There is a chart in the Europa build manual showing peak skin
temperature as a function of ambient and paint color. The same
chart can be found online at
http://kr.abshier.org/newsletters/nl32.html, where it is
attributed to an article in the September 1975 issue of Soaring
magazine. The online chart is a bit hard to read - the lines are
labeled, from bottom to top,

white
yellow and pink
light blue and aluminum
purple and blue
light green
orange and tan
red and green
brown
black

As an example, at various ambient temperatures, it shows
                          70 deg     90 deg    110 deg
white                     117        139       163
yellow and pink           125        147       169
light blue and aluminum   130        152       177
purple and blue           135        159       184
light green               142        167       192
orange and tan            149        173       199
red and green             166        191       219
brown                     178        205       231
black                     184        211       239

HTH,
David



On Saturday, August 24, 2002, 7:42:58 PM, Jim wrote:

> DuPont have a tech bulletin that shows skin temps as a function of color (no mention of gloss as a factor).  Their data show that black is something like 80 to 90 degrees hotter when sitting in the
> summer sun than white.  Pale greens, pale yellows, and very pale blues were not much different, but darker colors like Ferrari red and British Racing Green are getting up there close to black.

> The more prudent course, it would seem to me, would be to confine dark colors to the underside or trim stripes, sticking with white or a light pastel for the upper surfaces.  We sat on the ramp at
> North Las Vegas the other day with an air temp of +44C -- what do you suppose a black plane would have topped out at?

> Jim Cameron, N143ES