The Ship Model Forum

In WWI did Germans paint out the pennant numbers as in WWII, or should I apply decals as per instructions? And did they camo paint torpedoboots or were just in overall dark gray?

Can't comment on the numbers.

However, according to the regulations, torpedoboats were to be painted black all over from 14.12.1898 on until 04.12.1916, when they were to be painted dark grey all over. In practice, camouflage may have been applied at the front, but one would need to find an image of a specific boat at a specific time to ascertain this.

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Eberhard

Former chairman Arbeitskreis historischer Schiffbau e.V. (German Association for Shipbuilding History)

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Thanks. After some Google imaging it would appear that they had no pennant numbers during WWI.

Are you building that kit? I want to pick it up at some point.

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We like our history sanitized and theme-parked and self-congratulatory, not bloody and angry and unflattering. - Jonathan Yardley

It's a fair kit, but some detail is a bit chunky. North Star has a PE set for it which helps a lot! I also replaced the main guns with similar resin ones (not identical replacements, but reasonable fascemilies) from Komplect Zip.

On most photos made during the war no numbers are visible.

There is also a lot of strong evidence that torpedoboats were painted already grey in 1915. The same grey as for the hulls for the bigger ships was used - but in case of the torpedoboats both on the hull and the superstructure. This grey was called dark grey - but was actually a light grey. The decks were probably black.

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It seems the torpedo boats were repainted in a light grey by mid-war, and your boat. At Jutland, there are accounts of the German boats being much hard to spot than than the darker British destroyers, and there are a fair number of late war pictures showing light color boat. However, those were fleet boats, and the A-class boats were much smaller and operated with the Flanders flotillas in the Channel so it doesn't necessarily follow that they would be the same color, even in the same time period. I was curious about you question, and I found an interesting picture of the A-class boat A68 right on Wikipedia of all places. A68 would have been from the preceding class as A86 but was very similar as you can see. They were both war-built boats, A86 in 1917, I believe, A68 would not have been much earlier. As you can see A68 is in a very dark color (black?), much darker than the fleet boats, and the hull numbers are clearly visible. The deck looks like it is the same color. So, there is some evidence of a similar ship from a very similar period, with the dark paint and hull numbers. Gives you some options at least.

This is interesting: I just found another pic of A59, of the same class as A68, and another boat that was also given to Poland after the war and it, too, is in the dark grey (black?) paint with the hull numbers prominent. Here's the link: http://www.weu1918-1939.pl/orp-slazak/ Maybe that's the way to go for these A-class boats?

(By they way, I have forgotten to sign in originally so this may show up duplicated as a guest post)

That is interesting that the A-type boats appear to have been painted like the pre-war boats.

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Moved to the camo section for safekeeping.

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De quoi s'agit-il?

In Fock's Z-Vor there is a photo of A 61 painted dark grey, white number at the bow - and a black panel midships.

There is also a photo of an earlier Type A I - painted light grey.

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I'm trying to draw a conclusion about this.....

For a boat for Jutland, say a G-37 for example ( ), should it be light gray, or dark grey, or is it uncertain enough that one could just pick one?

For Jutland: very likely a light grey over all, the same the colour as the one of the hulls of the larger ships, i.e. the colour named "dark grey", which is not really dark at all. Plus a red rear funnel.

There was to my knowledge never a official dark grey in use. The pre-war and early war colour for the torpedoboats was black. That was changed to a light grey starting in 1915.

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Thanks, Maxim. Is there documentation for this you can point to? I remember someone saying there was an order to make that change at the end of '16. I imagine that many orders like that are issued just to catch up with actual practice. But it would be nice to be able to point to some general evidence external evidence.

Thanks!

The official rules are given in Die deutsche Kriegsschiffe by Gröner. These refer to the 4th of December 1916 for the change. If photos are checked, for most classes of destroyers (Große Torpedoboote) completed in 1915/16 or later there can be no photos of black painted ships be found. That means the change must have happening much earlier than at the end of 1916.

I have searched for photos for the G 37, B 97, and G 101 class. For none of them I found a photo showing a black painted ship.

Apparently there are differences for the smaller torpedo boats (A classes).

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Thanks again.

I picked up a new (to me) book: Jeffrey Judge _The Imperial German Navy of World War One_. Looking through the torpedo boat pictures there are a couple of pictures of late series boats that look pretty dark, but not sure they are black. I was a little disappointed not to find anything more definitive. BUT, there is a picture in the section on Lutzow that is labelled "V45 after taking survivors off Lutzow." I'd like to know if that's really what is photographed. It's believable in that it looks like there are a lot of guys crowded onto her. In that picture it's pretty clear she's not painted black.

There are several photos that seem to show the ships with light sides and dark decks.

So, I think I'll be painting mine light gray with dark gray decks.