Don Hammer wrote in message . ..
The word in most cases is tradition. Back in the days of #2 cotton,
we painted the fabric with silver dope and put white over that. It
made it last longer, so, we still paint corporate jets white - go
figure.

I don't know about the newer composite aircraft, but most fiberglass
gliders are restricted by their type certificates on how much and
where you can put other colors so you don't become Icarus in the
bright summer sun.

Don,

If you look at the aircraft of the '20s the colors varied hugely.
When the small, horizontally opposed engines were developed, allowing
for much cheaper airplanes, pioneered by Aeronca, the paint schemes
got simpler (apparently in trying to keep costs down), with one
primary color...which for some time was yellow. During the post WWII
boom Piper was putting out yellow and black airplanes, Cessna had
either bare metal or white as the base, Globe had bare metal as did
Beech, then white started to creep in to a greater and greater extent.

All the best,
Rick