The Ship Model Forum

Christian,

Thanks much for your observation - they're most helpful.

I'd like to show 3 pics from the Derfflinger video on YouTube - it's essentially a photo album so print screen was easy. I can't testify for the authorship, but it strikes me as a kind of labor of love. I know from past experience that the WWI German Navy has some very dedicated students. (They claim Derfflinger was called "Iron Dog" but its crew - never heard that one.)
Below is a sobering pic of DF's bad damaged turret which, as I recall, took some very good damage control when hit to prevent even more serious damage. There's nothing on top, but it's possible that the paint was either burned off or scraped off:

The next photo shows more repairs to the superstructure and guns. It does appear that the turret has been painted on top although it's hard to see black there - perhaps old black and white photo could distort that. What is not possible to see is a circle and I doubt that would disappear.

The last photo shows DF immediately after repairs are finished. You can see the change in mast camo that Tanner mentioned. The top of the turrets are clearly very dark - but if there are circles there I don't see them. And this photo is very rare to my eyes. Most pics of German BBs that show the circles etc are taken from the air - illustrating why they were of value. This one is taken from the surface but at an angle that allows a good look at the front turrets.
(I still don't see fear of air attack coexisting with circles on the ship. Stupidity exists in war of course. Many German tanks in Poland had large white national markings which were immediately removed when they found that Polish gunners were using them as a target. The Japanese quit putting large hinomarus on ship decks after Midway, guessing correcting that US dive bombers were assisted by big red "bulls eyes" on their target.)


Many of repair photos suggest that some serious weathering would be in order for the hull. A couple of years back I did the ICM Konig and remember mulling this over. The German fleet was well exercised, but spent much time in harbor. But I'm not sure that sitting in salt water would look pristine unless there was an ample supply of paint available and the will to use it. Tanner mentions that when the Brits examined the ship on arrival in Scapa Flow that they found the paint bunkers empty. What we'd need is a lot more high quality photos of German ships at sea and sadly I doubt we're going to add greatly to the limited supply available which are pretty ambiguous.

A factoid: the Brits raised Derfflinger at Scapa Flow - but didn't finish scrapping the vessel until 1948: three photos on that matter in the video. Reminds me of the day in the early 70s when I had a close up view of the scrapping of an Essex class carrier which had been mothballed in the Sacramento Delta. A worker thought it was Essex herself. A sad sight really.

Eric

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A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Eric,

as said before, I can only recommend Gary Staffs book . There you have all the pics, but in better quality than from Youtube.

The second pic is also in the book and there you clearly see both circles on the turret.
Regarding the other two pics, I have to check if they are also in the book. Perhaps there you se the white circle.

And yes there where arial attacks in WW1. I think in book was wrote the Lützow shot down two planes.
But on the other side the flak guns where reduced on the Derfflinger. So the threat was not that big.

Greetings Christian

_________________
At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Love the rigging...well done!

Eric,

Here you can see a few more photos about the DF:

http://www.sms-navy.com/bc/sms_bc_derfflinger-derff-photos.htm

_________________
Non sibi sed patriae

It looks to me that the YouTube video got most of their photos from the site recommended by Sabor although the third photo I used is not there. I only used the YouTube video as support for the articles by Tanner and Nagel. Both articles are well sourced (Nagel's is actually piece from a book manuscript unfinished at the time of the author's death.) Both say the air ID circles were put on in October 1917. Amazingly the major sources in both - Groener and Jung - are both available on Amazon auf Deutsch for a considerable charge. There are even more recent volumes for reasonable cost on German Amazon. Translation software has come a long way and I'd think it could be integrated into Kindle. That would be very neat.

Nagel makes an interesting point: most of the history of the Imperial Navy in WWI was gathered by about 50 German professionals (lawyers, historians who had other specialties etc) who shared a great interest in the subject and readily collaborated. No small matter as Germany didn't publish an "official" history of WWI the way the British did. (Very different in WWII - the Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt, MGFA - roughly Military History Research Institute- now in Potsdam - published a splendid 13 volume on "Germany and the Second World War." Not as comprehensive as the American equivalent, but much better narrative for most readers and researcher. Glad I looked this up - the English language version is now out in paperback at only $69 per: Oxford held the hardcover price at about $350 for years - five times the cost of the German language hardcovers.)

