"German Tank Colours in 1945" Topic

I read somewhere that in 1945 the Germans switched from dark yellow to dark green as the base colour on their armoured vehicles. This led to vehicles either being camouflaged at the factory or sent out to units to be painted there.

Can anyone confirm the details about this or the effect it had on very late camouflage schemes?

There are clearly changes in the last months of the war. Check out The Tank Museum, AKA Bovington. They've got a very late war panzer in which a disruptive pattern--single color, if I remember correctly--is painted just over the reddish primer.

I've seen mention of the dark green base, but not in the detail I'd like to be certain. Worth considering that usually such orders said "use up existing paint stocks first" and German supply chains were badly disrupted by 1945. A few surviving vehicles mostly camouflaged in dark green doesn't necessarily mean an order, and an order wouldn't necessarily produce dark green tanks.

For myself, I figure by the time I've painted up German forces in Dunkelgrau for the Blitzfkieg Era, Gelbbraun for North Africa and three-part with Dunkelgelb base for 1944, I've done enough for the Third Reich. But note that I could legitimately paint at least three other schemes--dark gray with brown disruptives, early North Africa and winter whitewash. Dark green base would mean seven options for WWII German vehicles. At some point, you have to give up and build an opposition army.

Not to muddy the waters, however, I have read that some very late war tanks were turned over with just primer. There is a book that I have but cannot find (I moved house) that shows German tank colors and explains the various camouflage patterns and gives approximate dates by looking at contemporary photographs. If I can find it I will let you know the title. It is a great book. I was surprised to learn that there was no enforcement of uniform styles for tank colors. There could be variation between companies with the same parent unit. That sounds so Un-German whenever I consider the topic.

+1 Red Jacket – I read that somewhere as well.

Here we go! From the "Flames of War" people, The Art of War: Wehrmacht Edition. Starting about October 1944, they're using the primer (RAL 8012) as the primary, and Dunkelgelb (RAL 7028) and Green (RAL 6003) as the disruptives. Then in December, the primary was supposed to be RAL 6003 with Dunkelgelb (RAL 7028) and Brown (RAL 8017) as the disruptives. That makes a total of eight cammo schemes for WW2 Germany not even counting winter whitewash or early North African "splash mud on everything."

If you're not familiar with it, the RAL is the official German description of the color. Nothing to do with Ral Partha. If you google RAL and the 4-digit number, you should get a pretty good view of the paint color.

And yes, confirmed by multiple sources and all kinds of imagery: the Germany army prescribed only base and 20% each for disruptives. They never centralized camo schemes. Usually someone did around platoon-battalion level. You rarely see vehicles in the same platoon in different paint schemes. I always thought it was amusing to hear people talk about the German lack of initiative as I walked down our vehicle parks with all the tanks identically painted.

Standing behind everything I wrote before about time lags and paint shortages. Berlin could issue orders, but it couldn't necessarily deliver paint.

Brilliant! Thanks very much people. This is just what I wanted. The ultimate aim is to paint up some E Series Panzers in ‘what if' scenarios. (The supporting infantry will be in ‘Leibermuster camo.) Should be interesting.

Logistics tend to support painting and priming at the stationary factory rather than painting at a field location which does change.

When I reported to myCavalry unit in 1977, the men had just finished painting their tracks. The divisional paint shop was out of operation for months. The difference in each vehicle was not appreciated by the command. We had priority when it re-started. The Army has a manual with the paints to use and location. I would imagine the Germans had the same.
Americans used a temporary coat of white wash as well.

As noted in numerous sources, the Germans in WW2 did not have standardised camouflage schemes. Exceptions being vehicles camouflaged in the factory, when some sort of template was obviously used.

The application of camo in particular patterns was at the discretion of unit commanders, and if you are trying to model real vehicles your only hope is to look at lots and lots of photos.

One factor is the red and brown paints came in cans, and had to be let down with gasoline, or less successfully, water, so the shade varied considerably dependent on how much gasoline was available/used in the mix.

TimePortal, you can imagine anything you want, but there was no such German manual. "We do it this way, so surely other people do it the same way" is a delusion which will lead you down any number of rabbit holes.

If you won't listen to me, amuse yourself by looking at contemporary photos of German vehicles.

Looking at the results of a Google Images search of RAL 7028 reminded me of the old story about the blind men and an elephant. Will the "real" RAL 7028 please stand up?

Ok no manual or guidelines to factories.