SOS Prussian Inf. Officer Restoration #1, 2014

b.loree

b.loree

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I have established a new sub forum on restoration projects. This one concerns a Prussian Reserve Inf. Officer helme with a number of problems. This helmet has been subjected to a lot of heat as can be seen from the finish. The card board backing on the kokarden was also fused to the shell and had to be sacrificed. Fortunately, I have templates to make new ones which will be painted black like the originals. Besides the backing issue these are the other problems: rear visor restitch, sunken top as there was no support disc, extensive finish crazing, tear to the calf skin sweat band, shell is misshapen and needs blocking, rear visor lining is separating from the visor, cloth liner has some separation issues and needs to be restitched to the liner band and last the thin cane pieces in this cloth have broken. This old beauty has suffered a lot however, all the fittings are there and the chin scales, kokarden, wappen are excellent but quite patinated. I will also be working on the second SOS helmet shown in the pics which has some finish issues but is in much better condition than this one. Some pics:






We will see how well this works out over the next few months.

 
Great Brian, looking forward to your pictures!

Be careful on the Jägermeister while restoring though :D

Regards

Marcel
 
Brilliant. I'm massively excited about the new Restoration subforum - thanks you b.loree!
 
I am swamped with other people's helmets right now so this old beauty has to go on the back burner for now. I am working on the other one seen in the pics.
 
Ok, I am working on about 5 different helmets right now, 3 of which are my own and I finally got some time on this old beauty. The finish on this helmet looks very bad, it was probably stored in an attic where it baked in the summer and froze in the winter. However, despite all the cracks and bubbles the entire finish is still all there, its just moved around a bit. So the solution is that every thing on the helmet has to be sanded and smoothed out using the shellac thinner and cotton ball method already described.
Here is a pic of the shell in the midst of the first sanding. The shell and visors are going to be sanded repeatedly and after each time the brown shellac dust will be melted back into the cracks. So what we are doing here is sanding down the bubbles and ridges and using that finish dust to fill in the crazings. I must admit to being quite pleased (chuffed) with myself for coming up with this method ( sorry but I do think that its cool).
A pic of the first sanding:


Note how that lovely brown dust settles into the cracks and depressions, exactly what we want! I only sanded one half of the shell at a time because I do not want to lose that dust!
This is the helmet after 2 sandings:




The wappen imprint on the front of the shell will not be touched.

You can see in these pics that things are being softened and slightly filled in. I have not touched the visors as yet but the same method will be used. Everything is going to be sanded repeatedly until I get the smooth surface ( as smooth as possible) that I want. I will wait 24 hrs between each sanding to make certain that the surface has dried. No doubt, some finish will have to be used to fill in a bit but why not utilize the old finish which is still there?
 
:-k :-k I'd be 'chuffed' too! Pretty interesting technique. Certainly worth a try. I might even be able to find the right helmet for it.

:D Ron
 
This is where I am at with this helmet today:
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There is still a bit of work to be done and I have started on the front visor as can be seen.This has taken a long time as customer's helmets come first. :)

Rear visor will be next.
 
Ok, so after 1.5 years of off and on restoration, I finally have completed the reservist officer helme. It took me that long, because I had a busy 2015 working on customer's helmets. I think it turned out pretty well, so here are some pics:




Remember, this helmet had been subjected to a lot of heat, the finish had bubbled and the kokarden had fused with the shell. Unfortunately, the original card board backing on the kokarden had to be destroyed in order to get them off the shell. I made new backing, painted them black and put them on the helme after restoration.


The rear visor had separated from the shell and pushed up above the stitch line. Consequently, when the visor was stitched back into place, there was a ridge of melted finish along the back of the helmet. This was sanded and filled in.




Fittings were cleaned and then put back on after the finish work was completed.



 
Once again: an outstanding result. Ready for yet another century !
Thanks for sharing !
Francis
 
Brian,

Superb work again. I really look forward to your restoration posts to see what can be achieved by someone who really knows what he's doing!

Patrick
 
Thank you gentlemen, your comments are much appreciated. It took longer than it should but things turned out quite well.
 
Incredible job! It's great seeing the before and after and gaining an appreciation of how much work you put into it.
 
Thanks Eric....I love a challenge and problem solving plus these pieces are survivors. There were millions produced but their ranks have been thinned.
 
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