I write military history for a living and know sources can be very tricky especially if your dealing with multiple archives. So it's very possible that a historian like Staff writing now would have advantages over those who wrote in the late 80's and 90's: I'd guess however that new information might include photos etc and perhaps more data on colors but the chance of finding a new collection of important data unavailable to those 30 years ago I'd rate as very low. And historians writing at a great distance from the events have certain advantages - although rarely admitted earlier researchers have the major advantage of rubbing shoulders with people that were part of the actual historical events. And I'd want to know if the photos were heretofore unpublished: restoring an old photo with a professional photo editing software could be a boon, but only if the researcher wanted something more clear and was not looking for something he thought should be there - you can easily and even unintentionally change the quality of a photo for the worst. It's the nature of the beast. And the third photo found above in my post is very clear and I don't see circles. But I'd state that as opinion only. If the ID circles were only on two turrets a circle on B turret could be invisible from that angle.

Anyway, I've ordered Staff's book on German Battlecruisers for Vanguard: his larger volumes are pretty costly and overkill for me on this subject. I have no problem with putting on decals - it's simply that if Tanner and Nagel's sources are right they shouldn't be there. That's a detail that can wait for some time on this build. However, I do need a good 7001 quick - think I'm going to try a chromatic black which will have a blue hue when lightened with white. That's the kind of thing that I find fun.

Thanks for your patience
Eric

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A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Thanks70skid .

@Eric

The white rings where there at Jutland. There is also a aerial pic of the Derfflinger on the way to Kiel for the repairs after the battle.

Greetings Christian

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At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Chris,

I'll accept your data. Were the ID markings on all four or B and C alone as on your Lutzow?

Thanks
Eric

_________________
A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Here is the pic Eric.
You clearly see 4 rings. The big question is, why Derfflinger had 4 and all other known only 2?
Perhaps it was the first one in 1915 where test where made?

Greetings Christian

_________________
At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Hello Christian,

Could you resend this picture with the text please?

_________________
Non sibi sed patriae

Hello Gabor,

here is the complete pic.

@ Eric,
I just saw it recently, your pic with the damaged turret roof is from the HMS Lion and not the Derfflinger.
So now it's clear why there are no rings on the top .

Greetings Christian

_________________
At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Thanks a lot. Until now I thought the recognition rings were used from 1917. But now I can see I must use them on my Derfflinger. Fortunately the turrets have not been placed yet

_________________
Non sibi sed patriae

Gabor, I don't think, the Defflinger's lower turrets are not painted with white recognition rings. Look at this photo of Derfflinger' arrival just after the skagerak battle: http://www.sms-navy.com/bc/SMS_Derfflinger-BatDam_02Jun1916.jpg

But I suppose, that the upper turrets already have recognition rings, as on turret A of SMS Seydlitz http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/OnlineLibrary/photos/images/h59000/h59637.jpg.

But I have no photocraphic evidence!

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Peter

http://miniships1250.jimdo.com/

Hello Peter,

the evidence is in the pic from me shown above.
The Derfflinger had definitly 4 rings at Jutland. The big question for me is when they where applied?

I think on my 1915 Derfflinger I will leave them away.



Greetings Christian

_________________
At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Hello Guys,

Thank you for the photos. Seeing them (taking a very close look) I must say that they both prove that the rings were there. The aerial photo is the best, but even the other one shows the ring. Please take a close look to the left side of the turret top. You will see a small half moon above the hole. It fades out and "comes back" on the right side of the top. It's hard to notice because it can easily be mistaken with some kind of spilled out material. But it is not.

_________________
Non sibi sed patriae

Peter,

On the photo you have of the A and B turrets after Jutland, Shaft claims that the paint had been "burned away" because of battle damage. If this is not so, there are no circles there - period. Can't say that I understand why the dark paint wasn't burned away too.

