Hello,

Do you have an advice for the Tortoise`s colour and which brand reproduce it? (Acryls)

best wishes,

moritz

I recently acquired Meng's kit and I've been thinking about the same thing. Most of the ones I've seen built are a dark green similar to how the one at Bovington is painted, but I sort of want to do mine in a "what if" scheme, maybe put it on a base driving through a breach in some dragon's teeth. No idea how to approach that though.

I could be wrong but I think it was deep bronze green. Which I think is a very dark gloss-ish green. is there no colours listed in the instructions?

Paul

The 6 prototypes were probably all in gloss deep bronze green. For operational service a matt khaki green would have been appropriate, as for Comet etc. There is a lot of debate about exactly what that colour was and how it weathered. Truth is there were probably several shades from different suppliers and batches. Unless there had been a major change in practice, any camouflage would have been black - which we stuck with from WW2 all the way through the Cold War. Winter whitewash could be interesting over black & green. But if we're in Panzer 46 mode, what if Tortoise had still been in service in 1956. Suez sand & brown colours? Or how about a Beute Schildkröte repainted in AK's late war German colours?

Peter, thanks for your reply. I feel I've got a pretty good handle on German camouflage but I haven't built many British vehicles so my knowledge in that area is much more limited. Are there any good reference works I should look into, something along the lines perhaps of the Panzer Colors books?

Also, just dug out my kit instructions, and they call for Vallejo Dark Green (VLJ 70893) which I find online also called US Dark Green.

I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure: Britain adopted an olive-drabish color to match US OD, post 1943. Different pigments were used in the formulation so it wasn't 100% identical (maybe 98% ). As a result, British OD tended to fade out to a greenish hue, while US OD went towards brownish-khaki. When I paint Commonwealth vehicles I use Tamiya OD with a bit of Olive Green. The British Bronze Green was a post-war invention.

Bigglesis exactly correct. The Tortoise would have been SCC15, Olive Drab. When fresh it is almost identical to US Olive Drab, so Tamiya XF-62 is just fine.

When faded (and it took quite a while in the field to fade it as it was good paint) the SCC15 did take on a somewhat more greenish shade versus the US OD. We're talking a year or two old here, not a couple months.

There is no such British colour as Khaki Drab, it never existed. Deep Bronze Green started to show up on vehicels in the late 40s although apparently even some vehicles in Korea were in SCC15.

To get a scale effect, lighten the Tamiya paint with dark yellow (dunkel gelb works fine) and just a hint of white to account for sun bleaching. Not too much white at all (if any at all) or the paint will go grey and look more like the US OD.

Of course, once you start weathering a lot of these nuances go away, but start with the OD and you'll be OK.

Paul

Hello,

thank you guys for your help!!!!



Best wishes!!!

I've been thinking, would it be reasonably plausible to paint my Tortoise olive drab with flat black splotches of camouflage?

In a word, "yes".

If you go by the more usual British applications of the black disruptive (MPT 46 scheme, I think) then you should be just fine.

Paul