most visible color/paint scheme?

[Zeldman]

I'd also recommend wig-wag lights because our eyes are attracted to motion.

I second the wig-wags.

 

[Daleandee]

I have wig-wags, tail tip and belly strobe, painted the wingtips, checkered the tail with orange, installed ADS-B, and I try to keep my eyes outside. There are a few things that I don't want to experience, an in-flight fire or a mid air collision are pretty close to the top of the list ...

 

[Tusayan]

Well, I've had two different people nearly hit me while I was flying a bright yellow piper cub - the second time being another piper cub! So I'll have to downvote that.

Oddly enough, I had trouble yesterday spotting a non-ADS-B yellow Cub that was passing to my right on a reciprocal heading slightly below. I was surprised that the color was hard to see, against a background of brownish yellow dead grass.

 

[Pinecone]

all that makes good sense...
so I'm now wondering why specifically the USN has stuck with this particular color scheme? they've been using it a long time...
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Also curious why the USAF doesn't seem to care?
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Remember, the USAF decided that since those students flying the T-38 were destined to be fighter pilots, the planes should look like fighters.

 

[Pinecone]

BMW did a research project to determine this for ground vehicles, cars, ambulances, fire trucks.

IIRC, they found there was no one right answer for all conditions of lighting and visibility.

So you needed to paint each fender, door, hood, trunk, roof a different color. Some colors that were best in some conditions included light blue, yellow, red, white and others.

 

[brien23]

Got to love people that paint their aircraft in camouflage and then complain someone did not see them.

 

[Southpaw]

I like my color scheme. I bought it that way.

 

[Brad W]

Lot of factors here...visibility air-to-air, visibility after crash landing in fields, forests, deserts, snow, etc.....

Big thing, air-to-air wise, is to make the "object" quickly identifiable as an airplane, and thus help other traffic spot you. Here's something I put together a while back. Three basic color schemes of the same airplane, close in, and at a moderate distance with land and sky backgrounds.

Notice how the multicolor Eagle looks visible close-in, but the different colors get muddy at a distance and the plane gets harder to spot. Even the version with just the single wide stripe on the wing suffers at a distance. It breaks up the outline and essentially makes the plane smaller.

Remember that most of the airplanes you see are mostly white. Thus, a white airplane will probably be more quickly recognized than even a red one....which, at any sort of distance, will basically start blending into the background.

that's a great illustration!