Yuku free message boards

Flight decks usually got a new coat of paint during refits, and the RN carrier of the sixties had a cycle of two years service followed by a refit of between six months and two years, depending on if it was a straightforward overhaul or major upgrade. The late fifties/ early sixties RN scheme was a green flight deck with yellow unbroken stripe on the angled deck. The landing area was often painted a lighter colour, sometimes a shade of grey rather than green to make it easier to see. As the sixties moved on the colour scheme evolved, with the angled deck centre line changinging from continous yellow, to broken yellow (when the aft lift first became a 'gap' in the line), to broken red around the mid sixties, to red with white outer edges. the flight deck colours changed from green to dark grey/lighter grey with the darker shade on the landing area, as this made the centre line stand out more and this scheme remained until around the mid seventies when only Ark Royal remained. She dropped the deck recognition letter from her deck around 73/74 as there were no other carriers she could be mistaken for from the air though her air group retained the letter R on their tails. The Wingtip safety lines at either side of the landing area gained large white blocks along their length to improve visibility for approaching aircraft (some sources say this was to assist night landings, but having seen footage from the pilots POV of a night landing all that is visible are the landing lights on the centre line, round down and 'donkeys tail'), and in her final commission the landing area was repainted in a lighter shade than the rest of the deck. These changes make it fairly easy to date pictures of the Ark during her final years for one thing. The red stripe was a 'dayglo' colour from the mid sixties, and reportedly stood out well against the sea and the rest of the flight deck.