Like all bureaucratic organisations the Reichsluftfahrt Ministerium (State Ministry for Aviation), or RLM for short, tried to standardize as many things as possible and one of these was colors of paint, which were known by a RLM number. For example late war dark green being RLM 83. In the following list are the most important RLM colors, their official description, an approximate US Federal Standard color code and sample.

 

RLM #	NAME	DESCRIPTION	FS #	SAMPLE
RLM 01	SILBER	SILVER	17178
RLM 02	RLM GRAU	GREY	36307
RLM 04	GELB	YELLOW	33538
RLM 21	WEIß	WHITE	37886
RLM 22	SCHWARZ	BLACK	37038
RLM 23	ROT	RED	31136
RLM 24	DUNKELBLAU	BLUE	35052
RLM 25	HELLGRÜN	GREEN	24108
RLM 26	BRAUN	BROWN	30109
RLM 27	GELB	YELLOW	33637
RLM 28	WEINROT	MAROON	20061
RLM 61	DUNKELBRAUN	DARK BROWN	30040
RLM 62	GRÜN	GREEN	34159
RLM 63v.1	GRÜNGRAU	GREEN-GREY	36307
RLM 63v.2	LICHTGRAU	LIGHT GREY	36492
RLM 65	HELLBLAU	LIGHT BLUE	26329
RLM 66	SCHWARZGRAU	BLACK-GREY	36081
RLM 70	SCHWARZGRÜN	BLACK-GREEN	34052
RLM 71	DUNKELGRÜN	DARK GREEN	34079
RLM 72	GRÜN	GREEN	34058
RLM 73	GRÜN	GREEN	34092
RLM 74v.1	GRÜNGRAU	GREY-GREEN	36081
RLM 74v.2	GRÜNGRAU	GREY-GREEN	16099
RLM 75	GRAUVIOLETT	GREY-VIOLET	26231
RLM 76	LICHTBLAU	LICHT BLUE	36473
RLM 77	HELLGRAU	LIGHT GREY	36492
RLM 78	HELLBLAU	BLUE	35414
RLM 79	SANDGELB	SAND-YELLOW	33434
RLM 79	SANDBRAUN	SAND-BROWN	30129
RLM 80	OLIVGRÜN	OLIVE-GREEN	34096
RLM 81v.1	BRAUNVIOLETT	BROWN-VIOLET	30118
RLM 81v.2	BRAUNVIOLETT	BROWN-VIOLET	30045
RLM 81v.3	BRAUNVIOLETT	BROWN-VIOLET	34086
RLM 82	LICHTGRÜN	BRIGHT GREEN	34128
RLM 83	DUNKELGRÜN	DARK GREEN	34083
RLM 84v.1	GRAUBLAU	GREEN-BLUE	35622
RLM 84v.2	GRAUBLAU	GREEN-BLUE	34432
RLM 84v.3	GRAUBLAU	GREEN-BLUE	34554

A note of warning - although I did my best to include approximate samples of the RLM colors, I can not guarantee their accuracy. I've used many different sources and sometimes the difference was so big that I had to make a choice. Just look at them as an extra, although I'm pretty confident that they are close - in as much the FS numbers and the on screen sample. I did not compare ACTUAL RLM color chips to the FS color fan, so bear with me...

NOTE: THIS PAGE IS IN NEED OF REVISION.

Please send any comments, suggestions or corrections to rhorta@xs4all.nl