British IR AA Missiles

[rickshaw]

What colours should British IR AA Missiles be painted?

In particular, I'm referring to Red Top operational missiles.   I've seen pictures of Red Tops with their fuselages painted white, silver, light grey and green.  I've seen green fins, silver fins, black fins and all attached to different colour fuselages.  I've never seen a blue (inert practice round) coloured one though.  Which scheme is the correct one?

[Weaver]

I suspect the answer is "both", depending on the timeframe. In the days when Lightnings were silver, Red Tops and Firestreaks were generally white, with Red Tops also having the silver body/white wings option. When the Lightnings got cammo or all-over green, then matching green missiles began to appear.

I'm sure I've seen red ones too, but I suspect those are for publicity shots.

[Mossie]

You'll pretty much see most of those combos.  Operational Red Top rounds were generally silver/NMF or grey with white or green fins.  The rear of the missile tends to be the same colour as the fins.  I've seen white bodies but these tend to be dummy rounds used for exhibitions & such.  I can't remember seeing an operational white or green Red Top, these tend to be Firestreak. I haven't ever seen a blue Red Top, training rounds for aquisition only usually had their fins removed, otherwise they were indentical to the standard missile.

You often see a red trim to the fins, these are protective covers only used on the ground.  Equally, you'll often see a cap over the seeker, I've seen red, white & yellow, sometimes stripes of varying colours.  You might occasionally see an in flight missile with the cap still on.

General rule is that pre-1976 you'll see silver or grey bodies on Red Top with white fins, green fins after this period.  Firestreak all white before '76, all green after.  There were some other experimental missiles such as Taildog & SRAAM, white or silver/NMF seems to be the general uniform.  Later ASRAAM is allover pale grey