Correct Late War RLM Model Paint

[fubar57]

It may already have been posted here but all I've found are discussions of the colours themselves. Is there any paint producer out there that makes the correct colours in either acrylic or enamel? I've got 2 different brands and it turned out both were wrong. I should have mentioned that I used Tamiya green that wasn't specifically an RLM colour but it was close enough

 

[Crimea_River]

Model Master makes RLM enamels which I've found to be pretty good.

 

[fubar57]

Thanks Andy. I'm trying to stay away from enamels but choices have to be made

 

[Crimea_River]

I've been mixing my colours with Tamiya paints, first by stealing Wayne's formulas and then adding some of my own after researching from other sites. If you end up going that route, let me know. Happy to post my mixes.

 

[mikewint]

Geo, as you know from my Maus and Huckelbein thread I've been down that road. The term CORRECT LATE WAR is essentially meaningless as the Germans had a LOT more to worry about than matching colors and diminishing supplies made it increasingly more impossible. I'll repost a bit here:

Sammelmitteilung 1 had stated that "Delivery of colour charts for RLM shades 81 and 82 is currently not possible. For this reason there is no acceptance inspection of the paint's shade." There were to be no official descriptions of RLM 81/82 and manufacturers were obliged to describe these colors themselves. Dornier referred to both RLM 81 and 82 as Dunkelgrün; Blohm & Voss described RLM 81 as Olivbraun and RLM 82 as Hellgrün, and later Messerschmitt, as Braunviolett and Hellgrün, respectively. Rather than simply replacing RLM 70/71, it is possible, too, that these colors were reissues of the nearly identical RLM 61/62 that had appeared in the Farbtontafel of 1936 (the first to be issued by the RLM) but withdrawn from service by the beginning of the war. Indeed, official color descriptions were thought to be of secondary importance and only twenty-eight colors had official names, none after RLM 73. Color samples not available at the time a Farbtontafel was printed (or issued after November 1941), such as the desert colors RLM 78 and 79, were represented by paint chips stuck on a blank page.
It should be appreciated that RLM colors did not necessarily match even those applied by the manufacturer or subcontractor at the factory. Paint formulations could vary from one batch to another and colors thinned or combined, especially toward the end of the war and in the field, when supplies became more scarce and conditions for proper application, more difficult. It was not enough that pigments be thoroughly mixed but that nozzle settings and air pressure, viscosity and proper spraying distance, ambient temperature and humidity, surface preparation and drying times all accord to regulation.

That being said I like Model Master ACRYL line of RLM colors and both Vallejo and Life Color make excellent colors. Vallejo's AIR line of paints airbrush perfectly but are not made for brushing for that try their MODEL line. Life Color tends to come in KIT form, e.g., they make a 6-paint set for DUNKELGELB

 

[rochie]

George.

I am thinking of getting some of these Hataka paint sets, they do a late LW set.
Cannot vouch for the colour matches but reviews seem good.

PAINT SETS | Hataka

Late Luftwaffe paint set | Hataka

 

[mikewint]

Karl, thanks, they look like very comprehensive sets. If.when you try them please post. The next GB is Vietnam so I'm looking at that set.

 

[rochie]

Karl, thanks, they look like very comprehensive sets. If.when you try them please post. The next GB is Vietnam so I'm looking at that set.

Will do Mike.

The Vietnam set is the reason i am looking at them, gotta get me a SEAC coloured Phantom, Thud and Hun

 

[fubar57]

Thanks for that Karl. So far I've found one distributor in Canada and they wanted $25ish for the late war set. HOWEVER....that is in U.S. funds(?) and they want an additional $21 for shipping. I'll look on eBay at a later date

 

[mikewint]

Let's see first off, on Ebay for $18.50 plus $4.95 shipping:

 

[mikewint]

Second, I've done 5 Vietnam scooters so far: the 105, 104, F-4, A-1J, and Spooky

 

[rochie]

Oh i forgot about a Skyraider, i also already have a scooter that is to be done in Kiwi markings courtesy of Even, they were delivered to New Zealand in SEAC colours.

Those look great Mike, love the 104

 

[Crimea_River]

A great D-9 artifact posted over at TOCH that I kept in my files. Though wet, it shows the Hellgrün quite nicely.

 

[mikewint]

Andy, very chool!! My Model Master Dunkelgrun looks more olive but then we have all the color rendering problems discussed before BUT it is Day-fin-ite-ley NOT Blue.
Karl, I've never done a Hun but I am thinking about the upcoming build. The F-100s were all ground attack and I think it killed those guys to have to paint those sleek metallic birds the color of a Vietnamese swamp.
The 104s were SHARP looking aircraft. They used to say that the MiGs would scatter for cover when a 104 arrived though they never did make a kill
F-104s DaNang 1966

 

[JKim]

Watch out for the Hataka paints. Maybe user error I don't know but I've had bad results with two sets of Hataka paints bought at different times. One was the RAF set and the other was the US Navy set. Just couldn't get it to spray worth a crap using a bunch of different thinners INCLUDING Hataka's own thinner. The paint had a tendency to either pool like water or tip-dry and spit.

Finding a one shop stop solution for late Luftwaffe colors is almost impossible because the colors themselves varied as aircraft production was farmed out to different factories There was not enough control to ensure that each factory was using the same colors. Mike's description of RLM81 is a perfect example. Is it a brown, is it a green, is it an olive? Yes, yes and yes? I actually like this ambiguity and allows the modeler a little bit of creative flexibility in their builds. I never use the same shade of 81/82/83/76 in my builds.

