Bismarck, HMV, 1:250

[Decaturbeginner]

yesterday I realized I'd just built 20 of 28 lifeboats wrong & would have to double back....but that's small potatos compared to your Bismarck, puts my setback in perspective. You have my sympathies. Good that HMV spotted you another ship, very good that you got back on the horse...and 'break-a-leg' going forward.

[drg]

Originally Posted by Decaturbeginner

yesterday I realized I'd just built 20 of 28 lifeboats wrong & would have to double back....but that's small potatos compared to your Bismarck, puts my setback in perspective. You have my sympathies. Good that HMV spotted you another ship, very good that you got back on the horse...and 'break-a-leg' going forward.

Oh dear! The thing is, once you’ve corrected everything, and it’s finished to your satisfaction, none of the setbacks really matter. In fact it makes the finished model more of an achievement.

[airdave]

Sorry about the Hull set back.

I'm so glad to see you added the German insignia.
If the insignia background is there, the swastika should be there too...I think its important for accuracy.

And I am glad to see you painted it successfully...you did a great job!
Digitally adding the swastika would have resulted in mismatched colours on the newly printed parts.

I have had recent successes with printing onto thin vellum and tracing papers.
Then cutting out artwork to create thin paper decals.
With a good backside coating of pva glue, the "decals" become thin and sticky,
and you can get them to lie very flat. (The thinner the paper, the better, obviously)
I stay away from really complicated shapes, like individual small lettering.
Prefer to cut them out in a block with some background colour.

..............................................

On the topic of whether the Swastika is an accurate part of Bismarck's paint scheme,
this is some interesting info posted by a fellow that seems to be well experienced in these matters:

...the best we can do is to look at Prinz Eugen photos and the wreck of Bismarck.
Prinz Eugen: photos and the Rheinübung video shows the turret tops (air recognition signs) and the swastika (national emblem) covered with canvas when entering the Norwegian fjords.
On the morning of May 22 - shortly before or after leaving the German air cover around Norway - the Prinz received an order from Fleet (Lütjens on Bismarck) via radio transmission to
overpaint air recognition signs and national emblems with hull grey.
Later photos clearly show that the canvas is gone and the grey paint is on.
At least this drives us to the conclusion that they did it on Bismarck as well.

On wreck photos you see remainings of the red band, the white ball, the black swastika and the grey paint to cover everything.
I think this is just the result of decades under water.

To sum it up, the canvas was just used when they knew that it can't be blown away from wind and weather, such as in (normally) calm fjords.
As soon as you enter the 'open' sea, it is better to take it off, otherwise the wind or green seas will do that for you.
Lütjens gave the order to Prinz Eugen to overpaint it, and I have no reason to believe that this order was not valid for Bismarck on which Lütjens was sailing.
In a nutshell, during her last battle, the swastikas were not visible because grey paint was covering them.

The required gray paint would be Außenbordsgrau (literally: outboard grey).
So Dunkelgrau 51 (scale model paint) it would be.
Problem here: the (horizontal) turret tops appear way too dark on wreck photos to be Dunkelgrau 51.
They may have used Dunkelgrau 2 for this.
But the grey paint visible on the wreck's swastikas appears as Dunkelgrau 51.

Interesting that he notes that you can see the "red band" on the wreck...I can't.
Is he seeing the gray band that covered the swastikas?
We know that in late 1941, the red band had been removed leaving only the white circle and black swastika.
Would they have put it back?
https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...heinubung.html

[airdave]

My apologies for the info I have posted...I hope its not too far off topic (from your build)

I just noticed that that the model (cover) says this is a 1940 Bismarck.
So how the Bismarck appeared at sinking isn't really relevant.
My mistake.

But interesting to note (on the information website I quoted) that the swastika paint scheme didn't appear until sometime in 1941? along with the disruptive paint scheme.
https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...tbism1940.html
https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...heinubung.html

And this fact was quoted earlier in the thread...I glossed over it during reading. My bad.

Originally Posted by JohnMGD

In 1940, the year this model represents, there was no swastika painted on the deck of BISMARCK,
if you want swastikas on the deck you have to think of building the GPM or HALINSKI model of the ship.
which represents BISMARCK in her final configuration. This is just my thought.......