Here's the problem with the Shaft book. Except for some some logs and final reports etc from various ships, all of his sources are secondary. (I've seen similar in-house documents for WWII USN vessels and they are not extensive.) And he employs no footnotes so you can't cross-check his claims. That's normal for a nonacademic book. I have a terrific book on USAAF colors in WWII written by a gent named Archer and his son. They are able to cite chapter and verse, give exact dates and tell why a particular change in colors or camo is listed, but it's an exception (And highly recommended - the authors also claim that model paint companies misinterpreted USN aircraft colors and that the various multi-shade patterns are off in hue: gotta try to track that one down). Shaft's book doesn't deal with a single narrow subject and is geared more toward design and operations ship by ship, that limits micro-detail. As near as I can see Shaft says nothing about colors - although I haven't read it all. In the text he claims that in late 1915 Derfflinger was one of the warships that were fitted with a crane (Derfflinger's never removed) for a spotter plane, and that's why the circles were painted. The Nagel article I quoted earlier claims that in late 1915 the High Seas Fleet painted the tops of their turrets black for aircraft ID and the circles came after Baltic festivities in 1917. (Black turret tops wouldn't have any real purpose during a surface battle - I'd think it would have made the turrets a little hotter.) They could both be right. If you had a column of ships in operations and a spotter plane in the air it would might have been of great value to the pilot to pick out the ship that carried the crane. (In the 1942 carrier battles in the Pacific both sides had aircraft approach for landing on an enemy deck: a Japanese plane was within an inch of touching down and the US crew didn't fire on it. So even big ships look little from a few thousand feet.)

If the photo that Shaft claims is of Derfflinger going from Wilhelmshaven to Kiel is accurate, the case is made. Which means that A and B turret must have been repainted at Wilhelmshaven because our better picture clearly shows only dark on top. I will accept the evidence but can testify that ideally you'd want more than one photo and you'd certainly want reference to materials that directly contradict your information. But we're not dealing with the causes of WWI here, and there's no reason to expect a full display of historical method.

The only English translation cited by Tanner (and Shaft) is Erich Groener's German Warships 1815-1945- Vol I Surface Warships: Naval Institute 1990. (On Amazon for $16.) For detail freaks it sounds like a very good book - "just the facts" and tons of them. Reviews give a good idea of what it's like. What might be neat is a book widely available in Europe "Vom Original zum Modell: Die Großen Kreuzer Von der Tann, Moltke-Klasse, Seydlitz, Derfflinger-Klasse" (author Gerhard Koop). So would another modeler oriented book Die Anstriche und Tarnanstriche der deutschen Kriegsmarine (Dieter Jung: 1998): deals mostly with WWII but if early war ships carried WWI paints I could see the value (even a chapter on aircraft ID markings).

Just shows that anyone that claims history is a science has never tried to write it. So we must be content with what we have. I'd say it's enough for most modelers.
Eric

_________________
A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Hello Eric,

this with the spotter plane makes sense. All BCs had two rings and Derfflinger with the crane had four to help the pilot.
So I should also go for rings on my Derfflinger.

Regarding this pic:

http://www.sms-navy.com/bc/SMS_Derfflinger-BatDam_02Jun1916.jpg

In Staffs bigger book there is a greater version of this pic.
There you can see a white top of the rangefinder of the C turret.
On the pic you can't see a ring because you only see the sloping part of the turret roof.
The ring was only on the flat part of the turret, as the range finders where and thats why the had a white top on the pic.

Greetings Christian

_________________
At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Chris,

Photo interpretation can be a very tricky job - I've talked to people who used to do it for a living in both the Pacific Theater in WWII and later in Vietnam. I'm looking in Staff's book at the photo you listed. I don't see circles - you certainly should be able to see them on D turret. It would be nice to know what was done at Whilhelmshaven - were the turrets repaired there and repainted? Perhaps so. Because if they weren't it's hard figure why the circle on D turret is so easily visible in the photo showing the movement of the vessel to Kiel. Obviously some major repairs were done at Kiel because the aerial view photo - no model of clarity - shows, according to Staff, damage to the quarterdeck. I can certainly see desire to properly patch the areas on the ship that had allowed extensive flooding. But were they worried about clear aircraft IDs in the Kiel Canal?

As noted, I'll take the last photo to be enough to base my model on (although let's hope the decals are good - that kind of thing is no picnic to mask). However, I find it difficult to imagine that Staff had not seen the Tanner and Nagel articles (Tanner's page was updated in 2008). They use sources very similar to his. And they make claims exactly opposite to his. Perhaps Staff believed that online articles were trifles that didn't need answering - a dubious conclusion if made. (I found aviation written by non-academic aviation "buffs" invaluable when writing my last two books.) Had I been in Staff's place I would have made mention of two separate articles that contradict his, and give a quote from his sources that would seal his case - something like a sentence from Derfflinger's Final Report. He chose not to. Nothing in his book is directly documented - nothing - so there's no way for someone really interested to cross check his claims. (That's what citations are for.) So we are taking one undocumented claim over two undocumented claims - and it certainly sounds like Nagel was a serious student of the High Seas Fleet.

