The Ship Model Forum

Dear All

Late to the party here but I'm just about to start in on my Dragon 1/350 Scharnhorst and intend to paint her in the final scheme. I've noted Antonio Bonomi's in depth stuff and excellent renderings of the Ostfront scheme. I've also just bought the Draminski AoTS book.

The book's introduction thanks Antonio for his help in putting the book together.

Here's the thing...

The Ostfront scheme on pages 72/73 differs from the most recent renderings I have from the internet attributed to Antonio. This is particularly noticeable around the bridge/forward superstructure, funnel and Anton and Bruno areas and the fact that the bow and stern areas appear light grey rather than off white.

Just wondered if the version shown in AoTS was in fact the result of the latest research by Antonio and/or whether it is considered as definitive as possible at this time?

Many Thanks

I assume it just had faded, I need to look at photos again. But,... who would tell you it's wrong? There doesn't seem to be much of a difference between the camo dark grey and faded black, and you could always get away with it by saying "scale effect"... :big_grin:


Happy painting ~ Olaf!

Thanks much, Olaf! Any thoughts on the funnel cap above the flare, i.e. aluminumbronze, black, or one of the dark grays of the camo pattern? From photos, it looks like perhaps the very top portion of the cap (above the flare) looks pretty dark September '43, but it's notably lighter in Dec. '43 (just faded? but definitely far from black at the time)

- Sean F.

Here's Rob's beautiful [url=http://www.tankwerkz.com/schgal.html]CG-Scharny[/url]. Rob and I were discussing the number of colours on the superstructure, he saw four, I saw three, but I may have had not the photo quality needed. I was going by the number of paints that were available according to the paint regulations*, and since there were not enough grey tones, the lightest of the four tones could have been off-white. I'm still in doubt about that, but with regard to the bow and stern, yes I have seen photos on which these areas are so bright, that I recommend them to be painted white. This would be in line with "known" colours and schemes of other KM-warships of that time in that area.


Happy painting ~ Olaf!

* Those from 1941, since those from 1944 were not applicable in 1943. At least this is what I thought a couple of years ago. Today I'm leaning towards the possibility that they've followed the Dechend recommendations from 1942/43, meaning that they were painting their ships according to regulations even before that regulation had been issued. This further means that they could have used anything to their liking, even paints they may have found in Norwegian paint stores, making it absolutley impossible pinning down "exact" colours some 70 years later.

[quote="Tracy White"]This.... thread.... LIVES!

[size=50](but sorry I can't answer your question)[/size][/quote]

Yes, yes it does. :)

I remember reading and studying it heavily a couple years back when a group of us were building the Dragon Scharnhorst together, before we all put them on hold (not a specific,deliberate decision - it just happened). I've pulled mine out and looked up this thread that I remembered... finding it on page 8! It's been longer than I thought! But since it always annoys me when someone creates a new thread relating to something that's already been discussed, I opted to add on to the existing one.

Anyway, to clarify: I do mean the final "mountain" pattern, and not the preceding dark middle/light ends scheme. I have my hull above the boot topping painted white (well, slightly off-white) and need to mask for the wavy thin white striping before spraying on the darker colors, and need to know if I ought to mask off the bow and stern while I'm at it. Throughout this thread I see the color pallet discussed well and thoroughly, and a nice color rendering of the forward superstructure with the individual color patches identified, but not the same treatment for the hull.

- Sean F.

This.... thread.... LIVES!

[size=50](but sorry I can't answer your question)[/size]

I've gone through the pages of this and the CASF thread, and haven't seen a specific answer to these questions:
In Scharnhorst's final scheme, should the extreme bow and stern be white, or hellgrau 50? In some photos they look quite light.
It looks to me like the funner cap is not black, but is it aluminumbronze, or just a continuation of the colors below the cap?

- Sean F.

Olaf,
Thank you for the link.
I had that site bookmarked before my pc crashed in March.
As I said in my post I like the disruptive pattern and will most likely use one form of it.
The details of the Kagero book are.
The Battleship Scharnhorst
By Mariusz Motyka and Grzegorz Nowak
2nd edition 2010
ISBN 978-83-61220-38-1
Regards
Richard :thumbs_up_1:

I don't know when the Kagero book came out, maybe at that time they didn't know better. It is known for a couple of years now that the final camouflage is the one known as 'mountain profile', look [url=http://www.kbismarck.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=450]HERE[/url] for one variant.

