128fiddler Posted July 26, 2018 Share Posted July 26, 2018 Hello all, Once when I was young and collecting all Airplane magazines, there was a picture of an East German MiG-21MF taking off wit RATO. I was so impressed that I would do such colour scheme once. However being a bit older now and having seen many other pictures of East German MiGs and the discussions about the right colours etc. I must say I never encountered such colour scheme again, except that picture. I googled it and shamelessly plugged it in here to show what I mean. It looks like an Middle East/African user colour scheme but with roundels and numbers of East Germany. I do think this could have been a NMF finish and being tampered with to suggest camouflage colours or is this a genuie picture after all? Did the Germans flew this style camo? Here it is: So what do you guys think? Apart from the thought that how awesome it would be to see this in real life? :) 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
franky boy Posted July 26, 2018 Share Posted July 26, 2018 Love that, imagine the noise. Thanks for sharing James 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnT Posted July 26, 2018 Share Posted July 26, 2018 That picture is the front page of Osprey Air Combat Mig 21 by Bill Gunston. Sadly the caption inside does not throw any more light on the paint job. I found some photos of camouflaged East German aircraft on airliners net but I am pretty sure we can't and don't copy them here for copyright reasons. A google search under camouflaged east german migs gets you there though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jabba Posted July 26, 2018 Share Posted July 26, 2018 I have two books on the final days of the East German Air Force and they both show plenty of MiG-21s in this type of colour scheme. The books are "Final Touchdown the last days of East German Air Force" by concord and "East German Air Force Final Flightline" by Airlife. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsairfoxfouruncle Posted July 26, 2018 Share Posted July 26, 2018 (edited) Hello @128fiddler ... Have a read through this thread. Its a few weeks old and covers mainly MiG-17’s but it deals with East German Camouflage and may help you with your search. Dennis Edited July 26, 2018 by Corsairfoxfouruncle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
128fiddler Posted July 26, 2018 Author Share Posted July 26, 2018 (edited) Hah, Very strange to read in Jabba's post that this was a common paint scheme as I only find it in one side profile drawing, no pictures. From Corsairs post I see the things I've frequenter have read, that most of the GDR MiGs were in darker green/brown colours. But after a bit of research, this is more resembling a Czechoslovak camouflage. As the most of GDR MiGs were painted in an alternating lines scheme. In the picture above you can see that the brown is the principal top colour covered with rather large green blotches. That's why i find this picture so strange. Did the GDR use Czech built MiG-21MFs? If this type was ever built in Czech license. To me IIRC the MiG-21F-13 was built in licence, maybe the PF and PFM as wel, but can't recall reading they built the MF as well? Or was this a batch meant for the Czechs and in the end being delivered to the Germans? Who can explain this Camo? Thanks! Edited July 27, 2018 by 128fiddler Typo etc... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Floggerman Posted July 27, 2018 Share Posted July 27, 2018 The MF on your picture shows the original camouflage as delivered. Only a few of GDR MF's wore this scheme (and no, they all came from Soviet Union). Interesting, some wore a light grey overall scheme. All of them were overpainted during the first maintenance in Dresden Maintenance Factory and got the well known dark green/dark red-brown. The brown faded quickly to more greenish. They never had NMF. BTW: I remember a RATO in during summer excercise in 1981. Take off from grass runway (parallel to concrete main runway) in Peenemuende (JG-9). You'd never forget the noise... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jure Miljevic Posted July 28, 2018 Share Posted July 28, 2018 In their book Arab MiGs, part four (highly recommended) Tom Cooper and David Nicolle give colours for this scheme as beige BS381C/388, green BS381C/283 and light admiralty grey BS381C/697. How Soviet colours could be compared to British standard was highly debated question so browsing through old Cold war topics may yield additional information. Cheers Jure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Floggerman Posted July 28, 2018 Share Posted July 28, 2018 (edited) The original soviet painting was for sure not a desert cammo (not helpful in Germany) I try to find this pic in better resolution Edited July 28, 