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PostPosted: Mon Oct 05, 2009 4:05 pm 
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LOL once again a color question! I would assume silver because of the rule of tincture, but I really have no idea.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_tincture


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 3:11 am 
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Ciao all,

@ Rob,

that particular question about the silver vs white made me curious since I saw the 2 colour options years ago on different book sources.

I think the response is on the Scharnhorst official Gedenkstein that is a cemetery stone to remember the crew, a monument placed on a cemetery by the Scharnhorst survivors. On the Gedenkstein stone top left corner there is a Scharnhorst family Coat of Arm and the band inside is WHITE, and not silver.

I have found than a confirmation on a Scharnhorst documentary were survivors were speacking for a TV documentary from a Kameradschaft reunion in Germany, into an hotel conference room. On the wall behind the survivor talking there was a Scharnhorst official Kameradschaft Coat of Arm and again it was WHITE on the band, not silver.

On an older General Scharnhorst family Coat of Arm print of the 19th, century I have found it was again clearly WHITE.

So I think we can assume that the diagonal band inside the Scharnhorst Coat of Arm ( Wappen in German language ) is WHITE.

Back on the camouflage now were the colours are surely : ' mainly dark grey tones ' according to Egil Lindberg that I take as an official Norwegian underground reliable source.

Bye Antonio :thumbs_up_1:


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PostPosted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 7:19 am 
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On the Scharnhorst of the postwar Federal German Navy, it was silver - or at least it appears darker then the ship's hull number:

http://jreichert.leute.server.de/CrewIV59/Scharn1/g0158.jpg

Happy painting ~ Olaf!


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 2:10 pm 
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Hi guys,

Time for me post here on why I suggested the blues and grays for Scharnhorst final camouflage pattern. I was going by the colors in the patterns in the German Navy Camouflage book, Anstriche und Tarnanstriche der Deutschen Kriegsmarine. The pattern Bild 8 on page 33 is my basis for choosing the blue/gray colors. I believe these are the colors used in that area and time frame.

I have not had the chance to do the level of research on Scharnhorst that A. Bonomi has, but I would say that any Navy veteran's that have stated colors, almost never get the paint colors correct from their memory. That is why I do not take what they say as always correct, because my experience has almost always shown that source of information to be very flawed.

Could the all gray colors by Antonio be correct? Absolutely! Just as much as my blue/gray colors could. We just do not really know. These are all educated guesses.

Steve Wiper


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 4:09 pm 
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Ciao all,

nice to talk to you again Steve.

I got now from were you had those colours on page 33 of that book were there are generic colour schemes.
On same book at page 80 you have the book authors opinion about that camo scheme, with their opinion on red-brown and olive drab colours.

I respect your opinion of course but you do not have to think you are going to compare it with my personal opinion, since I was still unable to decide among the 3 options mentioned above when I found what I think is the final answer about the dilemma.

The Grey tones call is not based on German veterans recent memories or my personal preference based on my generic assumptions.

It is based on a December 1943 radio message from Norway agents controlling Scharnhorst while into LangFjord in Norway to London RN Intelligence service that requested exactly that precise question, so was a precise response sent from Norway to London few weeks before Scharnhorst was sunk on 1943.

When you will have the time as you wrote to perform my same level of analysis and research than you will realize that Egil Lindberg was a Norwegian underground agent and was in contact with London Intelligence on late 1943.
Jonas Kummeneje made the camo drawing of the scheme that was sent to London, Egil Lindberg sent after the radio message with the colour specifications as requested specifically by the British soon after having received the camo drawing scheme, stating that Scharnhorst was still painted " mainly on dark grey tones " like few months before when she was in KaaFjord anchored at Auskarneset on August 43.

So we have an historical evidence mentioned not by me, but by Alf R. Jacobsen book on Scharnhorst, and Mister Jacobsen is an excellent history journalist I trust completely, as the level of his books is really great as far as detailed researches on Norwegian, British and German archives.
Not to forget that was Mr. Alf R. Jacobsen as you may know to lead the researches on Scharnhorst wreck and finally find it. So he knows what he is talking about.