 

[mikewint]

Jkim, thanks for the input on Hataka paints. I tend to stick with Model Master and lately Vallejo Air which, for me anyway, sprayed perfectly right out of the bottle. Their "dropper" bottle is also perfect for filling airbrush cups, but their Model paints are a PIA to brush as the bottles are tall and narrow necked. I was putting a drop on the model then spreading it around with the brush.
I like Tamiya paint for just about everything BUT their lack of direct RLM colors limits, for me again, their use on German models. Yea I know, there are lots of mixing formulas out their but why fiddle around when I can buy pre-mixed colors directly from Model and Vallejo

 

[stona]

Finding a one shop stop solution for late Luftwaffe colors is almost impossible because the colors themselves varied as aircraft production was farmed out to different factories There was not enough control to ensure that each factory was using the same colors. Mike's description of RLM81 is a perfect example. Is it a brown, is it a green, is it an olive? Yes, yes and yes? I actually like this ambiguity and allows the modeler a little bit of creative flexibility in their builds. I never use the same shade of 81/82/83/76 in my builds.

I essentially agree with this, but it should be remembered that all the manufacturers were producing the paints to the formulae which originated at Warnecke and Boehm. Most colours remained very consistent, despite changes in formulation, RLM 66 being an example.

RLM 81 is something of an enigma at the moment, it maybe that there were indeed two distinctly different versions, a brown olive and a green olive version. The evidence is mounting that RLM 83 was a blue colour and NOT the olive green colour previously assumed.

I generally use the Sovereign Hobbies (ex White Ensign) enamels for my RLM colours. I almost invariably alter them in some way, but they serve as a good starting point. I've also used the new(ish) Humbrol versions of RLM 70 and 71 and thought they were pretty good too.

Cheers

Steve

 

[fubar57]

Interesting Steve as the Vallejo Model Air RLM 81 I was going to use on my Do 335 but decided against it is definitely of a brownish ilk.

 

[mikewint]

Sammelmitteilung 1 had stated that "Delivery of color charts for RLM shades 81 and 82 is currently not possible. For this reason there is no acceptance inspection of the paint's shade." There were to be no official descriptions of RLM 81/82 and manufacturers were obliged to describe these colors themselves. Dornier referred to both RLM 81 and 82 as Dunkelgrün; Blohm & Voss described RLM 81 as Olivbraun and RLM 82 as Hellgrün, and later Messerschmitt, as Braunviolett and Hellgrün, respectively.
Model Master RLM 81 goes along with the Braunviolett. This is their color post.

 

[mikewint]

The RLM 83 designation and colour name relationship is currently considered interpretive. What is known is that there was a color identified as 83 and that it was a dark green shade. This information is based on official paint samples, photographs, crash reports, comparative analysis with surviving aircraft, wreckage fragments, etc. (Smith and Creek, 1994, p.247; Smith and Gallaspy, 1977, pp.134, 136-137). Interestingly, Hitchcock (1983, p.13) was the only one to states that "Colour 83 has been officially recorded only as 'green'." Unfortunately, the source document is not indicated, though the presumption, given the publications subject, is that it was related to Bf 109 G production.
More recently (1999), Eagle Editions published a color paint chip chart utilizing material acquired from the late Ken Bokelman. In the preparation of his chart, they used as a reference a color paint card with a dark green paint sourced from Warnecke and Böhn archives that was identified as 83. Ken Merrick, long a colleague of Bokelman, shared much of their respective resources too and Ken invariably drew his current comments and insights from this new information and obviously supersedes his beliefs since the publication of his original (Merrick, 1977) and later book (Merrick and Hitchcock, 1980). Michael Ullmann also provided significant input into this research (Ullmann, 2000, 2002).
Work by researchers in Eastern Europe added important information, and hard data, regarding late-war colours (Poruba and Janda, 1997; Poruba and Mol, 2000). These researchers based much of their conclusions on four paint cards found at Prague-Rusin at the end of the war. Only two of these were identified on the back of each card: 76 and Nr.82. These matched exactly with other samples of these two colors. The other two cards were not identified, but again matched the known and accepted shades of 81 and 83.
Therefore, from what is known to date, the identity of color 83 is recognized and accepted as a dark green color. This is confirmed from various secondary sources, but most particularly primary sources such as the color paint cards from Warnecke and Böhn, and those recovered from Prague-Rusin which in both cases simply identified the color as 83.

Michael Ullman and native German has stated that his familiarity with the German Language and his full access to WWII official documents uniquely qualifies him to make these assertions:

Test Order E2-45/31
(Development and verification of camouflage for the Mediterranean Sea)
Report August 1943:
Alongside RLM 73 a "darkblue" colour will be use. Flighttest in the near future.
Report September 1943:
Using the camouflage pattern "Land" and "Sea" with RLM 73 and the darkblue colour 300/III suggested for introduction.
Report November 1943:
Closed with report dated 10. November 1943. Colour RLM 83 "DARKBLUE" with RLM 72 for Sea- and RLM 70 for landaircraft suggested for introduction.
Sammelmitteilung 2, dated 15. August 1944:
…on the dark shades RLM 72, 73, 75, 81, 82, 83 …. (no colour was stated)

Ulmann also mentioned that he has only seen one document earlier mentioning RLM83 and he then believes it might have been a typing error? This has then been wrongly "adopted" as one of the colors seen on land based aircraft BUT the newly found document states RLM83 was a color intended for aircraft operating over the MTO together with RLM70 or RLM72 and was stated "DUNKEL BLAU" (Dark blue) and intended for introduction at the same time as RLM81 and RLM82.
The RLM 83 was to be applied at unit or depo levels and not from factories, question is how much this color was ever implemented as in late 43-early 44 not much flying operations was conducted over the Mediterranean.

So even if the above is true am RLM 83 DunkelBLAU makes no sense for any land based aircraft