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Swedish M37 helmets

Article about: Good Morning to all, I want to show you my little collection of Swedish M37 helmets, I'm not a great expert on these helmets, but it is a model that I like a lot and I consider it very moder

  1. #21

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    Probably Eskilstuna Stalpressnings AB in Eskilstuna

  2. #22

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    The Swedish M37 was also used by The Danish Brigade trained and equipped in Sweden 43-45. It's extremely rare as the brigade never exceeded 5,000 men including all support functions and air and naval personnel.

    Swedish M37 helmets

    Swedish M37 helmets

    Swedish M37 helmets

  3. #23

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    The Swedish M37. It's just not 'warry' enough is it. Taken for granted as just an 'ordinary helmet', and Advanced Collectors barely notice it much less wonder "If only it could talk...". But there's a lot going on with this sturdy, serviceable, and attractive little thing.

    As you know, Professor, this basic helmet was in service for at least fifty years and went through three major changes. The shells remain the same (leaving aside possible changes in weight due to material changes, minor manufacturing differences etc) but there have been three liners and three chinstrap types used, all of them substantially different. The three liners are shown below, the leather being the earliest, Swedish-made, essentially the same as on previous Swedish helmets. The second is the dome-mounted Schuberth I-53 liner as seen in West German police/BGS helmets of the early 1950s; this version was introduced 1960-62, and in collector-speak is known as either the M37/60 or M37/62 depending on who you're reading. (As far as I know the Swedes made no distinctions.). The third and last is another Schuberth liner, this one mounted on plastic supports riveted into the shell, and is usually known as the M37/65.

    One thing I am interested in is how much modernisation of earlier-made shells went on. It has been said, for example, that all the shells with the second liner were newly-made for that liner, and have only two external rivets for the chinstrap connectors. I know this is not right because I have two examples with the I-53 liner which have blind rivets closing off the holes left by removal of the original leather liner. I'm very interested in hearing about others.

    Also, I have two M37/I-53 which have chinstraps with the US-type as shown here, which is a sort of T-1 but without the ball fitting. The theory is that all these later M37 helmets have the loop-type fastening as on the West German M1A1, as show in the image of liner 3. Obviously not correct.

    And one more question - what do the stamps an almost every M37 mean? Found along the inner rim, they are surprisingly varied, and may indicate maker and year of manufacture. Mine include -

    69 K, 72 S 41, 75 S 42, Three Crowns 72, Swedish Army Crest 75, and a very late made shell with a white ink stamped Crown 72, AL-E 70.

    The one thing we can be sure of is that 69, 72, 75 are size markings. If the appended '41' and '42' on two of these are dates, then I have a fully refurbished 1942 shell with the third-pattern liner. Wow. Yeah. And is 'S' for Sandvik? 'K' for ?

    Please post any and all observations of your examples. Nothing is too obvious.

    Swedish M37 helmets

    Swedish M37 helmets

    Swedish M37 helmets

    Swedish M37 helmets

  4. #24

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    Here's what I mean about the blind rivets with the type 2 (I-53) liner. If you see the side shot of the shell there are obviously three rivets visible (therefore six in all). Notionally, if these were new-build shells for this top-mounted liner there would be only two rivets, the larger ones midway for the chinstrap. But no, there are six, four blind rivets closing off the holes where the type 1 liner pads would have been secured - see second picture.

    I have pretty much convinced myself that the plastic section of the type 3 liner is formed to be secured in exactly the same places as where the original six rivets on the original M37 are, therefore no new holes required when refurbing old shells. All very clever.

    NB it is also true that shells with just two rivets for the straps and type 2 liner exist. I have one. So obviously there were new-build shells at about that time.

    Swedish M37 helmets Swedish M37 helmets

  5. #25

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    Steady on the case. Finding and trying to decode the stamps, which are on virtually every M37.

    Anything including 'SJ' with a horizontal arrow through the letters is Sandvik, and all seem to have a two digit year suffix. eg '41'. Sandvik seems to be the only maker to actively identify themselves at any point (though the AL-E on late white stamped shells may indicate a maker). For all I know they're all made by Sandvik and they only used that specific stamp in the 1940s. (Does anyone have a shell with a pre-1940 stamp?)

    Helmets with the tre-kronor or shield motif theoretically denoted whether for armed services or various branches of civil defence. This isn't clear and anyway there's a *lot* of overlap and change of use.

    There are many others with simply a size number followed by a letter. I have so far seen H. K, L and M. I have no idea what this means; twenty years ago a Swedish collector suggested that this indicated manufacturing plants, but I am not convinced.

    Later, end-run, production helmets have a white ink/paint stamp, inside a rectangle, as described in a previous post. It includes what I believe is the year, eg '73'.

    Be all a lot easier if there was even *one* book about Swedish helmets. In *any* language. But oh no.

  6. #26

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    Thanks Greg, for these further studies and hypotheses.
    Lots of interesting info, actually until today I don't think I have found in-depth explanations on the subject.

    Regards

  7. #27

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    a book....mmmmm......as someone said to me a long long time ago "should be written by someone who has number of these things....someone who likes them....someone who already knows more than most"....mmmm....let me take a moment to look around the room and see if I can see any candidates...........mmmm........no......oh....wai t a minute.......over there......in the Wales bit of the UK....pinkish shirt, grey hair.........hey you....yes you..... do you have a pen and paper?

    ;-)

  8. #28

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    The only think I use a pen and paper for is shopping lists. If its worth writing its worth doing on a keyboard. However, until Stefan (Anbratt?) in Sweden gets on with his ten-years late promise, I might be the last best hope. We continue.

    I have been picking at the 'AL-E' stamp on later M37. Taking it is probably true that Eskilstuna Jarnverk really did have a hand in most Swedish steel helmets (as claimed in Casques de Combat Tome 3) I employed my utterly useless Swedish and found that EJ were taekn over by Alfa-Laval in the 1960s (vague, yes, I'm a bit lacking a useful Swede here, which is odd as I know several but not one of them remotely militaria fans). Could then the 'AL-E' be actually ALFA-LAVAL - ESKILSTUNA? Definately maybe, but probably not. Steady on the case. In a minute I will start assuming that those '75 K' type stamps really are all Eskilstuna Stalpressnings products with an alphabetical batch number. See how dangerous this is.

  9. #29

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    Figure I might as well toss my hat, err, helmet into the ring here and post my example.
    Swedish M37 helmets
    Swedish M37 helmets
    It is marked 69K
    Swedish M37 helmets
    But on one of the liner tabs, it is marked A2 with a single Swedish crown stamped above. Does anyone else have a similar marking?
    Swedish M37 helmets

  10. #30

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    I'm sure I have seen something like that marking on the leather, but it must have been on an M26 or M21. I have just one original-form leather liner M37 and that has a simple '75' size stamp, nothing else.

    By the way, my feeling is that the first series with leather liners is uncommon verging on rare (probably not in Sweden but that's no use here in Wales...). think yourself lucky! My theory is that they were substantially wiped out in the conversions to the type 2 and then 3 liners.

    Curiously, the type 2 (I53, metal spider) liner seems comparatively common even though it was fairly quickly superceded by the type 3, and the 3, plastic clips and pull-out liner, is most usually seen. Mind you, *none* of these are especially easy to find now; and it isn't long ago that all those Advanced Colectors were going on about how dull common and ordinary they are. Definately harder to get than any TR helmet now. Bah.

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