Landships II

Hi Gwyn, that sounds like a great find, keep in touch.

As for Grit, putting aside whether it was repainted or not, I had a play colour correcting the photo and I could not get a brown finish without putting the other colours visible out of a natural range. Although there is no colour chart being held in front of the tank (something I really wish people would do on at least one photo), knowing how rust and old metal should look on these metal beasts, I can be pretty sure the top coat of paint is a green. I've tried the same with a few of the photos and I don't get a brown.

Colour photos are not always perfect but normally it is possible to pull something close to right from them. The human eye on the other hand can have issues with the colour green when it stops being of a bright hue. Having sold paint for many years I never cease to be surprised by the number of people who show a mild form of colour blindness when it comes to the colour green. It's why on the issue of colour I am healthily skeptical of witness accounts and will always go with physical evidence with a provable history.

Grit shows signs of a dark grey base coat matching that of the inside photos, which has then been over coated with a light grey with a top coat of dull green. The green on the underside of the sponson shows it to be painted over a paint that has flaked away. It matches the style of weathering of the dark grey on the sides in this view. I'm not saying the dark grey is original but certainly older than the green.

There are areas of graffiti scratched into the paint, it would be interesting to see if it can be dated by its style and content as it would help determine if all the the tank was repainted.

My 'opinion' on Tank colours are....

MK1 tanks light blue/grey... most but not all then camouflaged.

MKIV tanks a brown of some hue, then later green as things become more standard Army colours.

MKv tanks green

I don't think anything that makes us all look again at the past and what we think we know is ever wasted time.

So what do others think?

Helen x

Original and corrected photo attached

Thanks Mk1 Nut.

It seems unusual that there is no documented source about what paint should be used on the tanks as they come out of the factory.

I have just finished writing a book on German artillery SPGs in WW2. The German high command issued dated orders to all factories telling them what paint to use. You can trace when it changed from Panzer grey to dunkelgelb (dark sandy yellow). 

The British army being hot on paperwork would have had similar instructions you would have thought. 

I have not found any documents at the IWM London so far. 

I was hoping to find the same historical evidence about paint continuity across different production plants in the UK and in expeditionary tank maintenance workshops in France.

How did the repair mechanic or the storesman not what paint to order. What was its central supply number?

We have had over 100 years to find out this sort of information. It must be somewhere.

There seems to be a bit of confusion about paints back in WW1. There were only limited premixed paints available in WW1. These were

often suspensions of finely ground white lead in linseed oil, pigment was added to produce the desired colour.

Paint was usually made as required by mixing white lead and pigments with linseed oil / white spirit. Linseed oil paints are not long term storable

because the oil polymerises fairly readily. Paints were specified in terms of a recipe which the local people tried to follow as best they could.

The bottom line is that there was a lot of variation in colours even when paints were made up to the recipe.

Regards,

Charlie

Craig, Contrary to the assertion that there is no documented source on what colour tanks should be as they emerge from the factory, there is, and I have given that information in previous posts. It may not be as precise as you would like but that's not to say it doesn't exist. I would also point out that it is notable that the Supply Branch of the Mechanical Warfare Department, even at the end of the war, did not have a section dealing with paint. This suggests to me that firstly there was no real standardisation of paint supply, second that it was not regarded as a matter of any consequence and thirdly that there was no one tasked with producing the records you're looking for. Gwyn

[Edited to correct embarrassing error - apologies Craig.]

The British did use a dark brown color for their vehicles in the middle of WW2 when they ran out of the green color, but that was a dark brown which I assume would be too dark for WW1 vehicles.

Oh wow. That has upset the apple cart. The Tank Museum painted their WW2 Covenanter tank light brown khaki. I was part of the team that dug up the Covenanter tank in Dorking in May. It was fantastic to find original olive green paint and regimental markings and serial numbers still on the tank after it had been washed of chalk soil.   What colour Humbrol paint do you think best matches Pantone 560c? 

I am also puzzled as to the purpose of painting the track, when there are contemporaneous accounts of it being covered in hot oil during maintenance to keep it lubricated. Paint is a strange lubricant.

I agree it's green, but is it paint?

Gwyn

I know we're talking about something that happened 100 years ago. But are there any written records from the various factories of what

paints they obtained for the tanks ? example the primer (red oxide? shown in the picture) .  If there is a record somewhere, it may shed

some light. 

The other possibility (as implausible as it may be) that this tank ran over some vehicle (or part there of) and the green paint stuck to the tracks.

 Would the Tank Museum have any records of the paints that they found on the tanks they have on display / refurbished.

Never underestimate the power of bad photography.  On another forum, I mentioned how an Imperial Japanese car came in both green and khaki versions.  It turned out it only came in khaki and the green color was the result of faulty photography!