As earlier noted, I don't think it necessary to have properly done academic history to guide us in matters like this. It's not important enough. But I've got four books in print and wish I had been paid for every error I spotted in others' works, and the errors I made that almost made it past my editors (I was lucky enough to have WWII and Vietnam veterans proof my manuscripts - and each found something stupid - little, but the sort of thing that reviewers and other vets - who made up much of my audience - would have spotted and thought I didn't really know what I was doing) those errors I made that did make it through. Writing history is humbling.

Eric

_________________
A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Mr. Tanner had an email connect built into his article. A few days back I used it to write Tanner and ask about the circle dates considering the photo evidence. Here's a portion of his reply that just arrived that does close the matter:

"Eric

I'm glad you've found my site useful and wish I'd had the time to add more content I've collected over the years.

It's interesting you bring this image up. My friend Peter Lienau and I had this very discussion in the early 2000's when we found the version of the overhead photo I've attached. After looking closely at other photos of the damage Derfflinger sustained we agreed this is Derfflinger after Jutland and that Groner and Nagel were wrong about the dates when the circles started to be applied. I also have a slightly clearer version of the other photo you sent showing the damage aft (attached) and if you look closely you can see the side arcs of the circle on D turret along the right edge and behind the leftmost spotting scope.

So yes, I'd say you'd be safe putting all four circles on (note the difference in circle thickness depending on turret) and a red funnel.

I've attached some photos taken later in the war of Derff, sistership SMS Hindenburg and battleship SMS Konig-Albert with their various circle configurations. I suspect the variations are to allow the spotters to ID individual ships in the same class that may look similar otherwise.

Regarding the why of the circles. Not so much for onboard A/C launched at sea (no catapult so only way to launch/recover was to be DIW or dead slow - not a good practice in a war zone) but for the observers in the many dirigibles the HSF used for maritime patrol and the probable source of our overhead imagery.

I have an Osprey series book by Mr. Staff that shows the photo you mention of the A/C being hoisted on/off Derfflinger. I also have a set of 1917 drawings of her sistership SMS Hindenburg that show the basic idea of how the boom was rigged (attached). I am also attaching a photo taken onboard Hindenburg where you can see the king post base for the boom behind the two kneeling sailors and the eye bracket mounted on the bulkhead above them where I suspect the boom tackle would have been attached. I suspect Derfflinger had a similar arrangement in a similar location. Probably too small to model in 1:700 but there if you need it.

I hope you find some of this information helpful. And send photos of the model when you are done!!


V/r,
Tom
Tom Tanner
constellation@juno.com "


So circles it is. Personally I intend to take serious liberties with "red" - nothing like a Ferrari. We'll just say that the heat of the funnel would have turned into some kind of brownish red. I can't imagine it having been thickly applied - it would have been a time consuming job in any situation. And if the High Seas Fleet really painted their ships in unteutonic gaudy colors, I will correct the error. I'll let the famous German marine painter Claus Bergen (official naval painter to the Kaiser and was influential enough to get Scheer to stage a simulated Skagerrak to aid his paintings on the battle and late in life he gave one work to JFK and now hangs in the Kennedy Library) Below is "March to the Skagerrak" and depicts Konig entering the fray. Nagel thought the color might have been artistic license because annealed red should be a yellowish brown - but you can't trust the guy.

See, history is humbling.

Eric

_________________
A model boat is much cheaper than a real one and will not sink with you in it.

Here is the pic I mentioned, on the bigger one you see the white top of the range finder of turret C.
And I made a pic of turret C alone, there you see the circle .

And thanks for the e-mail with Mr. Tanner. In Staffs book, not Osprey, there is a pic of the crane for the plane.
If you need it to send it him, let me know.

Greetings Christian

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At work:

1/700 IJN Yahagi

Thank you Christian and Eric for your answers an Christian for sharing the photos.

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Peter

http://miniships1250.jimdo.com/