Belt identification help needed

[Collectinsteve]

Hi all!

I've had the following three belts for a while and decided it's time to bug you guys to find out what they are. We had a discussion about the first two belts and the conclusion is they were used by organizations such as LSHD, Feuerwehr, THW, ZB, etc. I found the thread here:

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...s+radio&page=3

The question I have is if there is a difference between the khaki and olive drab belts? Meaning, did one service get x and the other y? Or is one earlier and one later? Here is a comparison of the two side by side:



I also have this odd belt. It appears to be for trousers, as it is narrow and has the same buckle as Splittertarn belts. I don't have a Arbeitsdienst belt to compare against, but I thought that was made from HBT cotton and not webbing. Here's a picture:



I thought I saw a picture of something similar in Schuster's book, however I couldn't find anything tonight when I looked through. Any ideas?

Thanks!

Steve

[blake485]

belts

those are early west german BW belts. sometimes they were dyed black for patrol reasons and i will dig up some fotos for them.

[blake485]

belts

here is a foto for comparision

[Collectinsteve]

Very nice color photo! However, these belts are not the same as the early BW belts. They are often called early BGS belts, but they are not that either. These belts are for the FuG 6 radio and were used by disaster relief agencies, such as LSHD, THW, Feurwehr, etc.

Many early non-military/BGS uniformed forces were very similar to BW and/or BGS items. Sometimes only stamps or pain color are different. However, these belts are easier to identify. There is a clip and a D-ring, neither of which are present on any known BW or BGS belt.

Many collectors get tricked into thinking these are BGS (I know I did when I paid EUR 80 for my first one!) because so little is know about early BGS items and even less is know about Polizei/LSHD/THW/etc. The few photos we managed to find of BGS using the FuG 6 shows them with leather belts, so I'm inclined to think these are not BGS.

What I'm missing, and have never seen for sale, is the shoulder strap that goes with this belt. It goes from the D ring to the clip and on that strap is a clip for the radio to hang from.

Here is a picture of the FuG 6 in use by BGS (1955) and another post showing the belt and the radio in a Feuerwehr manual. Both pictures are found in the link I mentioned in my original post. Thanks to Gordon and Hoover for their contributions.

Steve