Hello all,

A qucik question. Did any of the early A1 versions of the Luchs stay in service late enough to see the introduction of NATO 3-tone camo? Or were they generally all green?

Thanks.

Hi Ralph,
a word of clarification before. We see Luchs A0 with the gunners periscope and the IR/White searchlight and A2 with the gunners thermal sight. Luchs A1 modifications included the installation of a double ammo feed for the 20 mm gun, but nothing external. Doppelgurtzuführer was installed in 1983 while installation of the thermal sight started in 1985. Flecktarnanstrich painting started in 1983/84. So you can paint your model in Flecktarnanstrich but without the thermal sight.
Cheers

The German DoD officially approved the Nato-3-tone camo in 1984, so from about 1985 on everything started to convert to that appearance relatively swiftly.
There were some really "weird" applications preformed by the units themselves, I remember the Green-tone being of a very "light" typ ... my assumption being that initially there wasn't sufficient CARC - supplies to go around,
Also, in the initial stages most was applied by brush resulting in a very "sharpe-edged" appearance.
So I would believe it is safe to conclude that by 1986 most frontline units/vehicles would have preformed this transition, regardless of any update programs which may lay ahead. At their individual maintenance/upgrade intervals the vehicles would then receive a proper/professional paint job at the depots/factory. But by 1989 all frontline units would have transformed to exactly that look one can visualize today.
So it all depends on the time-line and good reference.

Cheers
Christopher:-H

Thank you, gentlemen.


I'm off to find some proper decals. This may be a fool's errand.

Decals are always the weak spot on kits. Luckily, there is a company called TL Decals here in Germany.

https://tl-modellbau.de/Bundeswehr_1

They hava a broas range of decals in many scales, among them 1/35 scale Bundeswehr stuff. Maybe you can give it a try?

A fantastic resource! Thank you for the tip, Herman.

As a follow up question. Can anybody point me to a good book or online resource describing which units of the Bundeswehr operated which vehicles and when?

Here is a "quick-fix" ... in German though.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Panzeraufklärungsverbände_der_Bundeswehr

Cheers
Christopher

THE book about the Luchs.

https://www.amazon.de/Sp%C3%A4hpanzer-Luchs-technische-Dokumentation-Waffensystems/dp/3613031620

Like a Spielberger book, it covers the development and oper- ational use of the Luchs, great resource for all Luchs fans.