I personally decided among the 3 colour options and establish it was grey after having read his very good book and found that very precise info he found on British archives.

Bye Antonio :thumbs_up_1:


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PostPosted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 12:54 am 
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Antonio Bonomi wrote:
I got now from were you had those colours on page 33 of that book were there are generic colour schemes.
On same book at page 80 you have the book authors opinion about that camo scheme, with their opinion on red-brown and olive drab colours.

Don't forget to mention what I told you a couple of years ago. The English text in this very caption is completely different than the German one. An English version a but closer to the German text could be:

Fig. 19: After transferring the battleship Scharnhorst to Norway in 1943, the ship received the multi-coloured camouflage to blend into the background during her longer stays in the Norwegian Fjords, caused by the lack of fuel.
A coastal camouflage in red-brown, green and yellow was also given to her sistership Gneisenau after her guns and the destroyed foreship had been removed at Gotenhafen in 1944.


I don't know why the translator invented the stone grey, olive drab and brown red for Scharnhorst (if it was a translator at all ...). With regard to the English captions, this is not the only inconsistency in this book ...

@ Steve ~ Thanks for your opinion. The German explanation on p.22 for 'Bild 8'/p.33 states what this pattern could have been used for - hiding speed and heading of the target vessel - and explaines that the choice of colours plays only a minor role in this case. However, I still believe that you don't need blue tones in front of a winterly mountain background and that there would be really no need to conceal speed and heading when lying at anchor.

Of course, this doesn't mean anything in case when Randy hopefully turns up and presents the document - or whatever it is - that clearly says Scharnhorst was painted blue ...

Happy painting ~ Olaf!


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 3:07 pm 
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Antonio, I have had this question bothering me for a while, but how feasible are the information of those agents?

I'm asking you in plain ignorance of who they were and what knowledge they might had concerning distinguishing one colour from the other, how close they got to the ship, what were the weather conditions, and were these informations merely visual or did they have access to "painting instructions"?

What do we have that tells us that the agents' interpretation is accurate?

Marco


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 9:58 am 
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Ciao Marco and all,

I perfectly understand your point, it does not surprise me.

But it is only when you study very deeply the role of those Norwegian underground agents and what they did that you understand the importance and the accuracy of their information and how much the British rely on them.

They were really risking their lives for that, as they were tortured and killed if caught by the Germans. Kalle Rasmussen when was caught, in order to avoid being tortured and running a risk to release his friend names, jumped from a window on 3rd floor in Gestapo office in Tromso and killed himself, he was just married and his wife was pregnant at the 6th month, he saved Torsten Raaby and Harry Pettersen doing this, otherwise they were going to be caught and killed.

I have met and interviewed personally Harry Pettersen on 2004 before he passed away, so I had the opportunity to verify my theories based on Leonce Peillard Tirpitz book with a real eyewitness and I was surprised because they were doing much more than I have thought they did initially.

http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ida_og_Lyra

On this Alf. R. Jacobsen books are very precious history references bringing to us the 3rd component of the war scenario, we had the British view of the events, the German one lately surfacing, .. and we were totally missing the Norwegian one, .... Alf R. Jacobsen filled the empty space with his books very accurately of course.

Jonas Kummeneje in order to get the Scharnhorst complete camo scheme went very close to the Scharnhorst anchorage in Sopnes bay into LangFjord as he was living there, that is why he got selected to do this, and while he was fishing and talking with the German sailors, he draw accurately the camo scheme that was than sent via Sweden to England.
But it was a black and white sketch, so the British asked the colours after, and the answer was : " mainly dark grey tones/patterns " and this was sent via radio by Egil Lindberg soon after. Alf R. Jacobsen found the transcription of the December 1943 received radio message in London while he was writing his book on Scharnhorst.

http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopi ... &sk=t&sd=a

So based on the above I think this can be taken as a real historical documented evidence and I have the highest confidence level on it being exact.

He went close, very close to Scharnhorst due to the fishing trick, and he saw the ship very well, only visually of course.

