RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Thanks for all the help and tips I've already had on here, much appreciated.
My rebuild of my secondhand 'mostly' metal tiger is progressing nicely, all of the electrical components have tested ok (by direct battery connection),so when I install and rewire with my TK7.0 it should all be ok.
I've just started the painting (everything was still bare metal or shiny yellow).
I've primed everything in acrylic red oxide and will shortly start spraying the topcoat with Dunkelbraun (thanks to the tip of about the very rare Dunkelgrau), which I would otherwise have mistakenly used.

I'm now wondering if I should leave any of the exterior as red oxide ? Or did they paint everything in Dunkelbraun ?
Maybe the inside of the wheels, or under the side skirt ?
I've assumed the inside of the hatch lids should be left as red oxide ?

Tigers, even the late ones were all painted in a base of Dunklegelb (German Dark Yellow) which Tamiya does a great version of in both standard shade XF-60 and a lightened version XF- 88. You can also add a dash of XF-57 Buff to the standard stuff to get it lighter.
The primer red oxide undercoat would not have been seen.
The vehicles were assembled out of components that were manufactured all over the place & bought together for completion and the bits were all primed or primed AND base coated before leaving until directed otherwise.
We need to remember that weapons building was still a business, the factories need to be paid, and if the Minister for say Tiger parts was not getting quality control sign off he would not pay or the parts would be fixed at the detriment of the supplier.
Building tanks was and is , a business .

Later on as resources dried up, corners were cut, but not at the decision of the suppliers. The Waffenampt would have had to make a decision to change things based on info from the suppliers, Speer, all of that, then issue a design or process change to the various factories accordingly. Certainly no "willy-nilly "approach!
Imagine if you will the visit from the dudes in the long leather coats if some joker at the Henschel Plant decided that as they were low on Dunklegelb that a Tiger could go out in a green base without authorisation...............nope, visit not good and the boss would not get paid (or worse)

Hatch lid interiors were matched to the outer base colour until very late in the war, but early ones did have a version of white on them. While the entire interior bar a few bits was painted Elfenbien (off-white) or Cremweiss (cream white) the hatch insides were largely base coated so as not to cause a massive counter-camoflage when opened. Lessons no doubt learned from the early ones in service.
Under the guards also painted in base yellow as these were removed for train travel. No point having a racing stripe along the side of a Tiger just because the guards were not fitted or were torn off in action!
The top camo may not have been applied under the guard run though. A lot of camo was field applied & human nature is to not do more work than necessary so the guards fitted would have been painted over, just like the tools.
Modeling though creates a mind-mess when tools are painted over for some reason !!...........Ive done it, but it just doesn't sit well.
Inside the road wheels the same thing, suppliers of wheels would have primed them and very likely base coated them before dispatch to the assemblers. if they were directed to prime only, then thats a directive not a whim. Late Tiger steel wheels would have been base coated all over. Remember that wheels could sit around for a while before being fitted, might be sent as field spares etc so they would need to be suitably protected from devaluing on the shelf so to speak.

Tigers were a Prime Weapon and as such attracted the highest level of attention from the manufacturing process.
Id safely say no corners would have been cut without being strictly directed so.


I love a "lipstick on a pig "restoration job mate, and good on you for taking a wasted model & returning it to glory.

Thanks for the very detailed reply Herman.
The logic of painting the inside of the hatch covers in base coat had escaped me, yes it makes perfect sense now that they would have really stood out in red oxide when opened ! I'll correct that straight away
I've now given the whole thing a couple of coats of Dunkelbrau so I'll take some more pics and post that stage on here.

This stage shows the yellow base coat being sprayed on over the red oxide primer.
I was using Mission Models Dunkelgelb RAL 7028 MMP-011.

Here's the replacement radio gear going in. The original Taigen MCU was faulty so I managed to pick up a secondhand TongDe TD-3.0 unit with controller for £25 on Fleabay, (fairly identical to the Heng Long TK-7.0 I believe. The socket arrangement was completely different so I abandoned the original Taigen small 'daughter' connectors and joined extra long individual component leads directly to the MCU.
Thanks to Jofaur86's helpful replies I managed to get it all working using the IR main gun option from the originalkit, though without bothering with the IR unit itself. I'm thing of using that convenient socket in the commander's hatch to power a small FPV camera/TX with suitable wiring tweaks.

...and here's the assembled exterior view, now that the electrics are fully working.
The initial purchase of the faulty Taigen metal Tiger 1 part built kit had a few parts missing, (the turret gear ring and the intake hoses,1 intake hose clamp, and the plastic connector leading into the engine bay).
I picked up a new ring gear (again, via Fleaby for £5),and carefully dremelled the two extra teeth so that it can 360 now.
The misc extras (tow cables, shovel, etc) still need to be painted and put on.
I may re-do the Camo again though. Methinks I sprayed the green and brown stripes too close together, so it doesn't really resemble any of the layouts in the examples in the links given on here.

I still have the misc external parts to fit, and also the decals.
I tried to cut a stencil for the numbers with 2 inch masking tape,but it didn't work out too well ,so there was a partial respray of the turret side.
So I'm checking out the decal options,,,,

Pretty sure a bunch of the camos out there were field applied. Doesn't look bad at all to me, much better than the one I attempted.

The more I look at it the more I like it, well done!