[Shawn 507]

FWIW, wasn't the first Hellcat shown on Dogfights in the early lt blue over white scheme??

[Art LeBrun]

Osprey's Hellcat book only shows one aircraft in Light Blue and that is Flatlery 's 00 May 6,1943 on Yorktown. Any other color sources? 2 Squadron/Signal
to look at yet............

[skysurfer808]

Originally Posted by SkyBuffalo

Very cool info., SkySurfer, especially about the insignias!

Unfortunately, I don't think anyone has yet answered my original question : Did any F6F Hellcats fly in combat in just the light blue-grey paint scheme (without the dark blue overspray) in late 1943?

I had Flatley's plane as an example, and I know it got oversprayed when it went into battle in August '43. But did other Hellcats from other groups/ships fly in combat before they got the dark blue overspray? Or was the "Dogfights" episode wrong?

The Dogfight show's CGI Animators got the scheme wrong, which wasn't the first time. The animation folks there seem to go more for generic aircraft, likely in the interest of re-using them in future episodes. Still, their gaffes can be irritating, it is ironic that producers in China making metal objects actually have done more accurate depictions then computer animators and TV producers here in the States.

Examples of Dogfight Gaffes.

The light blue-gray Hellcats in the aformentioned episode.
The P-40s in the later segments of the Flying Tigers episodes...which were E/M/early model N's rather then the Generic B/E depicted, though the livery was accurate for the original AVG Tomohawks.
The Air Force Phantoms in the Operation Bolo Episode, which lack undernose IR Seekers.
The livery of Swede Vejtasa's Dauntless in the episode showcasing his fight against the Zeros, in which he got 3. Hobbymaster's Coral Sea Yorktown Dauntless has the correct markings for Vejtasa's machine, while the Dogfight show has it in a 1943 era tricolor with the Red Surround National insignia.
The Skyhawks in the Crusader Episode, which have the fin top fairings of A-4M's rather then being simple A-4B/C/E's that acutually flew in the earlier stages of the Vietnam conflict.

There are many more, but these were the most egregious gaffes I noticed. There's really no excuse for this in a show that prides itself on historical accuracy and accurate recreations of historic aircraft. After all, they did them using computers, and the aircraft depicted are portreyed in a huge variety of sources, not to mentioned modeled by scores of companies, both in plastic and metal. The show has gotten some famous ones right, especially during the original episode, where they had accurate depictions of Rickenbacker's number 1 Spad, Bud Anderson's original P-51B Old Crow, Blesse's F-86 and Duke Cunningham's Showtime 100. That's why I'm harping on them so badly, they got the planes right to begin with, but declined as the show continued. What is ironic and infuriating in the Hellcat episode is that Vraciu's White 19 was depicted accurately, and since they got that one right, and had the basic template for a Tricolor Hellcat, they have no excuse to have a historically inaccurate scheme.

The Hellcat was introduced to combat in August 1943 by Flatley's VF-6 in the strike against Marcus Island, so therefore, if Flatley's machine was in the tricolor scheme, and nobody else flew the Hellcat in combat prior to that it can only be concluded that the scheme of Flatley's machine in a combat was Tricolor, not the Hellcat factory rollout Light Blue Gray.

So to answer your question, Dogfights got it WRONG.

Skysurfer808