Now if you want to add to this 3 Tirpitz survivors eyewitnessess accounts, they confirmed it to me after 61 years on 2004, so it is not the best confirmation you like to have, as it is only old memory, but adds up to the above.
In fact not knowing at all about the Norwegian radio message existence and only looking at my model when we opened Tirpitz Museum in Alta, were my Scharnhorst model is exposed now, they all confirmed to me that Scharnhorst camo was like that, not blue nor red/green. Remember that from Tirpitz thay saw Scharnhorst for 6 months with that camo on from July till December 1943.

So, up to you now to make up your opinion about this,....

Bye Antonio :thumbs_up_1:


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 10:09 am 
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BTW, what happened to your examinations of the blues and greens? I remember that you played around with a very dark blue (RAL 5004?) ...

Anything new to report?

Best ~ Olaf!


Last edited by Olaf Held on Mon Nov 02, 2009 2:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 11:03 am 
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Ciao Antonio,

Thank you for the enlightment. You make very good points and realizing how several witnesses agreed upon the colours used, I consider myself satisfied.

I still remember it was made known that RLM82 and RLM83 might have been switched for the past 50 years. I really admire how new informations come to light and the process by which they are obtained is always a story in itself, so thank you indeed.

Marco


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PostPosted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 2:17 pm 
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Ciao all,

@ Marco,

thanks, I am happy you are ok and satisfied now.

@ Olaf,

my friend, with time and patience everything will be done on the right time and on the right way.

I already run one time with my Tirpitz infos and it was a failure from my side, so be sure I will not run anymore.

Those infos are there since 65 years, people can wait some more time when things will be done correctly, no problems.

Bye Antonio :thumbs_up_1:


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PostPosted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:26 am 
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Ciao all,

just an update on Scharnhorst coat of arm colours, about the white or silver stripe inside the Scharnhorst shield on light blue.

I have spoken with an Araldic expert, and he told me that on Araldic the White and Silver are the same on the shields.

He showed me an example of Savoy shield were the same situation is well visible, it was a silver cross in origin, now everybody uses white.

Bye Antonio :thumbs_up_1:


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PostPosted: Fri Nov 06, 2009 2:33 am 
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Antonio, thanks for the update. If everybody NOW uses the white, then we can assume that on the KM-Scharnhorst and the later Bundesmarine-Scharnhorst they used grey or silver?

To pick up the initial topic of this thread, is Randy still around to answer the question what kind of document it was stating that Scharnhorst was painted in blue tones? If not, and with the facts provided by Antonio, I think the blue then can be dismissed ...

Happy painting ~ Olaf!


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PostPosted: Fri Nov 06, 2009 12:00 pm 
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He knows about this thread but has been busy with other things.. it is low on his priority list.

He is working on a new paint chip set, for one.

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PostPosted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 5:19 am 
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I have been working very hard on current projects and decided to spend a little time trying to get my mind off them for the weekend. I spent a little time going back to Scharnhorst to correct what I realize now was probably an erroneous, but interesting, color scheme. The only color that I will cop to looking truly horrendous is the red on the lower hull, if it is toned down, the blues don't look that bad. But I decided to go back and do the scheme in German colors. I have fixed the forward superstructure so far.

A larger version of this image can be found here.
Image


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PostPosted: Wed Sep 08, 2010 6:38 am 
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rtwpsom2 wrote:
I have been working very hard on current projects and decided to spend a little time trying to get my mind off them for the weekend. I spent a little time going back to Scharnhorst to correct what I realize now was probably an erroneous, but interesting, color scheme. The only color that I will cop to looking truly horrendous is the red on the lower hull, if it is toned down, the blues don't look that bad. But I decided to go back and do the scheme in German colors. I have fixed the forward superstructure so far.


Hi Rob ~ The colours look fine, just remember, when you 'apply' the RAL 7016 to the steel decks, it should be a bit darker than the 7024. Btw, the roof(s) of the bridge could have been in 7024 as well - but I can't proof it.

The rest looks very good, I like the subtle blue hint in your 7024 and 7000 (at least on my screen). I'm not quite sure about the main turrets, if they were white or 7001. For me, almost impossible to tell from the few photos. I wish I had more of them and in better quality.

