Well, what I would like to know is.............

The US stars in WWII, you've got :-

Plain White star
A star with a solid ring &
A star with a dashed ring.

What do they mean?

Were they used for different operations/divisions/regiments or periods of the war?
#:-)

Plain white star was used for ground indentification on vehicle sides

star with solid ring and dashed ring used for aerial indentification.... mostly painted on front slope of a vehicle and sometimes on turrent top or sides..

i think but am not sure the dashed was later in the war..

I think the dashed circle was an indicator that the insignia was painted on with a stencil.

Wasn't the dashed circle and star used during the pre-war and early war period? Well, maybe not. I seem to recall some late war tank destroyers with the dashed circles. Perhaps it was as Sabot commented, a matter of how it was applied.

Not certain but I think pre-war and early war stars were yellow and lacked the ring altogether.

Shaun

Now that you menetion it, I think you're correct. There were dashes (so to speak) on some, and they ran around the sides of the turret. (I'm thinking of Patton's forces during the California exercises prior to Torch on this aspect)

Okay, my memory of the sequence goes like this:

North Africa - yellow stars, with bands on tank turrets. At a distance, the star was sometimes mistaken for the German cross, with the inevitable results.

Sicily/Italy - White stars (I think) with a circle added to stop any confusion with the German cross. The thickness of the circle could vary quite a lot.

NWE - White stars with or without circles.

Gaps in the circle resulted from not filling in between the stencilled segments.

The old Osprey Vanguard on US camouflage schemes had some useful stuff on markings in, but is now OOP.

Thanks Guys,

You see....... this is what I love about this site and the people who use it. Not only are you all quite superb modellers who don't mind sharing there tips and how to's, but between us all there's a whole lot of knowledge you don't mind sharing either.

Thanks again

you must not forget the blue drab srars/circles and vehicle code numbers from early in the war either.

Circles with dashes were stenciled on as were vehicle code numbers stenciled on as well.

I read somewhere ( I think it was book about u.s. markings on Pacific Theatre) that white star with ring was at the beginning of the war, then with dashed ring (about mid of war) and in the end of war US used white star. It's quaite convinceing because I haven't seen any tank marked with star with ring or dashed ring after WW II.
I'll check if I have that book and if there are exact periods fot each markings.

I checked and up to 1942 markings were similar to those in air force, then there where white stars with ring. At spring '44 rules were unified and as mark plain white star should have been used. In practice there were exeption of course. These information are from book about markings on Pacific Theater but I think that they are suitable for Europe too.

They changed over from white to black stars in the mid to late 70's now they don't use them at all (the rest of the story)

New stuff still comes with a small 3" black star. Stuff repainted at installation or unit level doesn't get the star added unless the crew does it.

good am,
check these out-www.olive-drab.com- www.home.planet.nl~whitestar/white.htm -has condenced the info found in "american camouflage and markings 1939-1945"by Terrence Wise-Almark Pub. 1973
good stuff and cheers
c6o

The "star-in-a-ring" was also applied as an allied air identification mark to British (& Polish & French etc) vehicles in NWE, whereas the simple star tended to be an American marking on the side of the vehicle (having said that I've seen lots of British vehicles with side stars as well). The broken ring is due to the stencil, I think there wasn't actually a star shape, there was just a segment, you painted the first part then moved it round, lined it up & painted the next & so on.
Some American vehicles for "Torch" had US flags painted on the side, presumably these weren't considered visible enough.