Hello everyone, quick question for my fellow modellers...I am building a Panzer IV H with the Schürzen...is the camo pattern painted on the tank behind the skirts also...or would it be the dark yellow color?

I figure with the crew painting the tank...would they worry about behind the skirts...but with them falling off so often...maybe they did?

Thank you in advance...
Eric

There are far more photos of Panzer IV Ausf H tanks without their side skirts than with, and it appears that the area above the mudguards was usually pattern painted, and the area below was often not. As for the turret skirts, the turret shell was visible from above, and generally got a camouflage pattern. The inside face of the turret skirts usually appears as dark yellow. Best advice is to pick a photo and work from that.

Using a common sense approach I would think if it's not visible why waste time and supplies I know they did no camo the belly of the tank. Only anti tank moles would see it. Same for interiors. If the bad guy was IN the tank he pretty much knew it was there. I know the interior of hatches were painted the base coat color To blend in when open. Side skirts, as mentioned, were maybe camoed above the mud guards. Below would only help if someone was between the skirt and the hull. Something I'd take into account is how visible the backs of the skirts (both hull and turret) would be. On the hull, if standing about the 1 o clock position, looking towards the 10 or 11, that might warrant camo. Same for the turret, probably no. there would probably only be an inch or so of the back side visible. As for from above, if a plane is close enough to tell if the back of the turret skirts are camo or no, the pilot is probably too busy dodging pieces of your explosion to care. Just my thoughts.

My take is that the painter would typically remove the schurzen and paint a camo scheme on the tank, then layer the schurzen on the tank and paint those as a unit on the vehicle.

That approach would be consistent with most photos you see.

Keep in mind that an airplane could pass over a tank from the side and the unpainted schurzen might stand out in the middle of all of the other camouflage. Just a thought.

I'd leave it in the base color. I doubt if a pilot would still discern if it had camo or not, by that time he would have known he's onto a tank.

That's hardly what the pilot would be trying to figure out : "A tank or not a tank, that is the question here." and not "is this tank camo'ed or not?". Big uncamouflaged areas surely make it easier to spot a tank from the sky.

However, if we factor in shortage of paint and other camo means like tree branches, I suppose the inside of schürzen were deemed unnecessary to paint with camo.

"Big uncamouflaged areas surely make it easier to spot a tank from the sky." ....... but, (A) the insides are not "un camoed" , they are the base color .... dunklegelb. An aircraft attacking at about a 30 degree angle (at a couple hundred miles an hour, with several hundred guns shooting at him!) is going to spot a 6 inch by 7 foot strip of dunklegelb without olive and brown splotches against the back ground terrain and the exposed side/ top of the tank with olive and brown? I'm talking turret.

Thank you everyone for your answers, I guess I did not ask my question clearly....I did not mean the back side of the skirts, however the main body of the tank that the skirts protected...if one was to remove the skirts, or they fell off...was the hull painted in camo paint?

Thank you,

Absolutely, yes. Schürzen would fall off, be torn/blown/shot off all the time...

I have seen drawings/paintings that were supposed to be based on actual vehicles that depicted both ways, base color only lower hull sides and cammoed lower hull sides. I guess it would depend if the tank had the side shields during the most recent repaint?

The don't believe anyone painted camo on the lower hull sides below the mud guards. 5 minutes after driving in the field, this entire area will be covered with mud / dirt / dust. Or maybe they did but again, you'll never see because of the point above. The hull above the mud guards typically was painted but there are many exceptions.

The shields on the turret were considered permanent fixtures so the few pics I've seen that show the turret sides, often show no camo or at best, incomplete paintwork.

Cammo paint isn't going to really hide a tank it just makes it harder to identify and confuse the observer. That's one reason there were so many tigers seen when what they were probably looking at was a Mk4, panther or stug. The only way to hide a vehicle is to cammo it with foliage, netting or debris you've gotta totally break up the outline of the vehicle.

