A recreation of the Chilean Air Force's F-16C/D Block 50 early blue camouflage for the F-16C Viper.
Back in '97 and in the midst of an economic crisis, the Chilean government initiated the Fighter 2000 program, a very expensive fighter program in search of a 4th generation jet that could replace the aging 3rd generation fleets (mostly Mirage M5Ms and Mirage M50 Panteras). Several options were presented to the Chilean authorities, including the heavy and expensive F/A-18, the Mirage 2000, the new (at the time) JAS-39, and somehow Sukhoi with their Su-37, being advertised to several other South American counries as well during the 90's. Despite the Gripen beating every other contender in technical and financial aspects, it lacked one critical thing: a proven combat history (and the hundreds of millions of dollars of funding by the United States' DoD and Lockheed Martin, of course). The F-16 was chosen as the winner of this program, and on December 27th, 2000, Chile bought 10 Block 50 Vipers from Lockheed Martin, and the first C-model was rolled out on April 14th, 2005, wearing the same colors this DCS livery uses. This made Chile the second user of F-16s in Latin America, Venezuela being first with their fleet of F-16A/Bs bought way back in the 80's. Of course, for a country that long, just 10 jets wasn't enough, so the Chilean MoD bought 36 second-hand MLU Vipers between 2005 and 2010 from the Dutch Government. By 2007, all Block 50's were delivered and integrated into the 3rd Aviation Group based at Los Condores air base, in the Atacama desert, bordering Peru and Bolivia.
11 years after the first Vipers arrived, a major overhaul of the entire fleet was initiated, and most Block 50's recieved standard grey colors, losing their original blue camouflage and blending in with the MLU Viper fleet in an effort to standarize the fleet.
At a first glance, the blue camouflage was extremely similar to the one being used by Mirage Panteras when these retired: a two tone blue camouflage with a white-ish underside, omiting the blue rudder that most Chilean military aircraft have. However, this specific Block 50 camouflage used a variant of the Have Glass coating, similar to that used by Greek Block 52 Vipers. This coating creates some unice weathering effects that are visible on the few Block 50's that haven't been repainted yet.
This livery was made with Texac's absolutely incredible Viper template and Helles Belle's pylon template. It probably wouldn't have been able to be created without these two, so thank you to both. I also included standard FACH Viper driver patches on the pilot. Great effort and time was put into creating a clean Viper that incorporates many small details from the real camouflage while giving it small refinements for the sake of a cleaner livery. Also, no bort numbers were added to the Viper, since my goal is to make a standard Chilean Viper and not to replicate an exact airframe. Also, this livery was made just in time for September 18th or "Fiestas Patrias", a special holiday for us.
Any questions or suggestions? DM me on Discord: sgmoncayo
