Re: Italian Roundels

Bill Shatzer (bshatzer@ednet1.osl.or.gov)
Mon, 9 Oct 1995 14:29:58 -0700

>
>Interesting that both types were used. I wonder why they
>weren't standardized early on in the war.

My own theory on this, which is _pure_ guess, is that it was
an economy measure. With aircraft recieved from the French,
it was cheaper and easier just to overpaint the blue center
on the French cockade with green to produce an Italian roundel
while with aircraft recieved from the Brits, it was easiest to
retain the red center while repainting the outer ring green.

I suspect the 'real' Italian insignia was green ring/red center
as that _seems- to be the one most used on Italian manufactured
aircraft (Capronis, Macchi seaplanes, Ansaldos, etc)

As an aside, I was just looking at the restoration photos of
Barraca's Spad 7 C.1 which, incidently, does have the red outer
ring. The pre-restoration photo shows the fuselage roundel
with the 'French' proportions while the after restoration photo
shows the fuselage roundel proportions were changed to the
'British' proportions. Why, I don't know.
-snip-

>Looks like the hunt continues.
>
>Does Americal or Aeromaster have a sheet with the green
>ring on the outside?

The Americal decal sheets come with Italian roundels in both
'flavors'.

Cheers,

--
Bill Shatzer - bshatzer@ednet1.osl.or.gov - aw177@Freenet.Carleton.ca -