Yes Tojo, which leads to the next task- matching.

That's pretty awesome, Snapz. I'd love to hear more about the whole process.

Yeah, really very interesting - that would explain why people compare preserved exhibits and can't agree on the shade of the colour - because there were different colours in use! At the same time it gives the modellers some "artistic licence" in cases where the details (like the exact date to be represented by the model) are unknown.

Thanks for sharing and haev a nice day

Paweł

If you have a panzer or softskin build between the dates above then the base coat would be that colour. The exception would be the last shade where the base coat was RAL 6003 Dunkelgrun from December 1944 although there is evidence that RAL 6003 was used as a base coat from October/November 1944. These might be field trials though.

Documentation and batch shades show that there was a +/- 3% variance (lighter/darker) than the original chipset. This does give modellers a variance option, but it helps to have the original correct chipset shades to work with.

The whole process is going into archives and sifting through a whole lot of paperwork and documentation. The rules are that you can't remove or copy anything, but you can make your own notes. Finding the golden nuggets is usually either intensive searches or pure chance and having a good friend willing to sit and translate for you.

I'm a retired Army officer and so don't give up on things easy. Finding the letter of congratulations was really a lucky chance as I was looking for something else but it gave me the chance to nail this down, especially when a search came up with the fact that the company who originally made the paint was still operating. being able to veryfy the archive documentation chipsets with an outside source is something not easily done as so much was destroyed or hidden away and forgotten about. 

Fortune favours the bold and after my friend spoke to a director of the company who was interested about my interest in this particular colour that they invited us to their works and to their archives. They had duplicate chipset books with all the changes and notes plus their own batch sample testing colours and notes. This information matched the archives  and they agreed to mix 1ltr sample tin of each RAL 7028 chipset colour and and test with their specialist equipment to make sure it was an exact match with the chipset.

This did cost me money....... but worth it!

What a truly remarkable research effort. You have persevered and succeeded where few have even thought possible. All the different preserved relics with all their different shades of RAL 7028 now make sense. The colors shown are pefect examples of those we have all seen on preserved pieces, but could never quite adequately explain. Questions about weathering, fading, method of application, color shift of color photos and slides, etc., suddenly fall away, now that we know there were 4 official colors. This is a giant step forward, not only for our modeling knowledge, but for our understanding of history as well. Well done Sir!

Holy cow! This is truly a magnificent gift to our community! Thank you ever so much for this!!!

I see Dark Yellow, Earth Brown, Red Brown, and a kind of light Olive Drab. This makes me see things so differently concerning German armor. Oh boh, oh boy, oh boy! :D

The artist in me is giddy as a child lol! Thank you!

Great stuff! Quite interesting indeed! I know the new Mission Models paint line covers at least two of these shades. And I am pretty sure another one matches up to a Humbrol shade. Seems like this color has as much variety out of the can as Olive Drab... and in a shorter timespan. 

Thanks for this!

Thanks for all your kind comments. I am hoping that the guys at Vallejo will pick this up and offer this colours as a complete set. I am about to send these painted samples to them. I know that if Vallejo take these on board then the colours will reman correct to the chipset and not be "scale corrected" which is a lot of tosh if you know exactly how our eyes and brain work together and bring these authentic colours to the scale modelling world.

If they are taken onboard, then modellers by using these colours can use the +/- 3% hue/shade variance themselves and then fade and weather to their own whims knowing that they are using the 100% correct colours to begin with.

This is incredible!  Thanks for the research effort.  Let's hope that the model paint companies take heed.

Bill Morrison

I like your dedication snap. They would go along way to explaining the account i have read of a 251/9 being stripped prior to restoration and them finding 7 differant shades of DY.

Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

I don't suppose you plan on sending the details of your find to any of the enamel paint companies such as Xtracolor or Colourcoats.

First off, thanks for taking the time and effort to do the research and post your findings here. I have bookmarked this thread for future armor paint reference.

Snap ;

 Thank you sir ! This will enable me to continue with building up my Bandai 1/48 German armor in the stash . I build these to remember a good friend and the fellow who left me his stash of these . Good Job and again Thank You !  T.B.

That is very interesting, thanks for doing the research and sharing with us. 

You know it would be cool if you could work out a deal with the paint company and buy it by the large paint can and repackage it for modelers. Then advertise it as 'Made by the same paint company that made the real thing!!!' 

