Commonwealth MkII Helmet & Liner Manufacturers

[tinlid]

Hi Xavier,
It's Clydesdale stampings 1940.

[Mark K]

Here is a we bit of an oddity and as Hong Kong was a British colony at the time I thought it was worthy of mention..
The Mk II helmet body itself is thought to have been produced by Chiap Hua Iron and steel works but unfortunately it is un-stamped so there are only period images and a few other examples known that can be used for comparison...
The liner itself is well marked though and was manufactured in Hong Kong by the Chiap Hua Manufacturing and is nicely dated to 1941 and in a size 7

Regards Mark

[WWH]

Thanks Mark, that's a great helmet you have !
I've had this mark one the manufacturer page.

Thanks for your help.

[NZEF2]

Thank you so much Mick for your highly informative thread. This helmet arrived on my doorstep today. Purchased in a local online auction I paid $116NZ for it and I think I did pretty well. I was able thanks to your info to confirm that it is a nice near complete early production Australian MkII helmet with a British made MkI liner and strap lugs. Helmet is stamped CS 13083, the liner is marked size 7 BH & G (Barrow Hepburn & Gale -- London,England) - 1939. The strap lugs are stamped 1939 also. It's also likely this helmet may have been supplied to New Zealand complete in the early war period before Australia then began the supply of helmet shells and Dunlop liners that were then locally assembled in NZ once local industry started producing parts. I guess the question is has anyone else seen this type of helmet and any information pertaining would be gratefully received. Enjoy!

Regards, Ian

[tinlid]

Very nice helmet, I guess Australain, as they too like NZ helmets had the British style Mk2 chin strap lugs, and British liners. But maybe it could have been used by NZ, but I know the chin strap lugs had NPZ on them. Either way, a nice helmet to have.
Any chance you could trace the service number?

[NZEF2]

Funny thing was at first I think quite a few of us thought it was an nPz example and the bidding was climbing quite steadily until I asked to see some closeups. Became a three way tussle among us who were after a beauty early Aussie helmet. The doubt creeps in where I have observed the majority of Australian helmets have the later lugs. Question remains, early pattern helmet fitted with British parts? . On the inscription I think it reads NX 96553 or maybe NX 76553. I can now confirm that the prefix NX is indeed Australian as evidenced by those seen on WWII Australian dog tags. Be awesome to find out who wore this lid.

[NZEF2]

Have spent a part of today doing some research and CSI type photo manipulation, have come down to the best three candidates as the soldier who was issued this helmet. Managed to find an archive website and these are the what I believe to be the most likely based on either NX96553 or NX96353 and NX76353. Depending on how you see it the fifth character can look either like a 5 or like a 3. The third character I'm pretty sure is a 9 but on entering a 7 in it's place yielded a result with the fifth character as a 3 (NX76353). Confused, no wonder!

I personally feel comfortable with the NX96353 option or link number 1. On wetting of the area the fifth character jumps as a 3. So if correct I can name that Australian soldier as Corporal EDWIN DUDLEY HOLMES, posting at discharge on 7 Nov 1945 at HQ 32 HVY AA BTY that was based in Port Moresby, New Guinea. That's getting awfully close to the Japanese for any kind of comfort. More research to come but for now my head is spinning.

1/ World War Two Nominal Roll

2/ World War Two Nominal Roll

3/ World War Two Nominal Roll

[tinlid]

That's great to add a name to an item.

[Jerry B]

Looking at other sites lists of liner makers, all have CCL as Christy & Co Limited rather than Charles Collet Limited as is listed here, except GHW which has it as both in different posts?

[Composite]

....OK, taking a short drive down Tangent Boulevard here but stick with it.....it's still about WW2 Brit liners.....please does anyone know anything about these stamps?



They can be found on the inside of the cloth headband on some liners....it appears to say "OK" and I'm assuming they're Q/C stamps like those punched into some of the liner "arms" of the frame.

Does anyone else have examples as I'm keen to see if there's any variations?...and on the basis this one seems to say "No14" I'm expecting there to be at least 13 others!! :-)

I'm assuming that the No14 bit refers to operator/inspector.......and "BB" the manufacturing company perhaps...it would be interesting to find one on a Q/C stamped liner as I'm guessing the headband Inspector differed from the frame Inspector???


...it doesn't get better than this right?.....who needs decals when we've got rubber stamping?.......decals? schmecals!!!!!