Late model Panther G

[Retired Bob]

Must not forget to polish up the inner wheel rims like in this photo:

Not a Ausf.G, but nice shiny wheel rims and idler.

[Robert Stuart]

Looking good Bob,
I like those late, solid colour, wheels.

 

p.s you can see some wheel wear on this restored museum Panther, from about 4m 25s

https://youtu.be/wKKktWu6Rh0?t=264

 

 

[Stef N.]

8 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

Must not forget to polish up the inner wheel rims like in this photo:

Not a Ausf.G, but nice shiny wheel rims and idler.

Which I did forget about on mine. Thanks for the reminder. 

[Jasper dog]

11 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

A quick update to this Panther, I have painted the wheels and tracks and have narrowed down the paint scheme to either the the one on the box top or a green with thin yellow stripes across, much like this one

Hi, I'm no expert but I'm not sure that's green with a yellow stripe, isn't it dunklegelb base with diagonal stripes of green and red-brown? Was it MAN that produced them in that particular scheme?

 

Atb

[Robert Stuart]

3 hours ago, Jasper dog said:

I'm no expert but I'm not sure that's green with a yellow stripe, isn't it dunklegelb base with diagonal stripes of green and red-brown?

And I know even less, but I'd tend to agree - there is a difference in tone between the darker stripes.

[diases]

I guess your talking about the white colour on the wheels.

Could it be snow/ice build-up, rather than polished steel?

 

Paul

[Retired Bob]

3 hours ago, Jasper dog said:

Hi, I'm no expert but I'm not sure that's green with a yellow stripe, isn't it dunklegelb base with diagonal stripes of green and red-brown? Was it MAN that produced them in that particular scheme?

 

26 minutes ago, Robert Stuart said:

And I know even less, but I'd tend to agree - there is a difference in tone between the darker stripes.

You are both correct, it was a scheme I had thought of painting, green and brown divided by stripes of yellow, but I was not sure how it went across the top of the turret and hull, but that's true for most schemes.

[Retired Bob]

24 minutes ago, diases said:

Could it be snow/ice build-up, rather than polished steel?

It was a well known Panther trade mark, the inner wheel rims and idler being polished by the track guide horns, check the video link on @Robert Stuartpost, that Panther has hardly moved since it was painted but the inner wheel rims are well chipped.

[Retired Bob]

What is the best guess for the colours of these Panthers, as can be seen the stripes do not go on the turret roof.

 

[Jasper dog]

6 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

What is the best guess for the colours of these Panthers, as can be seen the stripes do not go on the turret roof.

 

I don't think that's the same scheme, the stripes are going in the opposite direction,  they're to far apart and looks more field applied as opposed to a factory job. I'd guess a factory job would cover the roof, but that's a guess.

Perhaps @M3talpig or @Longbow might know, they're more knowledge than i on this sort of stuff. 

Good luck

[Longbow]

6 hours ago, Retired Bob said:

What is the best guess for the colours of these Panthers, as can be seen the stripes do not go on the turret roof.

 

 

It’s MNH factory camouflage.

 

It’s the same scheme I’m doing mine in, once it gets finished. 

Dark yellow thin stripes, red brown or chocolate brown thick stripes, and the last set of strips, and the hull and turret roof, are green. 

 

Theres a whole set of these photos in the thread I started. 

 

 

[Longbow]

Just an FYI, the MNH plant never used the steel rimmed road-wheel in the last station. 

 

You would be looking for an MAN Factory camouflage. 

[Longbow]

Here is an example of MAN factory camouflage. 

 

[Retired Bob]

It's been a while since I updated this thread as I have been doing some research on the these late Panthers made by MAN.  Dragon's box art for this kit shows it in dark yellow with a green disruptive pattern, b&w photos of a late MAN Panther fitted with a steel rear wheel taken in Germany at the end of the war appear to show a light colour with a darker colour patterned over it, this seems to confirm the Dragon scheme so I painted my model with a base colour of Tamiya XF88 dark yellow and was deciding which green to use for the camouflage pattern.  Big BUT, the Panther that had all the photos taken of it ended up in the USA, it was described as green with a brown disruptive pattern so I sprayed it with the new AK B Resedagrun late war green, which is rather light and would go with the b&w photos as the lighter colour.

