RLM hobby paint comparison chart

Hi all,
I am not sure if I have these posted before. But here is the background info from when I made them a couple of years ago.

I have compiled a colour chart of RLM paint chips taken from Merrick's book (Luftwaffe Camouflage and Markings 1933-1945 Vol.2 2005) along with a couple from the Kookaburra book by J. Smith (The Modeller's Luftwaffe Painting Guide 1979) and their claimed hobby paint equivalents from Testor's Model Master enamels and acryl range, Humbrol Enamels, Tamiya acrylics, WEM enamels, Life color arcylics, Vallejo Model Air and Model Color acrylics, Polly Scale acrylic and JPS acrylic paints.

The small notations under some paint matches(2:34, 5:116) is firstly the ratio and secondly the paint number (for Tamiya and Humbrol mixes).

'HCS' refers to a mix as per the old Humbrol Colour Systems book.

JPS paint was included as Mr. Popp, who makes this paint in Germany, worked in conjunction with Mr. J. Kiroff, who was the paint technology advisor in Merrick's book, to make the JPS range of paints.

You will note a couple of alternate colour chips (2005 Merrick versus 1979 Smith) for RLM79 and 83 and that different manufacturers have made their matches to one colour but not the other (IE Model Master to the 1979 Smith version for RLM79 and 83 and JPS to the 2005 Merrick darker RLM83 colour).

I am missing the JPS RLM79 paint (can anyone point me to a bottle?).

Some of the information may be out of date as the sources I have used may not be current.
Please note that the Humbrol site makes NO claim that the names on their tins represent the same colour as the names of the camouflage used on the planes we are modelling (ie RLM colours)!!

You can download them from my site in the links section: http://www.petersplanes.com/links.htm

I have also produced a Excel sheet for Tamiya, Humbrol and other paint equivalents for (most) RLM, French, Italian, RAF/FAA and USA colours. This is available from my website for downloading in the links section http://www.petersplanes.com/RLM%20colour%20chart.xls (http://www.petersplanes.com/links.htm)

It now has 16 references of suggestions for various mixes to achieve (supposedly) a match to the actual WW2 colours.

Remember these are other peoples suggestions as to what they thought was a best match and I have only compiled them into this one spot.

I have added some notes about some of the paint suggestions and mixes in the RLM section as to what I have tried against the Merrick colour chips (some are way off!).

My aim was to include as many paint mixes from varied sources in ONE spot as I could so that a quick and easy comparison can be done. And allow you to see the variety that other people think is a good match and decide for yourself. Also RGB and CMYK numbers are given to allow you to do correct colours on computer generated images or even to take it to the local paint shop and get them to mix up a batch in acrylic or enamel paints!

For example looking at RLM 83 there are at least 8 'recipes' most of them different from each other.

Chart 1:
Attachment 116065

Chart 2:
Attachment 116066


I hope you find these useful and that it will allow you to decide what paint is the better match for your Luftwaffe paint schemes.


Here is a updated RLM hobby paint comparison chart.
I have made the background in each row the same colour as the RLM paint chip (from the centre column) to hopefully show the difference better between the hobby colour and the RLM colour.
Chart 1:
Attachment 116063

Chart 2:
Attachment 116064

Fantastically useful - thank you for the hard work and for sharing!

Being partially colorblind, not only do I find stuff like this incredibly useful, but rather fascinating, too.
Thanks for all your hard work in putting this together!

Thats a lot of work, thanks

Yes Peter, the sheer work that you have put into that chart merits some Kudos.
Thanks for posting it.:thankyou:
Rob.:thumbsup:

:salute: Fantastic work there Peter. Well Done!:thankyou:

Interesting--how's your work compare to the chart at Paint4Models.net?

Hi,
Paint4Models.net uses (to my understanding) NOT the actual paint from the manufacturer BUT rather the 'colour swatch' as provided by the manufacturer (and these are printed and not the actual paint).

I have compiled a colour chart of RLM paint chips taken from Merrick's book (Luftwaffe Camouflage and Markings 1933-1945 Vol.2 2005) along with a couple from the Kookaburra book by J. Smith (The Modeller's Luftwaffe Painting Guide 1979) and the claimed hobby paint 'equivalents' from 8 or 9 common hobby paints.
The colour chips were made in Mr.Kiroff's factory from the RLM specifications. He also makes this paint for use on full size restorations (as well as the JPS line of model paints, which is why they are the closest to the RLM chips!!) and so I imagine the restorers of the wonderful flying planes you see now (well at least some of them) use his paint.
see:
http://www.rlm-farben.de/en/research.html
and:
http://www.kiroff.de/anwendungen/rlm...n.html?start=4
and:
http://www.rlm-farben.de/images/stor...lackketten.pdf

I guess (but am no expert) that most modern computer monitors will display all colours reasonably well and that for the sake of hobby comparison (and not professional comparison) it will suffice to see them displayed like this. If your monitor is out in it's colour rendition of a particular hue then both the RLM chip and the hobby paint 'equivalent' would be out similarly (up to a point anyway).

But basically this is as good as you are going to get, I think and will allow each modeller to decide for themselves what is a colour they are happy with in comparison to these chips.
So this chart compares RLM chips made by a factory that uses paint made to the same specifications as the RLM issued in WW2 and directly compares it to the paint out of the bottle (recognising that different hobby paints may vary with different batches AKA old Humbrol!!) of hobby paint makers who claim that this paint matches a particular RLM colour.
OFTEN close enough is good enough! And I certainly have used paints form different makers on my models that side by side look different, but i explain that away due to like in WW2 Germany there were differences in paint batches and of course old versus new or weathered paint.

Many thanks for your great work Peter.

Here is another comparison table for Vallejo paints

Thank you for all your hard work to produce such a valuable aid, Peter. :thumbsup:

While I appreciate‎ the work you put into this comparison, I have to add that RLM colors varried considerably by manufacturer, especially late in the war, when supplies were limited and production aims had to be met. So personally I would advise a new model builder (and some experianced ones too) to use the color he has the best feeling with (such as opacity, drying time, crumbliness, etc.).

Florian,
Did you read the last sentence of my last post above (number 8) "due to like in WW2 Germany there were differences in paint batches".
Besides, you are missing the point. The chart is just showing you what various hobby paints look like compared to each other and what is considered to be THE reference for RLM colours. It is for YOU, the modeller, to pick the hobby paint YOU like.

Peter, respect for the tables! Rep on the way!

I missed this topic before, and it was my huge mistake :)

This could also be interesting for those painting German Luftwaffe aircrafts of WW2.

RML Colors of the German Luftwaffe

Sascha