eStand Combat camouflage helmet

[Hans K.]

That's interesting Chuck. I've never owned a Bell L with an M16 liner, only M17 and M18s, and as far as I recall those were not clipped flat like the ones you show.
Bell L liner pins are a topic unto themselves.
And you're right about the pins on the OP helmet having been touched up with that nasty green paint.

Here are examples of pins from my Bell L with an M17 liner.

[C. Roelens]

Looks like you've got one with a manufacturer error on the prongs as well. I still owe you pictures of mine on your liner pin thread at ghw2. I've attached a few pictures of the outside of the liner pins of the Bell-L I posted above... definitely original Bell-L...

Chuck

[Rommel1942]

This helmet simply looks like an original camo that was entirely painted over post-war with the same shade of green paint, and then the underlying camo was dug out by a collector. The collector who removed the postwar paint didn’t do an amazing job as large areas of green still remain (I.e. look around the air vents, tons of postwar paint left there) and there are also several areas that go down to base metal (probably because he removed too much paint in those spots).

So yes, definitely an altered helmet. This should detract significantly from the value.

[101combatvet]

It's hard to tell from the pictures, but the outside of the helmet looks like it could be original period paint. The inside has been touched up, look at the rust in the crown area.