"Let the shock, indignation, armchair know-it alls start throwing the artillery, but I have been to the archives and the company and seen it with my own eyes. and these samples will shortly be winging their way to a modelling paint company in the hope that they will decide to put these in their paint line(s)."

First off, thank you for your time, effort, and financial layout in this project.  Being fairly new to model building, I was a little shocked and bewildered when trying to find accurate colors for WWII models.  This is truly a remarkable feat.  I am sure there will continue to be some who will continue to argue, as you state above, but in my mind, this is definitive.

The change in hue throughout the years is somewhat shocking, but as mentioned above, explains a lot.  I can't imagine Vallejo or Mission Models would not grab this with both hands.  Think about how many of us just on this forum who will immediately order a set!

Well done, sir.

D

I got the Amusing Hobby Jagdpanther II kit ys=esterday. The paint gude lists MiG Ammo colours and ove rthe 4 scheme options it has 3 differant shades of Dark Yellow. How close they will be to the real thing i can't say as i have never used MiG paints, but it looks like at lkeast one paint company is on to the idea of more than one colour for DY.

Hi Bish.You will enjoy the Amusing Hobby Jagdpanther II.. I did......

I would advise you to use the Friul tracks to avoid brain melting and therer are 128mm or 88mm barrels available here:

http://www.mrmodellbau.com/_shop/product_info.php?products_id=857

http://www.mrmodellbau.com/_shop/product_info.php?products_id=850

Here are pictures of MIG RAL 7028 paints along with the original chipset samples spoons!

Be Warned about MIG and AK. They subscribe to the "Scale Correction" crowd and so none of their paint range is accurate. While I do have some of each brand in my build room the only paints I use are the AK Xtreme Metal brand which are the best on the market with Vallejo's Metal Color being next.

IN the next two photos the original chipset are the top ones, and the lower ones are MIG from left to right:

RAL 7028 Dunkelgelb (MW) (010)

RAL 7028 Dunkelgelb aus '44 DGI (011)

RAL 7028 Dunkelgelb '44 DGIII (012)

Clearly the only MIG one close is the first one which is supposedly Dunkelgelb Nach Muster and is clearly a lighter "Scale correct" version. the other two as far as I am concerned are pure fantasy and have no basis. I have not seen anything resembling those colours in the official chipset.

I do not have Mission models (very expensive) and only one AK "DGIII" in my paintbox and so cannot give them a fair trial, so to speak.

I must admit I do like the Amusing Hobby kits and am looking forwards to getting my hands on their new E-100 series.

Nice job on that snap. I have seen the metal barrels, but to be honest i think the one piece plastic one looks ok. I learnt some time ago to wait until i get a kit before i get any AM, and with the 3 Amusing kits i have so far, other then basic tool clamps, i am not adding anything to them.

I like the look of the E-100 Flak, noit sure about the tank as i have the old Dragon kit, but the AH one looks differant from both the Dragon and Trump kits, i may just grab it so to have both versions of the 100.

Thanks for the heads up on those paint. I don't use those anyway, i prefer to stick to enamels, mainly Xtracolor but also colourcoats. Its just nice to see that other are looking at the idea of more than one version of DY, even if its not 100% correct. This is the first i have heard of it and just thought it was meant to be one colour and any variation might be caused by weather or differant production plants mixing their paints slightly differant.

I am with you on the scale correction topic, not somthing we seem to hear much about these days.

Bish

I got the Amusing Hobby Jagdpanther II kit ys=esterday. The paint gude lists MiG Ammo colours and ove rthe 4 scheme options it has 3 differant shades of Dark Yellow. How close they will be to the real thing i can't say as i have never used MiG paints, but it looks like at lkeast one paint company is on to the idea of more than one colour for DY.

 

Gunze had two shades of Dark Yellow in their Aqueous line. I don't know about if they continued that in their Mr Color line.

Just sayin, lots of thorough information in this thread. Color swatches on plastic spoons is much better to see actual color.

Hi,
This is XLNT!
Somone said earlier in this thread that between us we have been arguing this for ages and the discussion has been heated at times.

So thank you for your extensive effort!

Very Best Regards
Johan

The photos you posted are showing up as "Photo not found." Would you be able to reupload or post a new link to them? Thanks!

