Good day everybody..

based on my entry for Ardennes Offensive, the king tiger that I build depicted the one from SS-Panzer-Abteilung 501 with turret number 204.

my work can be seen here

in the thread, blade48mrd did mentioned about the colour of the turret number. Later he did the trouble to PM me and told about the colour of number which is supposed to be black with white outline. He did the trouble to explain together with his references...
and then I get confused...
My only reference was Battle of The Bulge by Steven Zaloga (Concord Production) and in this book the colour of the number is red with white outline.

I open this thread for discussion on the colour of the marking.

Opinions and ideas are greatly welcome.

Silantra, I posted an answer to this question earlier today, here is a link to it https://armorama.kitmaker.net/forums/42818&page=1
The reference book that shows "204" with black and white numbers is getting a little old, (it's been around about 15 years) it's not a bad little book (I have it) but the Zaloga book has newer info. I also checked "Tigers In Combat II" for a reference. Which again is a more recent publication. In this case I trust the newer publications.

Cheers,
Mike

Let me confuse you further: Osprey book on King Tiger has an illustration of a Tiger II of s.SS Pz. Abt. 501 with the number 204 in dark blue with a yellow outline. I was about to suggest that the numeral and outline color might vary with each company, but then I checked in Concord's Panzers of the Ardennes Offensive and there is a Tiger II numbered 312 with the same color configeration. Note: in each case the vehicle is painted in 'ambush' camo but the background colors are painted with a hard edge, ie; brush painted, and not with a soft edge, ie; sprayed, or airbrushed.

Hi Biggles ..I hate to disagree about how they were painted but they were sprayed but the hard egde was because of the stencils they were using in the factories. There was a paint shortage so brush painting would have used much more paint than spraying.

Rick

Hi guys just in case you didn't read the other message ..I added a couple of pictures of 204 along with 8 of 222 in my photo gallery.

Rick

Richard,

the gallery photos of #222 really help on the cammo patern... the B&W photos however doesnt provide much info on the color of the marking.....

Biggles,

yes,,,that''s confused..... but i guess i will stick to Tamiya offering with red and white color

Hi Rick;
The point I was making about spraying or brush painting refers to the visual effect on the model itself. A brush painted job (or air-brushed with a stencil!!) would more closely resemble the actual paint job, on the MODEL (caps for emphasis, not anger!!), than by the usual air-brushing method which leaves a soft edge. I wasn't commenting on how the Germans factory painted their tanks.