what color was the tiger 1 when it came out of the factory? a basic gray?

inquiring mind[ read dummy ]needs to know......

reb

This colour was Dunkelgelb- that was the basic colour for Tigers.

It was dark yellow,very good is The color Gunze Sangyo number 39

The early Tigers where panzergrau, which is the colour they where shipped to Russia and even North Afrika. Somebody will come with the correct dates, but the frst Tigers came from the factory before the order was given to paint all vehicles Dunkelgelb.

Cheers
Henk

thank you all, panzergray it will be then




reb

Tunisian Tigers were NOTshipped in Dark Grey. The above information is incorrect. The very first Tunisian Tigers are seen in the photos below being shipped. They were ALL painted olive sand prior to shipment. ref.("Tigers in Combat 1")







By February 1942, Tiger 1's were painted in Dark Yellow from the factory.

Steve

Quoted from Achtung Panzer

I stand corrected, the Tigers were shipped with light coat of dark olive green over their factory Panzergrey. Ooops. Dark (Panzer) Grey was not replaced untill Feb. 1943 however.

Cheers
Henk

My nearly worthless 2-cents...

IIRC (very poorly) from "The Tiger Tank" book by the author whose Churchill was KO'd by a Tiger in Tunisia;

he wrote that the early shipments of Tigers to NA were painted at the port of departure in "desert yellow" (whatever that was), but that some were rushed over so fast, they arrived in European Green (his words) and were expected to be re-painted once in theater.

This is an excellent book, and while it may not match the Jentz und Doyle lits for minuscule details, the author was at least there, and met the elephant first hand.

I'm inclined to believe the author about the desert yellow re-paint over the factory gray; by the time the Tigers arrived in NA, Rommel long ago knew all to well the need for an NA cammo scheme vs. a European color.

thanks guys for all info ths far

i reckon the training tanks would be gray too..........

good info for the dio i am going to do........

reb

Jees, Some people take things seriously......

Lets all take a look at the wonderful photos supplied...
Now, what colours the Tiger? what colours the uniforms on the men on deck?.......WHO Can see colours?

And as to accounts from people who where there......
If it wasn't written on the day it happened,published with a colour photo and written in the paint used,Then I'd believe Jentz and Doyle because their information comes from German military documents which have only been declassified in the last 10 years, not from some guy probably running so fast to get away from the tiger that he couldn't tell you what colour the back of his pants where...... 90% of first hand accounts from battlefield logs either say they where attacked by Tigers, when they where Mark 4's or Panthers.

Has anyone heard the first hand accounts of the Tiger Graveyard in Tunis? they all turned out to be properganda.

That's my Five dollars worth.

Gaz

Okay, we know that at some point the Tiger at Bovington was painted in these colours

http://www.tiger-tank.com/secure/journal27.htm

But the accounts of green Tigers from eyewitnesses like Gerry Chester can't be dismissed even if the tale of the paint being captured US OD is dubious. Not sure if it's mentioned on his site (below) but he is on record at ML saying that he saw green Tigers

http://www.nih.ww2site.com/

Steve, I think the book you mean might be David Fletcher's The Tiger Tank - a British view. Some of the content is taken from the evaluation of Bovington's Tiger carried out by Peter Gudgin, who's tank was knocked out in the same action as Bovington's Tiger. Gudgin isn't particularly reliable on colours and was IIRC involved in the confusion over the real colours of Bovington's Hetzer which led to some strange results - dunkel grau or green as a base colour.

It's true that the very first batch, sent to the East, were in Panzer Grey. Most of the rest were Dark Yellow.

But as for the batch sent to Africa with the 501st, there has been raging debate for a long time, with some Allied eyewitness reports calling them green.

The issue has now been effectively settled. These tanks were factory painted in the first Tropical scheme as you would expect. This scheme uses two shades of green-brown, very similar to each other.

The only unusual aspect is that this first scheme was officially supposed to be replaced by a second higher-contrast tropical scheme by this time.

Three pieces of evidence support the above conclusion:

[1] Numerous B/W photos of the tanks show a low-contrast two-colour scheme on them.

[2] Close examination of the Bovington tank by paint experts found the two colours of that scheme.

[3] Only last month, several colour photos of a destroyed Tiger was discovered. A two-colour scheme is visible on it, with very low contrast. It falls into the ballpark of the first tropical scheme.

David

I wonder if the crews of these tanks ever sat there and wondered if in 60 years people would be debating over of all things the color of their tanks. Kind of makes you think a little, anyway thats all I have to say. Pretty interesting about the tropical scheme.

~Chip #:-)

Two bits of clarification to my first posting

While we know what colour the Tigers were wearing when they arrived in Tunisia, we don't know what repainting (if any) happened subsequently.

The OD story is questionable since it seems unlikely that the Germans had the chance to capture enough US paint to cover multiple tanks.

If you want to know what I mean by "low contrast" , check out the third photo in Crockett's message above. That's the camouflage right there.

For the newly discovered colour photos, go here
http://www.timelifepictures.com/ms_timepix/source/home/home.aspx?pg=1
and search for images
52067589, 56254181, 56254583, and especially 56263153

David

I e-mailed Gerry Chester just last week and asked him about the Tiger he met up with in Africa....He swears it was green and as he says ...You don't forget the first tiger tank that you see on the battlefield... So I'm painting mine a dark green and am using Gerry as my reference...Can anyone else say they were there???
Gerry is on vaction but he said he'd send me some color pictures when he could .... As for your original question the original tigers coming off the assembly line were Gray and I don't think they changed over after 12 tanks to start painting them for the desert campaign . I'd say they were repainted in Italy before being transported over to Tunisia.

Rick

Hi Guys,

The following is from Tom Jentz and Hilary Doyle's : Tiger 1 heavy tank 1942-9145
" The 501st was originally fitted with 20 Tiger 1 and 25 Pzkpfw III (7.5mm) Ausf.N which where shipped to Tunis between November 1942 and January 1943.
Tigers shipped to Tunis were given a very thin coat of Olive green sprayed over the base Feldgrau ( Panzer Grey). The tactical numbers painted in feldgrau outlined in white."

So Yes, they where green not yellow but not US olive drab.

Gaz