In order of usage. These are the original chipset colours from an original manufacturer but done with modern acrylic paint and matched to the originals 100%. You do have a 3% +/- each way light/dark to play with but quite often natural light will do that for you.

I only see the recent photos linked (due to the photo bucket fiasco), but those Dunkelgelb samples reminds me a lot of the colour chips published in the Tomas Chory book - printed 2000, 2005, and 2016.  Same order in appearance (but he has five examples), so it's interesting how similar the results are.

regards,

Jack

These are samples of modern acrylic paint matched to the original chipset. I have seen Thomas Chory's book and there are only actually 3 RAL 7028 variants as the first one, Dunkelgelb Nach Muster IS NOT RAL 7028.

The first one came into use on new vehicles in February 1943 and was only used until the end of Operation Citadel, the battle of Kursk. It was never entered into the RAL Register and the colour was changed after feedback from frontline troops, but the name wasn't changed.

Dunkelgelb Nach Muster translates into Dark Yellow after Pattern/sample.

The first actual Colour that was registered as RAL 7028 was the second colour above. It was changed to the brown that is very similar to the Afrika Korps RAL 8000 and to the final shade which was given a field trial by Tiger II tanks with a RAL 6003 Olive green base coat taking part in Operation Panzerfaust in Budapest.

You can clearly see that in the photo above, the running gear is not painted in RAL 7028, but the much darker RAL 6003 and on the hull itself you can see that the lighter colour, which is RAL 7028 is clearly darker than the previous incarnations.

These colours were put to use on new vehicles from Christmas 1944 and officially sanctioned in January 1945.

As an owner of original vehicles I do spend lots of time in archives and also with companies that provide me with support and also equipment etc to keep these vehicles in an operational state. Getting the paint right is just one part of it and being able to work with a company that did make the original paint and will still do it for me (to modern standards) is a real boon.

Using the original colours on my currently operating vehicles I was able, last year to hine a Jagdpanther with it's long barreled 88 in a hedge at a re-enactment weekend and with extra camouflage such as a net, bushes tree branches etc may visitors actually walked past the vehicle not realising it was there untill we started it up and crashed through onto the battle area, coming to a stop and then firing the 88mm with a blank and setting off all the car alarms within a mile!

What you have to consider, when you are painting german armour is that the colours used from the change from dark grey are mimetic and the shade will change with the change in light and also the hue will change depending on the base colour. Also our own eyes and subconcious will change the colour too depending on background and distance to try and increase detail.

This picture is my 1/16 Trumpeter Jagdtiger painted in the colours above.

The same photo with a black and white period filter applied to that.

Urban background

The dunkelgelb looks a little different as the camera firmware is doing what our eyes and subconcious brain does to try and make out detail and definition. There is still the greenish tinge but it looks more of a dark beige and not as the colour suggests, Dark Yellow!

Here is my complete set

At a pinch, Vallejo's Afrika Korps Model Air paints will be fine as a RAL 7028 replacement as they are quite close and once mixed with the Green and chocolate brown and there is evidence to support vehicles beint pained with those base shades and used on the western and eastern front.

AK's real colours are not real! check out my post on that.

Snapdragon,

Well done, sir. As an historian and lawyer there is nothing I appreciate more than good research. Knowing what to look for and how to find it is an art, and one that you’ve obviously mastered. Very cool stuff!

Secondly, Tamiya XF-88 (Dark Yellow 2) appears to be a very close match to figures 1 and 4, assuming that my phone is correctly displaying the colors. 

Colour display on phones etc is always the issue with online arguments on forums.

I have sent chipsets to Vallejo and they are meant to be working on a set but when we will see it I have no idea!

in the meantime as a stopgap I use either the modern stuff, but it is really formulated for my big spray guns in the paint shop and doesn't like airbrushed very well or Vallejo's Afrika Korps colours that are the closest to the above and Vallejo's own RAL 7028 which is so close to the DNM colour you can only tell in very bright natural light the difference.

Tamiya and my airbrush don't like each other and if I do use those paints it is only for paintbrush use!

Many thanks for your awesome work! Tracking down the original paint manufacturer is one hell of a job. This will finally settle the issue on dunkelgelb paint. The story behind your research is fantastic and you should probably write an article on it. Modellers and historians alike will love it!

 Fascinating! So for curiosity sake how long has RAL existed?

Josh