Article about: Last week a mate asked me if I was interessted in a M35 helmet that some dude had in his garage. It was a dubble decal M35, without its liner and was repainted in black, but in really good c
Last week a mate asked me if I was interessted in a M35 helmet that some dude had in his garage. It was a dubble decal M35, without its liner and was repainted in black, but in really good condition. As the guy was only asking 40 euro's I said I'll take it without having to see it first.
Today my mate brought me the lid, and when I saw it I just wanted to cry!
What's the story?
The helmet was found in a house some years ago in Belgium, and was in mint condition with no rust and its original liner, chinstrap and dubble decal, Heer and the tricolour. The guy how bought it and who is no military collector, and ho has no knowledge of these things just simply ripped out the liner what he threw in the bin, had it sandblasted to get rid of the decals and sprayed it black! Now he was looking for a modern liner so he could wear it on his Harley. When he came across a modern German helmet kind motorhelmet to wear he never completed this project.
I had hoped he had just painted over the original paint and decals, but as you can see I have removed some of the black paint and underneath its just plain steel, due to the sandblasting. Only the inside is the original Feldgrau, and nicely stamped ET66, and with necknumber 3549.
Why do people do these things, it just makes me wanna cry.
I don't know what to do with it now, there's now place for it in my collection, so I guess I'll just flog it on and maybe somebody will do something with it, but what a waste of a mint DD M35!
Well, today I had another look at it and saw some green paint under the black, so decided to give it a go. I rubbeded the black paint with a delution product and got it all off. Underneath was still about 95% of its original colour, so it was never sandblasted or sandpaperded at all! As a matter of fact it looks quit good now, and I think I'll put in an originel liner and chinstrap. The bad news is that it had no deals.
Its looking like this now;
What do you guys think of it now? Its alot better than is was with that horrible black paint on it. Did I do a good job, or did I overdo the paint removing job? Some of the original paint came of too.
Great job!!! It looks 100% better.
I would put in a liner and chin strap, put the correct decals on it and put it in my collection.
It's terrible that some people don't know the historical value of things.
I think that the guy that should be ashamed of himself.
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