Happy painting ~ Olaf!

[quote]Did you compare the three WIP models? The same pattern on all three models?

Happy painting ~ Olaf![/quote]

As much as I like the disruptive camouflage paint scheme,
( and will most likely use it on my build.)
It was a wet weekend so I started looking at my references and found that on the Kagero
Scharnhorst Pages 5 & 10 it states that the ship had a two tone grey camo scheme at the Battle of the
North Cape.

Is there a definitive answer to this discrepancy ?
Or is it a coin flip ?
Regards
Richard

[quote]Did you compare the three WIP models? The same pattern on all three models?[/quote]

I did. There are variations in all pictures of the actual ship and in all the finished models in camouflage I have seen. That's why I was wondering. Everyone seems to interpete the pattern differently (not much different but still different). Probably I will end up with another slight variation in the pattern.

[quote="Skiper"]Anyone able to help on this? :thinking:[/quote]

Not me, sorry. If I had the financial background to soak eBay empty, I'm sure I could help with this or that close-up photo. I'm pretty sure such photos are somewhere, and I wish those in the posession of them would share them, no matter if they put them into a book or sell them off. Until then we have to rely on the few known photos on which you just see shadows and clutter on the superstructure. To make matters worse, I think they applied slight changes to the pattern from time to time (but this is just me).

Did you compare the three WIP models? The same pattern on all three models?

Happy painting ~ Olaf!

I've been following this thread with interest together with the 3 threads in the "work in progress" section of Scharnhorst but there is still an issue that is not clear to me. The 4 color pattern is easily identified as far as on what colors are used and where they start and stop on the hull, but what exactly happens for the superstructure? Apart of the 3 gun turrets, I still haven't figured out how many shades were used and where they were applied on the various supestructure sections. Anyone able to help on this? :thinking:

Thanks all:

I stumbled upon this thread, and thanks to all of you I am now ready to start some painting on my model. The final answer on the deck color was so helpful.

Thanks:

Dick Wood

:thumbs_up_1: :worship_1: :thanks:

[quote="kubaro"]I got the Schiffsbodenfarbe III Grau I from WEM. I assume that it works too for the steel decks.. isn´t it?[/quote]

Yes, the boot-topping and the steel decks had the same appearance - at least when applied freshly. The difference was, that the Schiffsbodenfarbe featured the antifouling ingredients which, as far as I know, had no effect on the shade of the paint. Of course, due to friction from salt water and whatever, the boot-topping faded much quicker. To be honest, I don't like KM 05 very much as it has a distinctive blue-greenish hue, which I think is incorrect for (not faded) RAL 7016. If you take WEM's AR G 08 (Armour/German ==> Antrazithgrau (anthracite) RAL 7016) your boot-topping and decks will look better (IMHO!). For the faded boot-topping, KM 05 is okay, but it looks silly on the decks.

Happy painting ~ Olaf!

Didn´t knew what boot topping meant... :sorry: (new term added to my list...xD)

I got the Schiffsbodenfarbe III Grau I from WEM. I assume that it works too for the steel decks.. isn´t it?

Thanks again, Olaf...

[quote="Olaf Held"]RAL 7016 => Schiffsbodenfarbe III Grau I (boot-topping) [b][i][u]AND[/u][/i][/b] Trittfeste Außendecksfarbe 59 (dark grey painted steel decks; 53 in the 1944 edition)[/quote]

The grey painted band is called boot-topping. Take care of it's width. On the actual ship it was 2 m (6'-6"-something). The 6-mm-Tamiya-masking-tape is a good match for 1/350 (wink, wink). On my model, the upper edge of the boot-topping is the top edge of the model's lower hull.

Happy painting ~ Olaf!

This topic has been very helpfully for those of us who intend to build the Dragon´s Scharnhorst. Thank you very much....

One more question......Can anyone tell me the color of the grey band painted through all the waterline (between the camo scheme of the hull and the Schiffsbodenfarbe III Rot 5... )...please?


Thanks in Advance..... :smallsmile:

[quote="MartinJQuinn"]
Thanks Olaf. Decks would be 7016, as in the final scheme, correct?[/quote]

I hope so. :big_grin:
I think they did not change the colour of the steel decks, no matter what (or if) a camouflage pattern was applied.

Happy painting ~ Olaf!