Very interesting responses about the photo's authenticity! And Rudolph and Fubar, thank you very much for posting the excellent photos and illustrations of WNr. 170075 coded B3+SH. This Me 262 B-1a (two-seater trainer) should certainly help shed light on the newly discovered Me 262 coded B3+AL (a single seater). While they are not the same machine, and are different variants, their camouflage schemes are strikingly similar. Most noticeably, both feature the dashing white lightning bolt motif. Both also served with Kg(j) 54, though in different staffels. Given the strong similarities, I wonder whether our subject machine's WNr. might have been very similar to that of WNr. 170075. I'd like to propose that B3+AL was an early production machine.
From reading various posts by David Brown and others, I've gleaned that Me 262s from 170 *** production batches were early production machines.Therefore, WN.r 170075 must have been an early production Me 262, judging from the werkenummer. If our subject, B3+AL, had a similar werkenummer, we should likewise identify it as an early production Me 262. Though Jean-Yves Lorant apparently hasn't made out the werkenummer, the article from the FalkEins blog mentions that parts of it are just barely visible in the photo. I'd love to know how much of it is actually legible!
Just a few more observations in support of my theory that our subject was an early production machine... First, this Me 262 has the pie-shaped navigation light on the bottom of the fin. While this type of navigation light was seen on some later production machines, I believe it was much more commonly fitted to early production Me 262s. Secondly, it has a scribble-type camo painted over the base camo. Though it's hard to tell from the photo, the scribbly mottle can be seen starting from the mid-fuselage section. Many of the early production Me 262 A-2a fighter bombers featured this style of camo. This is especially evident on the early machines assigned to KG 51 which frequently had streaky or squiggly applications of a darker color painted over a lighter, pre-existing splinter scheme. Interestingly, Jean-Yves Loran has apparently identified our subject as an A-2a variant.
I've included here a beautiful picture of an early production Me 262 A-2a coded 9k+ YH. This shows the scribbly camo to great effect! Though not seen here, this machine was also fitted with the pie-shaped navigation light cover. Wurger very kindly supplied us with this photo from a recent thread.
More thoughts?