...
I'll shut up now...sorry to have sidetracked the thread!!

[drg]

Originally Posted by airdave

My apologies for the info I have posted...I hope its not too far off topic (from your build)

I just noticed that that the model (cover) says this is a 1940 Bismarck.
So how the Bismarck appeared at sinking isn't really relevant.
My mistake.

But interesting to note (on the information website I quoted) that the swastika paint scheme didn't appear until sometime in 1941? along with the disruptive paint scheme.
https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...tbism1940.html
https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...heinubung.html

And this fact was quoted earlier in the thread...I glossed over it during reading. My bad.


...
I'll shut up now...sorry to have sidetracked the thread!!

It’s fine, I don’t consider it a sidetrack, just interesting information.

Unless I’m mistaken (probably am), according to the references I have, I can’t find the HMV colour scheme. The schemes I’ve found with both the swastikas and hull camo (as per the HMV 1940 scheme) both have either yellow coloured tops to all the primary and secondary turrets, or red tops to the Anton and Dora turrets.

Do you have any references that match the kit scheme (ie grey turret tops)?

[Beachead]

Glad you are able to continue. I have a feeling I'd have laid it up for a time.

[Resurgam]

I was overly ambitious and got this kit too...



It's currently hiding in my heater cupboard, and the place I was to put it is now occupied by Cobi (a LEGO-like company)'s take on the Bismarck.


In the end, I wasn't happy with all the warping, ill-glued spots, and mangled tiny parts.


I'm glad HMV sent you a new kit; I still don't have the guts to actually throw it away.

[airdave]

Originally Posted by drg

Do you have any references that match the kit scheme (ie grey turret tops)?

Look at those links I posted.
Its a big and in-depth site (all about the Bismarck and Tirpitz)
It shows all the varying paint schemes and possible configurations.
Heres the root menu for the Bis pages: https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...arck_menu.html

There does seem to be a lot of unknowns, but thats normal.

It is in many sources claimed that the turret tops was painted red.
However, colour film recordings proves that the Bismarck had dark grey turret tops while she was in the Baltic Sea during her sea trials.
Therefore, based on the informations available, the conclusion is that the turret tops was painted dark grey.
The fact that many sources claim that the Bismarck had red turret tops while she was in the Baltic Sea seems to be a guess solely based
on that the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen had red turret tops during her sea trials.

In April 1941, turret tops were painted Light Gray.

Later, in 1941, before sailing to Norway, it looks like dark gray panels were added to the top centers of the turrets.

[drg]

Originally Posted by Resurgam

I was overly ambitious and got this kit too...



It's currently hiding in my heater cupboard, and the place I was to put it is now occupied by Cobi (a LEGO-like company)'s take on the Bismarck.


In the end, I wasn't happy with all the warping, ill-glued spots, and mangled tiny parts.


I'm glad HMV sent you a new kit; I still don't have the guts to actually throw it away.

Ha ha! I had to screw mine into a ball and throw it away to motivate me to get a new one. In fact I took it out of the bin again and kept it as a reminder to myself to think before doing stupid things.

[drg]

Originally Posted by airdave

Look at those links I posted.
Its a big and in-depth site (all about the Bismarck and Tirpitz)
It shows all the varying paint schemes and possible configurations.
Heres the root menu for the Bis pages: https://www.bismarck-class.dk/bismar...arck_menu.html

There does seem to be a lot of unknowns, but thats normal.



In April 1941, turret tops were painted Light Gray.

Later, in 1941, before sailing to Norway, it looks like dark gray panels were added to the top centers of the turrets.

Sorry, I didn't look at all the links (was viewing on my 'phone). I'll look through them later and also see what it says in my Bismarck book by Stefan Draminski. He's been researching the ship since 2001 so I'd have thought his colour plates would be as accurate as any.


It's the same as always though - it's difficult to absolutely and definitively *disprove* a colour scheme. You can only replicate a scheme from a photograph and say "when that photo was taken, what can be seen is how it looked". And that's not even considering colour matching!