in the Old Scheme

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When American introduced their new colors, there was uproar. The criticism was plentiful. I seemed to be in a very small group of people that actually quite liked the look that they had gone for. Having been a regular customer over a number of years, I had grown tired of what I thought was a dated look. Over time I think people have calmed down about the change and now I don’t hear too much mention of it.

As more of the fleet gets repainted, I now notice more when I see a jet still in the old scheme (except MD-80s which obviously are not going to be repainted given their imminent demise). I have come across a few of the 737-800 jets recently in the metal finish. Here are some of them before they finally disappear for good.

Air China A330

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Boring paint schemes are far too common these days on airliners. The all white plane with just a hint of color is a little too much of a feature of things these days. A few airlines break the mold but not enough. One of the boring ones is Air China. They are not at all interesting for most of their fleet. However, some of their Airbus A330s are painted in a livery that is a bit more interesting. Sadly, I had never seen one. They fly in to San Jose but almost always they bring a jet in plain white. However, they changed it on a day when we were going to San Jose for some shopping so I added a small diversion.

This scheme is not the most dramatic and shooting it in the middle of the day is not going to emphasize it in the best way but I wasn’t going to miss the chance. San Jose provides a great location for getting close to the jets. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one interested in it coming. A few people showed up just before arrival and left straight afterwards. I just wish more airlines would adopt interesting colors. The planes are not very varied so the liveries are all that is left to mix it up.

The Merger Jet (At Last)

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West Coast airline flying includes a lot of Virgin America. Headquartered in Redwood City, just down the peninsula from SFO, Virgin America has been struggling to establish itself as a carrier with a different level of service. It must have done well enough because Alaska got worried enough to buy it. They call it a merger but Alaska bought Virgin. Everyone wonder what will happen next since the fleets are totally dissimilar as is the customer service. Alaska repainted one of their jets in a new livery to celebrate the completion of the acquisition.

It is one of their 737-900s and the colors migrate from red to blue to symbolize the joining of the two. I have missed the jet on numerous occasions. I thought I was never going to catch it but finally saw it at San Jose. You are a lot closer to the flight path at San Jose which is good. What is even better is being there on the pouring rain when the clouds part five minutes before the jet arrives. Sadly, the weather closed in just as it took off again but the light was okay over the airport, even if it wasn’t where I was. Still, I finally got it!

Spanish Fake Canopies

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When the Canadian Hornets first came into service, they introduced the fake canopy on the underside of the front fuselage. This was a painted outline of the canopy. The idea was that, on the heat of a dogfight, the opposing pilot might be confused about the orientation of the jet and think it was coming towards him rather than away as a result of seeing this canopy.

The US Hornets never had this on the fleet jets but it appears that the Spanish Air Force has adopted it for theirs (although not all of the jets are so painted). I heard a rumor that the Canadians have some rights on this and other users have to pay for it but I have no idea whether there is any truth to this or not. However, their jets certainly do have the canopies painted on the fuselage.

Old Spirit Colors and the Brief Livery

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Changing the colors of an airline is usually something that happens infrequently. It always gets a lot of comment when it happens but brand continuity is often a big deal. This is where Spirit is different. They flew for a long time in their gray scheme that had a digital block pattern going on. They changed to have something that was far brighter with a white fuselage and a blue fin with some color accents. When I saw a yellow jet at Oakland, I thought it must be some special livery. It turns out that it wasn’t and that this was their new “new” scheme. I’m not sure what the problem was with the previous one but obviously it didn’t last. I wonder whether they even had time to repaint the fleet?

New Alaska Livery

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When an airline decides to change its livery, it isn’t too long before large numbers of their aircraft are in the new scheme and you start forgetting that there was ever a previous paint job. In between those two points is the time when you are interested in the change. Catching something in the new livery is of interest. Alaska Airlines has changed their colors. As an airline that is active in this part of the world, the chances of catching the new look should be good.

It so happens I have seen two of them in close succession. One was overflying me while I was out walking. There was a lot of wildlife on my walk so I had a long lens on the camera so managed to get a couple of shots. The light was not great and there was plenty of cloud so not a great shot. The next time was shortly afterwards when the conditions had become considerably worse. Torrential rain meant that the plane was pretty obscured by the rain drops even though it was not far away. Neither of these will be shots that get pulled from the archives I imagine as they will be replaced by many more as the planes get repainted. However, they were my first encounters with the new look.

New KLM Colors

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KLM are one of the few airlines that are not soon to be rid of their 747s. They have demonstrated this by starting to repaint them in a new color scheme. When I was at LAX, one of the newly painted jets was due to come in. Annoyingly, rather than follow the normal approach path to the 24 complex, he came straight over the field and went in on the 25 complex. I saw it come overhead and could see it in the distance as it landed over on the other side of the airport.

Fortunately, later in the day I was on the south side up on Imperial Hill awaiting a message from my buddy that he was ready to roll. I had not thought further about the KLM jet but, since it had come in earlier, that meant it was going to go out again. It took off in front of me – catching me a little by surprise. I was able to get a shot of it in good light so all was not lost.

Did Anyone Bother With This Livery Design?

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Not long ago I complained about the dirty condition of a China Eastern A330. At the time, I thought it might be a non-standard jet because the livery was basically white with a couple of distinguishing marks. It turns out that I hadn’t appreciated that China Eastern have replaced their previous colors with a new and less colorful scheme. Since then I have seen some 777s come in with the new scheme. In an era of relatively bland airline colors, it seems to me that China Eastern have gone a stage further and taken any interest at all from the livery. Not a cool effort on their part I think. They should check out what China Southern is doing by comparison.

Canadian Battle of Britain Hornet

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1940 was a tumultuous year in the UK. While the war had started in 1939, 1940 was the year in which it came home to the British. The German air campaign was supposed to be softening up the defenses ahead of an invasion. Things turned out differently as a consequence of some valiant defense, some great pilots and aircraft and some strategic blunders by the Germans. As a result, Operation Sealion was cancelled and the UK remained out of German control although still subject to constant bombardment.

Seventy five years later, there are many celebrations planned to commemorate the Battle of Britain. Many air forces participated as part of the Royal Air Force with squadrons being operated by crews from individual countries such as Poland, Czechoslovakia and Canada. Canada is marking the anniversary in many ways but one is decorating a CF-188 Hornet in a special scheme.

The paint finish is replicating a Hawker Hurricane from 1940. The colors are reproduced and there are even red marking on the wing leading edge to represent the locations of the gun ports on the Hurricane. It also carried commemorative markings to recognize those that took part in the battle. I was lucky to see the jet at Chino. It flew after sunset on the Friday and then as part of the main display on the Saturday. The sunset show concluded with it dragging the hook along the runway in a shower of sparks!

This jet will appear at a number of venues throughout the year. If you can see it, do try and make the effort. The RAF has a Typhoon marked up similarly and I am sad that I won’t see that. This is a great alternative for me.