Here are a few pictures of tanks with missing skirts showing cammo patterns behind them:

https://www.worldwarphotos.info/wp-content/gallery/germany/tanks/panzer-4/Panzer_IV_13.jpg

http://knowledgeglue.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/DfWRzyB.jpg

https://c1.staticflickr.com/7/6037/6334540328_24518b4384_b.jpg

https://www.worldwarphotos.info/wp-content/gallery/usa/tanks/m4_sherman/30_Infantry_Division_M4_Passes_2_German_Panzer_IV_Tanks_St_Lo_Normandy_1944.jpg

Nice pics and it kinda reinforces what was already posted. The upper hull would be fully camo'd, lower hull not or simply invisible due to mud/dirt. Still not 100% on the area behind the turret shields. When I've done Pz IV's with the shields, I've carried the roof camo pattern partially down the sides, figuring lazy tanker's hand painting the camo wouldn't have been that concerned with fully painting the turret sides when they wouldn't have been visible behind the shurzen.

When I was looking for those picts I found others showing the turret shield doors open and you could see the turret was cammo'd but the inside of the shields wasn't. It was just the base color of the tank, dunkel whatever.

When I built my Pz III M, I left off the schurzen and painted the camo pattern. I then placed the schurzen on and used the original pattern showing along the edges of the plates act as my guide for where to place the new camo, imagining that the crew would try to make it blend into the first paint job.

Since the turret schurzen weren't usually removed, I painted the camo down the side of the turret and behind the plating as far as I thought a scale person could have aimed his spray gun.

In neither case did I paint behind the schurzen, as I noticed they were actually kind of hard to see behind due to their placement on the vehicle. As for aircraft, viewing my models from overhead gave me the impression that only a recon plane would be flying slow enough to notice and the tank should have been identified as such by that point, anyway. They do generate a lot of dust while moving.





If you look carefully under the turret schurzen you can see there is no green or brown on the sides of the turret's bottom except near the mantlet and the bin where there is more space, because I'm guessing the crew would not have gone to the trouble to unbolt a part they had no need to take on and off anyway, just to make it all nice and neat. But that's just my opinion; take it as you will.



I also tend not to paint wheels except in solids and/or when trying to replicate an actual scheme, as I recall the recommendation was to avoid lines or small patterns due to it causing a pinwheel effect when the vehicle was moving, making them potentially noticeable.


If you're in a recon plane and see this, you don't need unpainted schurzen to tell you it's a tank.

I still think that if the side shields were absent when they did a repaint they would camo the lower sides as if the shields were there. It is not much effort to paint the flat sides with a spray gun.

Why waste the time to paint something if it's going to be covered in mud 5 minutes after you paint it? If you are referring to the turret shields, it was extremely rare to see them removed, they were pretty much permanent fixtures unless damaged in battle.

Thank you everyone for all your interesting responses...sounds like i am not the only one learning something....which is why I love these forums!!

Think through the process and orders for painting German armour. For much of the war:

1) Tanks were painted the base colour (lets say Dunkelgelb) at the factory
2) Camo was applied at the regiment level using the two available additional colours
3) Camo was applied in pretty much whatever pattern the regiment commander approved.
4) CAmo was applied as the vehicles arrived in the unit (if time permitted) and the vehicles were essentially new.
5) Most German tanks didn't last long enough to be repainted, other than, possibly, whitewashed.
6) Camo patterns seen on vehicles iare specifically scaled and located for ground concealment versus airborne as aircraft are going by too fast for much more than impressions of colour and the overall vehicle colour has much more effect than the pattern. Plus the outline and track trail left leading to the vehicles is a much larger effect on airborne spotting than camo pattern. Tanks have patterns painted on top mostly for continuity when the tank is on a hill or incline and you can see the top versus for airborne observation.

Where does that leave us?

a) Loads of variation. Loads.
b) vehicles would be painted, generally, only when newest and with all/most equipment
c) removing skirt plates to paint behind is a big job, probably needing at least an A-frame winch, and therefore is a PITA.
d) painting the easily accessible sides of the turret and hull inside the skirts is _not_ a big job and produces visible results.

So where does this leave us? On the scale of _usually_ versus _always_, usually you'll see camo on the upper hull and turret sides behind the skirts but not below the fender where you need to take of the skirts for access. Painting inside the skirts is less likely because the usual benefit for camo was seen as from ground observation, not airborne observation so it's a wasted effort. especially when these things were painted at the front by combat units themselves, which generally have better things to think about.

But, given the first point (variation), if you want to paint the inside of the turret skirting, go for it. There's probably a photo out there that shows it.

Best bet, though, is to go with the suggestion of picking a photo and copying that. If you can't see behind the skirts in your photo, probably leave it unpatterned.

Paul