2018 by Floggerman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jure Miljevic Posted July 28, 2018 Share Posted July 28, 2018 Ageed, it does not make much sense. Still, camouflage pattern is bang on and it is the same as the one on Czechoslovakian aircraft. In his book MiG-21 Miroslav Irra mentions both camouflaged and light gray aircraft, delivered to Czechoslovakia in about the middle of the 70'. This sounds similar to your description of some DDR machines in your first post, Floggerman. So, those planes must have been produced at the same plant (possibly at about the same time) as MiG-21 MFs for Czechoslovakia. I think it is also safe to assume that camouflage colours were the same. Since Czechoslovakia only produced S-106 (MiG-21 F-13) under license, all MFs for NVA came from Soviet Union. Cheers Jure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Floggerman Posted July 28, 2018 Share Posted July 28, 2018 100% agree, Jure! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
upnorth Posted July 28, 2018 Share Posted July 28, 2018 Between page 3 and 4 of this document, it explains that the Czech MiG-21s in that camouflage came delived from the factory that way in 1973. The scheme was influenced by experiences in the Arab-Israeli conflicts and the first Czech unit to get them was a fighter-bomber unit. https://www.eduard.com/store/out/media/1199_TXT_EN.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
128fiddler Posted July 28, 2018 Author Share Posted July 28, 2018 Aha, that explains it then! Thank you all, your input is very appreciated! BTW floggerman, I'm so jealous! I was only born in october '81 which left me only a few nations operating the MiG here in the area... Until now I've seen the last of Europe, being Czech MFNs, Bulgarian and Croatian BISs, a single Serbian UM and Romanian Lancers. However hearing the afterburner kicking in was a joy to hear the few times I could, they fade away by your experience 😉 Trying to imagine the RATO I thought the grass must have been baked instantly with ' back to the Future like' scenes when it lifted off I would assume. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exdraken Posted July 29, 2018 Share Posted July 29, 2018 Color wise I'd suhgest something like thism just very different lightning! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jure Miljevic Posted July 29, 2018 Share Posted July 29, 2018 (edited) Hello Not quite, ex-draken, there seems to be slightly too much gray in green and brown seems to lack a bit of red in it. 128fiddler if you are in a hurry, here is the link to instructions for Eduard MiG-21 MF (page 15). Otherwise, thorough search through Cold war forum should get you to several topics, dealing with Warsaw Pact colours and paints. There I found several very useful links, unfortunately recent internet browser failure purged all my bookmarks. Cheers Jure P.S.: Upnorth, thanks for the link. It makes an interesting reading. Edited July 29, 2018 by Jure Miljevic P.S. added Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Floggerman Posted July 29, 2018 Share Posted July 29, 2018 6 hours ago, exdraken said: Color wise I'd suhgest something like thism just very different lightning! This is the later "Dresden" scheme Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
128fiddler Posted July 29, 2018 Author Share Posted July 29, 2018 (edited) Exdraken, it should be this scheme but with German markings: ©↗ Now that this has been solved, I'd say I could make a German MF in these colors, a Bis in the Dresden colors, and then a Czech and a Slovak MF in these colors together with a Czech UM in the Grey/darker grey... But i'm still in doubt as my modelling speed is like one in 10 years at the moment.. Ik guess i'll have to select but I have to say I'm realy eager to build the 7 mig-21s in my stash... Edited July 29, 2018 by 128fiddler Typo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
128fiddler Posted August 1, 2018 Author Share Posted August 1, 2018 Actually, as the link from Upnorth States, all MFs delivered to the Czechoslovak AF we're or camo'd or 'interceptor grey'. Now all MFs which I saw preserved without the brown-green camo, were all NMF. When did they change that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jure Miljevic Posted August 1, 2018 Share Posted August 1, 2018 128fiddler, check page 3, subtitle MiG-21 MF: ˝The first twelve modernized MiG-21MF fighters came to the 4th slp at Pardubice in 1971. These hailed from the 43rd and 44th series and all were delivered in natural metal.˝. Cheers Jure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
128fiddler Posted August 5, 2018 Author Share Posted August 5, 2018 Thanks Jure! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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