Need help with Uniform color

The basic colour for the uniforms is Feldgrau (or Field Grey) In Tamiya paint, you will be looking for XF-65. Most other paint manufacturers have an equivalent colour.

I believe the uniform style is more representative of early war uniforms and may not be entirely appropriate for Normandy (1944).

As stated, the Tamiya Feldgrau is about the closest I've ever seen... As for the uniforms, they're molded in the Heer M-1936/M-1940 pattern, but are easily converted to M-1943s by sanding off the pocket bellows, and the different number of buttons is almost impossible to see...  Keep in mind that the M40 Tunic did away with the "Bottle Green" collars also.   The M40/43 tunic collar is the same Feldgrau as the rest of the uniform.

M43 tunics were still quite plentiful by the time of Operation Overlord and subsequent battles, as well as troops still wearing jackboots vs the gaitered "Retreat Boots" seen in mid/late 1944... Troops that were being refitted got those first, with occupation troops and Combat Support units seeing them later.

Here's some tunics starting with the M-36:

M-40:

M-43:

Just for comparison, the M-44:

Note that the Waffenfarbe (Branch Color on the shoulder mark's piping) on the M-36 and M-43 is the Reed Green Panzergrenadier, and the White Infantry Waffenfarbe is on the M-40... For your 88's figures, the Waffenfarbe would be red.

And the first nominee for most helpful fellow modeler is......

Thank you guys for the info. Also can you help me with the color of the boots, belt and artillery.

Another question I have is can you use this kit with Tamiya 1/35 German 2cm Flakvierling 38?

Phil_H

The basic colour for the uniforms is Feldgrau (or Field Grey) In Tamiya paint, you will be looking for XF-65. Most other paint manufacturers have an equivalent colour.

I believe the uniform style is more representative of early war uniforms and may not be entirely appropriate for Normandy (1944).

Unfortunately I'm not familiar with the different uniform style but from my understanding of what you indicated is that this kit uses the type of uniform that is not used during the battle in Normandy, am I right?

They kit figures are molded in M-1936/40 tunics... Like I said earlier, the tunics can be modified to M-43 tunics by sanding the pleats off the pockets.  The number of buttons (5 vs 6) is then only real visible difference...

The uniform changes came about as a result of the Germans needing to save material.. The "newer" the uniform, the less fabric was used, and it was of increasingly poorer quality... They added more & more cellulose (read: Paper) to the wool, which caused the uniforms to wear out much faster... 

There were lots of units still wearing the M-43 (as well as M-40) in June of 1944... The longer the Soldat had been in the Army, the more likely it was that he'd still be wearing tholder, more rugged uniforms.. So, IF you sand off the pocket pleats, you'll have M-1943 tunics, or close enough.. If you don't, they'll be M-1940 tunics... Either tunic was still in use during Normandy...

As for the leather (Belts, jackboots, suspenders, clip pouches), paint it black if you're doing Heer enlisted troops...    The exception would be an officer's pistol belt with the open-face buckle.  Those were a medium/dark brown...