Hi,

Can anyone advise what colour German armoured vehicles had their tracks painted during the war. Was it a flat black, semi-gloss black or perhaps Panzer grey? I'm in the process of finishing Trumpeter's 'Sturer Emil' and would like to get the track colour correct.

Andy

None of those. I have heard, which I hope somebody else will confirm, that they were painted primer red when first installed. Needless to say, that didn't last long on the tracks once they started being used.

The best colour I have found for painting tracks is Vallejo Panzer Aces "Track Primer"

Regards

Rob

They painted the tracks a red oxide, the same used to primer the rest of the vehicle. You can achieve Vallejo Panzer Aces track primer by mixing Tamiya hull red and Tamiya metallic grey.

If, which I doubt but someone will surely correct me, they
were painted the paint would quickly have worn off. The only painted tracks I have seen on photographs are on vehicles at shows/exhibitions ....
Iron will rust, polishing against sand or other surfaces will make it shiny, trackpads are "black" rubber but take a look at old car tyres to check the colour of black because it is certainly not the same as black paint.
A set of tracks on a vehicle which has recently moved more than a couple of hundred meters will be shiny where it is polished against the ground or polished by the roadwheels and by polished I mean SHINY. Usually silver paint works good enough. Surfaces that are not exposed to polishing will be dark metal or rusted or covered by dirt depending on where the tank has moved and the weather when it moved.
Muck can be still wet or dried out o frozen, during the thawing season on the plains in the Soviet Union you could
get wet or frozen muck within the same 24 hours (day/night).
Muck can also have dried out (changed colour), the colour of muck depends on the soil in the operations area.
The edges of the roadwheels of a Panther tank will be polished against the guide horns of the track, seen in some pictures as a shiny circle inside the rubber.

So: Shiny where polished. Rust or muck where it isn't polished.
/ Robin

In a B/W shot of a Tiger l fresh off the assembly line and posing just outside the factory doors, the tracks appear very dark, maybe black, and shinier than the rest of the vehicle, possibly gloss or semi-gloss. Off course this coat of paint wouldn't last long during any movement.

I always thought that the tracks were not painted at all. I would of thought tracks would of been seen as an expendable item which is constantly replaced so why waste time and resources on painting them?

They end up a dark chocolate brown color,the high points that come in contact with ground wear to bear metal,then you can dust and dirty them with the pigment color where you are showing the tank

If they where painted it would be a Mennige, similar to the Dark Red seen here. If tracks are made in a different company than the tank then they would be sprayed with the stuff just to prevent rusting before they are installed.

Many thanks for all the replies. It's certainly given me food for thought!