Swedish M37 Helmet

[Steelhead10]

Hi all,

My newest addition to my ever growing steel helmet collection. A Swedish M37, sold as a potential Finnish issue although I doubt this now it is still an interesting helmet to find for any collection. This is painted in an olive drab green which appears to be painted over damage and has a shadow around where the Swedish Tre Kronor (three crowns) Decal would have been.

It retains what looks to be the original grey colour paint internally along with the original liner, albeit with a replaced drawstring and original chinstrap. These are still supple in the leather but do show signs of heavy use.

The shell is stamped with the Three Crowns into the metal above the "69" shell size stamp and a "5131" stamp.

With a picture of it between my Swedish M26 Helmet and Finnish used Hungarian M38/55.

I've tried the front of my thumb out of shot due to injuring it at work and it not being pleasant to look at
I hope you all Enjoy,
Matt

[Greg Pickersgill]

That's a very nice early one, not so easy to find now. Most of those that have been on the market recently are the later refurbs, and also a *lot* of very well-used helmets that had been passed on to Lithuania and Latvia back in the 1990s.

Good clear stamp too, that's not especially common. (Don't ask what it means...I don't know either...)

[Steelhead10]

Hi Greg,

Thanks for the reply. I did note that a lot of them for sale are later refurbs now, it's why I paid a little more than I really wanted to; but I didn't want to pass on one of these in original condition as I had the space to add it too. I didn't have to rearrange anything to fit another one in

I've noted that markings on these vary massively with no conclusive data, apart from size, it appears that "5131" seems to be some serial/production run as I note on Roberto's (OldSteel) thread he has one with the exact same stamp, although as you state not as clearly done.

Matt