Dear AFV modelers. I’m working on finishing up a 1/35 Tamiya Jagdtiger and I’ e made my own scratch barrel cleaning rods and tow cables. My question is whether in reality and in the field, tank crews painted camo over these items or left especially the rods free of paint?
I’ve seen photos which look like the rods are painted over. On another, lesser forum, this topic came up and some modelers were emphatic that the rods were left clean in their wooden finish.
Any thoughts? I’m shooting for a weathered, combat experienced Jagdtiger.
In my book about the history of the 653 sPzJg Abt, all but one photos show the Jagdtiger without cleaning rods…
On that single photo they look darker than the hull so I would say they were left unpainted.
Thank you sir. And what book would be the work you wrote? I have Devey’s “Jagdtiger The Most Powerful Armoured Fighting Vehicle of World War Two.” However, nothing in that volume establishes the answer to my question.
I believe that they were wooden, capped with a steel cup on either end with a threaded bolt which linked each rod. But I have no intelligence to support the thesis that these rods were intentionally unpainted by crews. My guess is that crews painted over everything with their ration of paint for camo.
By that period of the war, weren’t German tanks coming pre-camo’d from the factory? If so, the rods and other tools would have been added after the camo paint. Not sure if anyone had time to repaint in the field by then…
I doubt very much that the rods were painted. As Tom said, the majority of wagons by that stage of the war came painted from the factory. Crews may have done some touch up painting or winter white wash as needed, but doubtful they would not have bothered going to the effort of painting the rods.
I’m just speculating with an educated guess that the rods were painted over, as opposed to intentionally and individually painted, that’s all. Having served in the Marine Corps, my gut tells me that tankers would’ve just gotten the work done in a field expedient manner. Thanks
In this photo you can see the crew painting the tank with a spray gun, and the rods have been painted. If you as the crew are going to paint the vehicle, it is more work to have to remove and replace tools, tow cables, spare tracks, etc. It’s easier to just paint over them.
The key, as pointed out above, is whether the crew ever had the time to paint the tank in the first place.
Ken
the factory sent red oxide or plain dunkelgelb out the door and left camo to the units because the factory never knew the combat conditions thr tank would experience. that’s why units were issued camo paint in the field
gentlemen one more thing: when i was in the Marine Corps every part of everything was camouflaged so as not to have something unusual draw attention or be of different color or shape.
same here i would think
I believe delivery of overall red primer panzers to be an unfortunately rather persistent myth.
Not sure how that started, but I have a guess: modelers depicting late war vehicles with an odd red wheel or two, hatches, even a main gun barrel.
This eventually grew into legends of overall-red panzers.
At that stage of the war, I cannot imagine who would crew such a sitting duck.
Add to that the dwindling number of panzers fielded. It’s difficult for me to imagine anyone signing off on making them much easier for jabos to spot and destroy.
I think the myth started from the fact that tanks were no longer completely painted Dunklegelb over the primer - only 1/3 was painted Dunkelgelb; 1/3 Olivegrun; and 1/3 Rotbrun. Saved a lot of Dunkelgelb, and time!
Even the “exposed primer instead of Rotbrun” is questioned IIRC - we only know of the very last tanks rolling out unpainted, when the front line was within hearing distance. In the early years they came in base colour (grey or later yellow) with units to apply camo from supplied paint stocks. Then after everything went yellow they started factory camo for the last year of the war. At least that’s my understanding of it…
Even the last Tiger ll’s rolling out of Kassel, with the “Octopus” camo were completely painted, although it’s difficult to determine if the base coat was green, or yellow.
It’s not very good quality, it’s not definitive proof, but it is the best evidence we have. The original color image of the Neustadt Jagdtiger 331. I have attempted to clean up the image as best I can, but it leaves much to be desired.
If you enlarge the image, note what appears to be a spot of bare wood on the middle rod, near the center. The far-right end of upper rod closely matches the tone of the surrounding green paint, suggesting it could be painted green as well.
One has to remember the use of the gun cleaning rods - to push the bore brush and rags through the tube with generous amounts of bore cleaner. The bore cleaning solvents and gun oil soak into the wood. Any camo paint applied in the field over the oil impregnated wood isn’t going to adhere well or stick around for long. I have a set of US WW2 vintage cleaning staffs for a 105mm howitzer. You can still feel that gun oil in the wood.
I recently saw an hour’s worth of 1942 footage of German units – original color. What struck me was the rods were unpainted with metal ends. I’ve heard crews were loath to paint the cleaning rods as flecks of paint would come off during the swabbing process – adding to the uncleanliness.
