Pilotka from Espenlaub 1943 dated

[llegion]

Hi everyone,

I would like to present you my newest purchase. This is a nicely stamped mid-war pilotka from the Samoilova factory with some salt paired with a fairly rare red-lacquered wartime star. Supposedly this came from a veterans' family. Does anyone know why some pilotkas from 1941 onwards made by the Samoilova factory have sweatbands and some do not? And does anyone know where the Samoilova factory was located?

Thank you.

P.S. the staff from Espenlaub are very good to deal with and they are flexible on quite a lot of items. Everything went very smoothly.

[Gabriele]

Hello Legion,

I congratulate with you for the purchase of this fabulous pilotka A very nice example, I like everything of it. The guys of Espenlaub are simply a garantee

About Samoilova plant, if I'm correct it was in Leningrad, they continued the production during the war. The plant was founded in 1834 and renamed in 1922 after the name of Konkordya Samoilova.

Konkordiya Samoilova - Wikipedia

Best regards and keep going with the collection.

Gabriele

[Marcel Banziger]

Very nice one!!! Congrats

I agree, Espenlaub is very good to deal with. They became quite pricy though. Some items are ridiculously overpriced unfortunately.

[llegion]

A practically identical pilotka dated 1946 just appeared on Espenlaub. Not sure how to feel about this.

[Gabriele]

Hi Llegion,

Please elaborate your doubts, do you believe that the marking in your pilotka is not genuine?

To me looks like a good one, I don't see signs of alteration in the markings. Also, I don't think the product of the Samoilova plant of 1946 would differ much from the wartime period. In all honesty, I would be proud to own the 1946 made listed on espenlaub, the production of immediate postwar time is not common

Best regards
Gabriele

[Bagration]

he guys of Espenlaub are simply a garantee

I would say no ... clearly, some strange stories about them and i'm a witness of that.

[Gabriele]

Hello Bagration,

I'm surprised to hear that, my experience with Espenlaub is limited but excellent and I always heard good things about them. Would you like to share such stories with us?

Best regards
Gabriele

[Bagration]

Sure thing ! since you ask.

4 years ago (don't remember exactly) I sell to them my ssh36 that you can see here it's my own photos ... note that he didn't had any chinstrap.





And a year later ... he was back on espenlaub website ... but with a totaly different story, found in a barn in Estonia and even a name was added with ink ... and not just a random name but to Belogurov Georgiy a champion of an army contest !

(orignal link but don't work anymore : M 36, late war Khalhngolga steel helmet with history- Steel Helmets)

The price was above 1000€ and he was sold really quickly ... the add was still visible even so for a time but was recently removed for a reason, still ... i manage to take a screen the day I've seen it so here you go, enjoy ... it's litteraly the same helmet and you can see were the name is written, nothing was there even if the helmet was cleaned so everything was modified to make it more attractive, selling a good helmet with a fake story.





Here you can compare the photo took by me and after his "found in a barn" ... anyway the ink is even inside the scratches if you take a closer look.



Serial number of the helmet is also the same : 3-1347, same space between numbers ... in case you are still uncertain.

[Marcel Banziger]

The 'found in Estonia' was also used with an Ushanka which they in fact bought from the E-stand on the WAF. But adding a name and chinstrap and claiming all is original is just criminal in my eyes.

[Bagration]

The 'found in Estonia' was also used with an Ushanka which they in fact bought from the E-stand on the WAF. But adding a name and chinstrap and claiming all is original is just criminal in my eyes.

Yeah so respectful of the veteran and history (they even added a picture of him with the helmet) ... so that's why i have hard time to trust Espenlaub items, if they can make such "ink modification", i guess they can modify others items too to make them more sellable ...