Its that time of year when we should start to pay more attention to certain unappreciated parts of the ol' MkII...especially those poor souls which didn't make it to combat.
Let's look at some of those sub-standard punching holes....
Brit MkIIs - Show us your holes
Its that time of year when we should start to pay more attention to certain unappreciated parts of the ol' MkII...especially those poor souls which didn't make it to combat.
Let's look at some of those sub-standard punching holes....
Venturing into an area of collecting about which one knows little or nothing always feels like testing suspect ground for quicksand..
..but I for one would be interested to know more about these holes. I take it that they were for substandard/rejected for combat use helmets ? In one, two or three grades ? What made them substandard ? etc.....
( I'm always interested to see helmets on e-bay, 'genuine British WW2 Brodie found in a barn near Dieppe etc', but clearly showing three holes... )
Firstly, Happy April 1st!
...now about those holes......one to four were punched into the rim of helmets deemed to be good enough for some use but not ballistically strong enough for combat use. The "sub-standard-ness" was sometimes simply the mixed of metals used...so, nothing outwardly visible.....whilst others are obviously/visibly duff (that's a technical term which I don't want to drift into every day use!)
1 Manganese Steel reject Mk II No.2A Black ? when issued
2 Mild Steel strip Mk II No.2B Grey ?
3 Mild Steel plate Mk II No.2C Grey ?
4 Mild Steel Mk II No.2D Grey ?
...and yes, they OFTEN crop up as Dunkirk / D-Day items on Ebay and the like even though they never reached the Channel....the Grey ones especially are usually "RAF" or "Navy" helmets...just 'cos they're grey!!!!!!
Excellent- that's much clearer already. I look forward to following the thread.....
Martin...you know better than that...it's about BRITISH helmets...the next post will be along in......errrr..........2021.........
...although, I heard that some SS and FJ helmets had holes too........ :-)
Forgive my ignorance, but how did they test a batch of helmets to see if they were 'ballistically strong enough'.
Pretty sure they didn’t test one and then decide whether it needed punching or not....the descision was made at metal type/batch level.....so it was a broad brush job....presumably someone said “that lot will be 2Cs”..........
To keep this 'interest' in British MkII Civil Defence reject helmets going....
What was the rough manufacturing dates for these helmets, my understanding that these were made early war period as the manganese material was being reserved for military but the need for CD was also urgent.
The No.2A, was that rejected quality manganese steel or do they have manufacturing defects? I suspect the former from what I've seen.
Finally was there a scale of who gets No.2As as apposed to No.2Ds, a lot Cs and Ds examples are factory helmets and I wonder if that there was a level of discrimination in value of you head even in the CD world.
Please and thank you
Steve
‘Can’t help you with a lot of that....although my gut feel is that the “holers” were all early.......sorry...... I’ve only read one thing about a specific category of sub-standard being issued to a certain CD grouping....I think any snobbish-ness was around Mk2 v CPHs.
Yes, but those holes were caused in slightly more exciting circumstances!!!!by Composite
Regards
Mark
"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing he cares more about than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature with no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
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