DayGlo™ Paint


On 18th February 1959, TAA announced that they would commence painting their aircraft with the fluorescent orange paint DayGlo Fire Orange™. Fluorescent pigments were developed in 1934 by brothers Robert and Joseph Switzer, who subsequently founded the DayGlo Color Corporation of Cleveland, Ohio. (The name was originally presented as Day-Glo but the hyphen was subsequently dropped with no spacing between the two words.) For a time it was expected that the FAA would mandate the application of high visibility paint to all airliners, probably in the wake of the mid-air collision between a United DC-7 and a TWA Super Constellation over the Grand Canyon on 30 June 1956. TAA may have been pre-empting a mandatory requirement but in the event the FAA directive never eventuated.

TAA's DayGlo scheme existed in two versions. The first version (used on the Viscount and F27) featured DayGlo on the fin, rudder, wing tips and prop spinners as well as the fine fuselage cheatline, some of the lettering on the fuselage and the kangaroo emblem. The second version confined DayGlo to the fin, rudder and wing tips with the addition of a white horizontal band and a revised style of lettering on the tail.

Photographic evidence suggests that the Electras carried only the second version of the scheme. Again there were variations to the wing tip markings on the Electras. One variation featured a broad DayGlo band on the tip with narrower white and blue bands inboard. Another variation used in conjunction with the DayGlo tail consisted of natural metal tips with equal width narrow bands of blue, white and red inboard.

TAA's DayGlo scheme was short-lived because it was prone to fading and it provided poor adhesion for subsequent layers of paint. Aircraft were photographed with sections of the tail markings abraded and for a time VH-TLB was missing the VH from its registration! In the absence of a mandatory requirement and given the difficulty in maintaining the DayGlo finish, TAA abandoned the scheme after approximately three years, although some aircraft retained the DayGlo scheme until their next scheduled repaint.


A detailed account of the introduction of DayGlo paint on Australian aircraft written by Trevor W. Boughton appeared in the Journal of the Aviation Historical Society of Australia in August 1960. Click the heading below to read the article in full.

 


ANTI-COLLISION COLOUR SCHEMES

by Trevor W. Boughton

 

See also:

 

RAAF C-130A DAYGLO MARKINGS

by John Bennett

 

 


Day-Glo Color Chart

 

DayGlo Color Corp Logo

 

 

SIMILAR PRODUCTS

 

   
HI-VIZ "safety-sight"
Fluorescent Colors
Nybco Glowz
DayGlo Fire Orange

(Click on the images for a larger view)

 

Issue Date Remarks
3 12DEC21
Added a link to a paper on the use of DayGlo on the RAAF C-130A Hercules thanks to John Bennett.
2 26JUN21
Added a Day-Glo colour chart and Similar Products thanks to Tim Kalina.
1 25MAY21
Original issue.



 


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