However there is a colour photo of the Panther taken in the 1960s still with the original paint and it shows that the green was quite dark and the brown was a deep reddish brown, not at all like how the b&w photos made it look, back to the spray bay then. 

Btw, these AK late war colours say to thin them for spraying, I added 10-20% thinners and it was so thin that 4 coats were required to get a solid colour, I found it sprayed better without any thinner.

[Jasper dog]

Nice to see some paint going down. Tbh some of these AK and Mig paints, whilst I like them, can be quite variable when it comes to thinner, most I do thin but some as you've found straight from the bottle...

 

Atb

[Stef N.]

What thinners works best for AK paints (other than AKs, which is one I don't have)? As you say, some spray brilliantly from the bottle, but some don't. Their Dark Tracks, which is a great colour, is one that clogs rather quickly. 

Edited November 26, 2020 by Stef N.

[PlaStix]

That's looking really good under paint Bob. Nicely done. 

Kind regards,

Stix

[Retired Bob]

6 hours ago, Stef N. said:

What thinners works best for AK paints (other than AKs, which is one I don't have)? As you say, some spray brilliantly from the bottle, but some don't. Their Dark Tracks, which is a great colour, is one that clogs rather quickly. 

I used MiG universal thinner, I tested some first to make sure it worked ok.  I've had Mr Color self levelling thinner turn acrylic paint to something like chewing gum before.  

[Stef N.]

Cheers Bob. I've tried it out of the bottle and with Vallejo with the same effect. I was going to give Mr LT a try but I will give that a miss now.😀

[Retired Bob]

After several days of 1:1 scale wallpapering and wall painting I have finally managed to get a bit more done on my Panther, after my photo research revealed several good quality b&w pictures that revealed camouflage patterns on MAN Panthers with the last steel wheel.  I have used a hairy stick and applied a coat of  AK Rotbraun in a hard edge pattern over the green, only a first coat, a bit of tweaking will inevitably follow. 

Any comments or questions are always welcome. 

[Lewis95]

Looks stunning there buddy! 

[Redcoat2966]

That's a bobby dazzler .......very distinctive camo' scheme.......and thanks for the reminder too on shiny inner wheel rims....put that on my job list. I have a burnishable stainless Mr Color for that. I'll do some test pieces first.

 

Looking good Bob.

 

Regards

 

Simon.

[Retired Bob]

6 hours ago, Redcoat2966 said:

That's a bobby dazzler .......very distinctive camo' scheme....

Thanks Simon, I thought I'd give the AK late war colours a try, to be honest they both appear too light  especially the rotbraun as compared to the colour photo on the armorfortheages.com site.  I will try Tamiya  XF90, the main thing is to retain the hard demarcation.

[Retired Bob]

Had a repaint with Tamiya paint to change the colours to match the colour photo that I have seen.  The XF89 green sprayed on without a problem but when I tried to brush on the XF64 red brown it softened and mixed into the underlying AK paint.  I let the resulting gloop dry and then sanded it back, spraying seemed the only way I could a decent coat of paint on top of the original AK rotbraun.  I used blu-tac rolls to get a hard edge pattern, just a bit of touching up with a hairy stick and a coat of Klear  and I'm now ready for an oil wash.

 

I've painted the sprocket teeth, inner wheel rims and inside of the track horns with a steel paint.  As usual, any comments welcome. 

[Jasper dog]

Nice work!

 

Personally I think it's better for the new paint job, colours look more as I would have imagined, certainly aesthetically. 

 

The Panzer putty is worth a shot if you're wanting to spray hard edge patterns. I've some and it works really well, just don't leave it on to long before you paint particularly in warm weather, it has a tendency to move / slide with gravity.