I'm still not convinced that the large bow piece was in 7016. I always thought it was black. In some photos it looks remarkebly darker than (what we think is) 7024.

The antifouling paint (8013) ~ our holy grale. As mentioned somewhere earlier, I bought a sample from the German RAL Institute - of a colour which they said to me is the closest to RAL 8013 as you can get. It is in their RAL DESIGN product range and the ordering number is 040 30 30. If I remember correctly, this number represent the CieLab values of this particular colour. I ran this through a converter and ended up with RGB 140-65-43. The result (on my computer screen) looks good, but not as dark as the sample they sent to me. To my eyes, WEM's colourcoat comes close to it, although it looks somewhat 'dirtier' (like the discontinued Revell #383). We shouldn't forget that the "8" in 8013 marks this colour as being in the brown range of the RAL system. However, colour photos from WWII and e.g. Bismarck wreck photos are more in the range of my 140-65-43 (which is of course not a definite word, just a rough indication...). Very difficult ...

Happy painting ~ Olaf!


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 11, 2010 2:02 am 
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I updated the rest of the ship and put some new renders up in the gallery at tankwerkz. You can see them here: http://www.tankwerkz.com/schgal.html. Check them out, and enjoy.


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 11, 2010 10:40 am 
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DAMN I love that perspective shot. It really puts you on the ship.

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 11, 2010 3:58 pm 
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Hi Rob ~ Congratulations, now THIS is a Scharnhorst! As requested via e-mail, my 0.02 ...

I assume the red banner around the swasticas may have been RAL 3010 - this is today's 3020. It is lighter in appearance. I assume you understand the principle of "scale-effect". On a model, not all colours need top be enlightened. A few need to be darkened. E.g. red, when viewed from a greater distance, can appear darker than it is. What I'm trying to say is, that your darker RAL 3011 (Feuerschiffsfarbe Rot) may have been too dark to be spotted from an airplane at greater distance. Btw, didn't the red banner span the whole width of the deck? (I really should broaden my SH knowledge...).

Then, your RAL 7016 anti-glare coating on top of the bridge and rangefinder hoods. As mentioned earlier, I think it was RAL 7024. The 7016 was in use on the dark grey steel decks (and the boot topping) - if they painted the roofs on SH for this camouflage pattern in dark grey at all, I don't have proof of this. If they did, then they did so on all roofs (maybe except for the hangar).

Your 8013 looks fabulous! Not too brown, not too red.

Then, when looking at the top view, I highly (highly!) doubt the circular 'patches' beneath the 105mm being wood-planked. There was just 7016-painted steel deck with possibly rubber stips, maybe linoleum strips, maybe welded strips, but no wood anywhere. If you have definite proof that there was unpainted wood, please send a photo my way. Interestingly, you have the steel deck in two different shades of grey.

The funnel platform would have been 7016, too.
The boats - as far as I know - where not incorporated into the camouflage livery. They may have stayed in their original livery of 7016 (or black) lower hull (except for the small cutters), 7001 upper hull plus wooden (mahogany-coloured) cabin, deck, cockpit. (like the two boats directly at the funnel, but with wooden decks). But again, I may be wrong on this.

The wooden crated panels on the open bridge and the wooden slatted panels in the foretop gallery: Great colour, just a bit darker as the teak decks, just what I imagine when looking at b/w photos. Why are there only a few of the crated panels on the open bridge?

Life rafts ~ This is where I'm not sure. I have to look it up, but I think it was RAL 7012. I don't remember if this was in the 1941 or in the 1944 paint regulation. Another choice could have been RAL 1003 (yellow) as seen on (1941) colour photos of KM ships. Life rings where red, RAL 3010 (although I've seen red life rafts as well ...).

Phew, not much more comes to mind, should I look deeper? :heh:

Again, nice job, I wish I could virtually walk along the decks, climb up the ladders, etc. etc ...

Happy drawing ~ Olaf!


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PostPosted: Sun Oct 24, 2010 8:01 am 
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Are there any equivalents to the RAL numbers Olaf has listed in available enamel paints, particularly WEM? Also, what were the colors of the two tone pattern Scharnhorst wore just prior to this final scheme?

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