Shoulder strap loops.

[Charlie_Brown]

Ahoy Gents,
I'm a complete BW noob so please can can someone explain the purpose of the coloured sholder strap loops and what the different colours mean, platoon, branch? I have a moleskin jacket which came with blue loops.


Sorry that I need more guidance,
Regards,
Phil.

[Klaus1989]

The loops on field uniform ("Litzen" in German, not to confuse with old name for collar tabs) designate Truppengattung (troop unit type). They will match "Waffenfarbe" on service uniform shoulderboards. All infantry units for example are green and artillery red.

There are two colours of blue:
dark blue = Sanitätstruppe (medical service)
light blue = Technische Truppen (technical troops)

The left column are all Waffenfarben the Bw (found on modelling site):
http://autoflaggen.de/bw/bw_allg_wafarben.htm

regards
Klaus

[Charlie_Brown]

Thanks Klaus,

So I have a Technische Truppen jacket.

Phil

[Gordon Craig]

Phil,

These things are never as straight forward as they seem. I aksed a question recntly that is related to yours and the answer is found here. http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...d.php?t=428723

If your moleskin jacket has a badge of some kind on it that is directly related to medical troops or technical troops that makes life much easier. Without that, it is up to you decided what sort of unit the tunic belonged to.

Confused yet?

Regards,

Gordon

[hoover]

I think "Technische Truppen" is the wrong term.

It means Logistiktruppen and includes Transportation, repair and supply units.

[Collectinsteve]

I agree with Gordon that it could be tough to tell what sort of blue you have without something to directly compare against. The other one that can be quite difficult to differentiate is Flugabwehrtruppe and Artillerie. Exposure to sunlight certainly doesn't help any!

Steve

[speedytop]

Hi hoover:

I think "Technische Truppen" is the wrong term.

It means Logistiktruppen ...

Since 1959 "mittelblau" (mid-blue) is for Technische Truppe (Technische Truppen).

http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...20080518070116

It was divided in Technische Truppe (Instandsetzung) and Technische Truppe (Nachschub).

The Bundeswehr "Technischen Truppen" had been the Logistik-Truppen.

Now we have Heereslogistiktruppen.

http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...20100307120849

Uwe

[Klaus1989]

I think "Technische Truppen" is the wrong term.

It means Logistiktruppen and includes Transportation, repair and supply units.

Technische Truppen is what my 2007 copy Der Reibert says. If they have it wrong, who can you trust?!

Edit: Just saw Uwe's post and it explains why.

regards
Klaus

[Charlie_Brown]

Hi,

Well I have a set of the light blue loops and the dark ones and the ones on the tunic are the identical colour to the light blue ones,


Phil

[hoover]

I was incorrect. In the actual Reibert light blue is for "Technische Trupopen", and they consisting Logistik and Maintanance (Instandsetzung).-

Shame on me

[Gordon Craig]

Hi,

Well I have a set of the light blue loops and the dark ones and the ones on the tunic are the identical colour to the light blue ones,


Phil

Phil,

Everyone here is trying to help with your original question but I fear that we have only complicated the issue for you. Your original question was rather simple. You had a pair of slip on shoulder board loops, in blue, as used on field tunics. In your case, a moleskin one. With a moleskin tunic, if it does not have any badges on it other than name and rank, the options as far as you are concerned are one of two. Medical or non-medical. To stay away from conflicting terms we will use the general term Technical Troops for the shade of blue worn by non-medical personnel. Your comment above indicates that you actually have two sets of slip-on loops. One light blue and one dark blue. Simply put, the lighter of the two colours would have been worn by someone asociated with Medical troops and the darker blue with non-medical troops.
Now lets move on and make it complicated again. I've taken pictures of two of my tunics to illustrate the shade of blue that would be worn by someone associated with the medical branch and someone that is not. I will also show the arm badges on these tunics as examples of what I meant by my first comment on this thread.
The first tunic is to a soldier assigned to Sanitätskommando I, Kiel which is indicated by the arm badge on the left arm. He wears blue collar tabs and blue pipping on his shoulder boards. He is a medical trained soldier as indicated by the Tatigkeitsabzeichen over the right pocket.

[Gordon Craig]

Next up a picture of the collar tabs and the shoulder boiards together. Being made by different companies the blue is a different shade. If you took these boards off the tunic it would be very difficult to assign them to one of the two possible groups. Something that can also happen with the loops like you were asking about. By themselves and without a good point of reference like the two tunics I am going to post pictures of it would be very difficult to decide what branch they belonged to.

[Gordon Craig]

Next up, a tunic worn by a soldier not connected to the medical branch. His arm badge indicates he is assigned as follows. The text is from Kunswadl's book. The image in the book shows three different arm badges but we are concerned only with the one shown on the tunic;
"Die Verbandabzeichen des Heeresamptes, Köln, Des Materialamtes der Heeres, später Logistikzentrum des Heeres, Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler"

"The arm badges of the army Material Command, Cologne, the office for material of army, later the logistics center of the army, Bad- Neuenahr-Ahrweiler"

This officer does not wear any Tactical insignia so it is impossible to say what sort of position he filled at the headguarters unit where he served.

[Gordon Craig]

A view of the collar tabs and the shoulder boards on this tunic. The shade of blue on the two items on this tunic match exactly and would be easier to identify if they were not on a tunic.

[Gordon Craig]

The pictures above are a perfect example of how difficult it is to differentiate between the two shades of blue in photographs. With the tunics side-by-side the colour difference is very noticable.
Now, back to my first comment where Uwe was differentiating between who would wear a Techischespersonal Tatigkeitsabzeichen. I took the photo below from a post made by Uscha today of the tunic he wore in the BW. The arm of service colour has nothing to do with Technical Troops yet he wears a Techischespersonal Tatigkeitsabzeichen. Just for your info and to perhaps illustrate my earlier point better.

Regards,

Gordon