BW Heer Pilot Wings Opinions

[RamJet]

Just found this thread.


Wings are nice originals.

But I doubt that the "silver" one is a silver one, the colour of the wreath should be the same as the rest of the insignia in this case. As Uwe said: Much probably a faded bronze one.

And @ Uwe:

If You show me ONE Luftwaffe air crew member who put a wing with grey backing on his leather jacket I buy You a crate if beer.

Regardless what the dumb 37/10 says, we (Luftwaffe) used only blue-backing wings and the Marinflieger used dark-blue backed ones, if we do not wear special wing/name patches.

It's over now, on the new green flight stuff we won't see them anymore ...

[speedytop]

Hi Nico and RamJet,

once more, for me the wing in the middle is definitely not a silver one; Nico, please compare it with my silver one in Post 6.


Hi RamJet,

I can say, that leather is not a "Grundtuch", and therefore the regulations could not be valid for leather

Uwe

[RamJet]

Very smartly dodged, Uwe!

[SprogCollector]

Gents,
Thanks again for your comments.

I would agree that my 'silver' wing is just a lighter color bronze. All three wings appear new/unused so fading is not very probable.

If I understand the posts, it appears that Luftwaffe aircrew would wear the blue-backed wings on their leather jackets. The Kunstwadl book has a photo of 4 Marineflieger and you can clearly see the blue-backed naval aircrew wing on the jacket.

I suppose the quoted regulation is open for interpretation and this is how the blue-backed wings are worn on Luftwaffe leather jackets?

Due to the color, would it be correct to presume that my wings are possibly Heer wings specifically intended for the fliegerjacke? Clearly this color backing would not look right if worn on the service jacket since it is a very different shade of grey? This Heer jacket obviously has its wing in matching cloth



A bit off-topic but where can I purchase a BW-style name tape? For the fliegerjacke, I'm presuming this would be black letters on olive?

[Gordon Craig]

Sprogcollector,

Since the wing colour backing would match the service using the jacket I would assume the name tag backing would be of the same colour.
Name tags are readily available on ebay.de but usually in olive background.

Regards,

Gordon

[SprogCollector]

Gordon,
The backing color of my wings would appear to defy the logic of Heer using grey-backed and Luftwaffe using blue-backed wings. My three wings are neither of the two colors but do appear to match the color of the leather jacket. Placing my wings on a Heer grey uniform would make them appear far too dark and far too blue. Placing them on a Luftwaffe blue uniform and they are too light and too grey.

The regulations quoted seemed to imply that the wings would be for Heer or Luftwaffe use on the leather jacket but Ramjet clearly points out that actual practice doesn't support these wings in Luftwaffe use. Marineflieger had their own gold version and they appear to wear them on dark blue backing on the leather jacket.

I've never seen a nametape with a slate-grey backing. Perhaps Ramjet can comment on what nametapes were worn on the Luftwaffe leather jackets?

[Gordon Craig]

Sprogcollector,

It would appear that I was not clear in my previous post. I was only refering to the leather jacket. Not any other uniforms. As for the backings on the name tags. I have only seen four different coloured backings. Olive for the field uniform, blue- with gold lettering for the marine, and green and brown camouflage patterns. That doesn't rule out other colours though.

Regards,

Gordon

[SprogCollector]

Hi Gordon,
Yes. I misinterpreted what you were trying to convey.

Now I need to find some donor rank clip-ons to replace whatever was on the sleeves.

[RamJet]

To the wing backings:

There are two kind of greys used by the Heer: A very light one for high quality private-purchased jackets and a darker one for jackets coming from military stock (which are used by officers/NCOs when they do not want to buy a private uniform. Usually You can distinguish them by the shoulderboards which are not sewn in while on the privately purchased uniforms they always are sewn in). Don't care too much about the backing, it hasn't to match the jacket colour perfectly.

To the name tags on leather flight jackets:

Heer: Black letters on green backing
Luftwaffe: White on blue
Marine: Yellow on dark blue

Of course, now it's black on green for all as the green flight gear is common to all three services and the leather jackets are phased out.

[SprogCollector]

Ramjet,
Are you still allowed to wear the leather jacket and blue flight suits or are they now both officially not to be worn?

Chris

[RamJet]

Transition time.

As long as not everybody has got the new stuff, wearing the old clothing is offically permitted. After that, it is tolerated usually for a longer time.

Interestingly, when I visited the Navy helicopter wing MFG 5 at Kiel in June, I found that the old dark blue flight coveralls are worn by some technical ground personnell ... don't know if officially or just a fashion in this particular wing.

I am on reserve exercise at JG 73 "S" again in November. Will look and keep You informed about what I see.

[SprogCollector]

This appears to be a very old flying jacket but I think it shows the typical wing worn by Luftwaffe pilots. Note the white on blue nametape.

[RamJet]

First one: JaboG 33 patch sewn on in wrong angle. The F-104G silhouette should point to the 8 o'clock position. Type patches like the one under the name tag usually are worn at the sleeve. Of course, there are exceptions.

Second one: JaboG 32 patch sewn on in wrong angle. Eagle's head should point to the 7 o'clock position (note the NATO windrose on the right side). And a pilot name tag with a F-4F silhouette in a Tornado wing?? Also I can't find a name on the tag ...

Third one: Very unusual pilot wing. Black on green nametags happened - I know a Tornado WSO who wears them because it looked more combat like to him, but this is really the exception to the rule.

[SprogCollector]

Interesting comments! These jackets are all listed for sale at a dealer site. So, basically it's unlikely that the improperly attached unit patches are original to the jackets?

I found a few images showing the Heer wing in wear on the service uniform which does appear somewhat darker than the grey jacket so, as noted, my wings might just be from a batch with a different shade of grey.

For the silver-grade of wing, I found this issue on an earlier thread which clearly shows the silver as the same color as the rest of the embroidery. I found the double-wing to be interesting. I'm not sure how common this practice is or whether this is merely some type of unrelated photo? US practice is that former non-rated aircrew would never wear their non-pilot wings together with their rated pilot wings. US pilots qualified by more than one branch could wear their 'extra' wings above the upper right pocket.


When I was attending helicopter training at Fort Rucker, Alabama (1980s) there was a sizeable contingent of BW pilot trainees -- some Heer and some Luftwaffe. Most were junior NCOs. Does the Bundeswehr still have NCO pilots or are these trainees commissioned upon completion of their training?

My last observation is that in looking through the photos I have (not a lot of them), I have yet to find a photo showing a Heer pilot wearing wings on his leather jacket. All seem to have the olive nametape on the left side and a shield-type unit crest on the right side. Again, this is from a small smpling of photos so maybe not a very accurate picture of real-world practices.

[RamJet]

I think that is just a dressman's photo on an ad - as You said, no rated pilot wears a lower grade wing additionally. And the national flag on the sleeve is missing. Looking closer to the shadows of the wings they seem not sewn on but merely loosely attached.

The Bundeswehr still has NCO pilots, but only flying helos. Heer for sure, Luftwaffe - I just don't know, has to check. Fixed wing pilots are all officers.

In the early years of the Bundeswehr there were even NCO jet pilots in the Luftwaffe (not with the Marineflieger, there the jetties all were officers from the beginning). In the early 70s that changed.