Can anyone give me the proportions of the stars on American WWII aircraft. I need to make some masks. Thanks.

Verlinden makes a metal star stencil aimed for armor kits, but they come with various sizes so their use on aircraft would be easy.

You can also print out markings in the right scale, put the print over masking film and cut through it...

Toni

I don't know that there was a uniform direct proportion. Certainly early war Navy star roundels were proportionaltely larger than later war stars and bars. Best bet for proportions on any given a/c is to get out the old measuring tool check the reference picture and scale your stars accordingly. This is the only place my high school algebra come in handy.

I can't give you the dimensions. I do know that there were typically two sizes on each AC. The wing one was typically larger than the one on the side of the plane.

If you don't get a direct response you might try using a reference photo and using a known measurement back into and calculate the length of each side of the star point. Ie With a photo of your subject measure the length of the canopy rail in the photo, then compare that to the star, then translate that to the model scale. or you can print out a copy of the star in the photo and use a copier machine to reduce or enlarge till you get it to the correct scale.

There's a TM about US camo painting for vehicles, I think TB43-0209. I believe the first pages treat the isue of painting the star: how big, what color, what place, in which circumstances, etc. I think I saw reference where this TM can be found online via this site, but I can't find it back. I'm sure Rob (and other US military) can help.

I looked around, and here it is :
https://www.logsa.army.mil/etms/data/A/015165.pdf
Check page 3 and further on the "national symbol".
Jan

:-) Thanks everybody, some great ideas