Spike and Rim colors of M1915 Pickelhaube??

L

lettucetogod

New member
HI,
I recently bought a M1915 Pickelhaube on Ebay. On the helmet, The rim and spike seem to be painted a different color and the wappen is not painted at all. I know that towards the end of the war the German Army began painting the helmet parts green but the color of my spike seems to be a gray green while the rim is a dark green. Also, some of the paint is chipping and a gold brassy color is being revealed in some areas. I was just wondering if someone could tell me why this is? Thanks

Tyler
 
Hi

Indeed, the spike looks curious.

Is the spike removable?

Could you put a picture of the inside of the shell?

Eric
 
Tyler my first impression is that the spike and base are reproductions. The shape of the spike does not look right. I'm with Eric though can we see more pictures? Thanks for the post and welcome!
 
Hi,
the spike is removable, and the inside of the shell has a name and letters on it. In the picture of the spike, you can see the gold underneath the paint at the tip. I did some measurments of the base and spike to see if they were the sizes that a few reliable sites I found said they should be, and the base has a 8 cm diameter and the spike is 8.5 cm tall. Thanks for the help!

Tyler



 
Hi Tyler,
Welcome to the forum, I am afraid that I have a bit of bad news, the helmet shell apeares to be a converted fireman's helmet, the spike does not look like any original I have seen.
By the way, are you a lettuce grower?
Best wishes
Gus
 
Thanks for the news, I was just wondering how you know it is from a fireman's helmet? Also, I'm not a lettuce grower haha. Do you think that there is any possibility that this helmet could have been manufactured when supplies were in the beginning stages of running out; thus they may have used other helmets that were lying around?

Thank you very much,

Tyler
 
Hi Tyler,
The fireman's helmet has a comb the ran from the high front to the rear peak (visor), the stiching holes seen on the inside of the helmet fit the pattern (although the comb was usually brass and attached with several studs), in my limited opinion, there is very little chance that this would be a war time conversion. There are a lot of helmets out there that are converted, the fact that the spike seems to be a reproduction and the Wappen (front plate) does not match the finish of the visor trim would tell me that this is an assembled piece.
Best wishes
Gus
ps. it is a good place to start a collection of many of these fasinating helmets.
 
Tyler,
Here is an example of the fireman's "comb"
fakecoffeewappen.jpg


You can see the shape of the comb in thread in your picture. Under the spike on the inside there is normally a support disk. Round in metal.
DSC01153.jpg
 
Actually, I have one last question. I'm going to fix this helmet up just for display purposes next to my steel helmets, and I would like to know what you guys think I should do. Would it be better to leave it as is, or reveal the brass underneath of the green paint on the spike and rim? Thanks

Tyler
 
Hi Tyler,
If you strip the paint off the brass, then you need to have a brass Wappen to match, the mixture of brass and steel parts is another way to ID a put together helmet. The easyest thing to do is leave it as it is.
Best wihses
Gus
 
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