Any thoughts on the liner of this Ssh39?

[gertje]

Some time ago I picked up this Ssh39. Leather strap (not canvas) looks period attached. The (non-textbook) inlet looks like oilcloth affixed inside out. It's fairly dried out. There's some wool/felt fabric used to fill the sides between liner and shell. Production year is 1941. It lacks the red stenciled star.

As to the pictures: please ignore the little 'haze' in the middle of the picture (the lens was not clean). The white spots on the shell are traces of probably overpainted whitewash.

Can anyone verify if the material from the inlet is the same type oilcloth used on the inlet of the 1st type Ssh39 (and the postwar Ssh40)?
Or just give your thoughts on this helmet ...

[gertje]

chinstrap

[gertje]

'dark side' of the inlet

is this Soviet oilcloth?

[gertje]

stamps

I'll see if I can find some additional pictures from the outside of the shell.

Thank you for your opinions!

[gertje]

I've found a picture showing the front of the helmet.

[LeeG]

I am hardly the Soviet helmet expert, but I do own a couple and have done my share of shopping around. That said, this liner looks like nothing I have seen for SSH39 or SSH36 helmets and isn't anywhere in Clawson's book on Soviet helmets. I guess it could possibly be a field repair job.

[espenlaub]

100 % is not post war used,
I think it's can be repaired in the front( because the cloth is OK)
Or: liner made in the Leningrad-in blockade time, and I think it is the right answer.

[LeeG]

Good point, Espenlaub, I have seen some photos of pretty strange improvisations used during the seige (buttons, tunics). This liner could well be a Leningrad special. Does the stamp have a "lambda M 3"? That would indicate a Leningrad manufacture of the helmet.

[gertje]

Good point, Espenlaub, I have seen some photos of pretty strange improvisations used during the seige (buttons, tunics). This liner could well be a Leningrad special. Does the stamp have a "lambda M 3"? That would indicate a Leningrad manufacture of the helmet.

I can confirm by it's stamp that it's a Leningrad produced helmet ("LMS" or "LMZ" in cyrillic) in 1941.
Thank you for your thoughts on this one!

[gertje]

a quoted message referring to this specific thread

Your Helmet appears to be one of the early manufacture SSH39 that were made with the artificial leather 8 finger german style liner, It has a layer of white primer underneath. I believe the liner is a replacement, whether wartime or postwar is hard to say, but IMO its postwar, and for what reason, Im not sure, it could have been a movie studio job for practicality a bad attempt by a dealer to make something to appear correct. regards, Toomas Salazar

.

[gertje]

Thank you, Toomas, for your response.

The presumed whitewash could likely be a white primer peaking through a factory applied top-coating.
Are there methods in determining the timeframe when the liner had been refitted? Can I check on the fabric of the sewing thread or the oilcloth-type? Would a refitter have to loosen some rivets that I can check out?

As you can see in the images both sides of the liner have been stuffed. A faker could have done that to conceal his effort. It's also a wartime method to keep the liner in a fixed position. I don't want to displace this unless I'm 90% convinced it's a phantasy-liner.

Marcel

[Sturmpnr]

The presumed whitewash could likely be a white primer peaking through a factory applied top-coating.

I have had a couple of nice helmets like this with white primer underneath but most have had the primer on the inside and the green on the outside, meaning the green paint on the outside of the shell and the white primer inside and not painted white. I will look for a picture in my files of an example of this.

Regards,

Toomas

[Sturmpnr]

pic

[Greg W.]

1941 Leningrad SSh39

I thought I would add this for comparison. It has the "lambda M 3" Leningrad stamp. I couldn't do much better with the camera I've got. There is also an ink stamped 60 on the cloth liner. It is also named in pencil (weak) under the front of the lid.

[Peter_Suciu]

I am hardly the Soviet helmet expert, but I do own a couple and have done my share of shopping around. That said, this liner looks like nothing I have seen for SSH39 or SSH36 helmets and isn't anywhere in Clawson's book on Soviet helmets. I guess it could possibly be a field repair job.

I speak with Dr. Clawson fairly regularly and have really been studying Soviet helmets. I think this could be a variation of the earliest Soviet liner system. According to Clawson, and other sources, the Soviets used both German M31 style leather and also oil cloth in the SSh-39 helmets. This one seems unique but I think it is good.

Compare to the liner in the Soviet copy of the French "Adrian" helmet on Dr. Clawson's Web site:
http://www.personal.kent.edu/~rclaws...s/addenda.html