Japanese Type 90 helmet, history and discussion

[Nick Komiya]

Sorry, but speculation always gains currency later as fact, so I will not be party to that and leave it for others. Your wild guesses are as good as mine on this point.
Here's a prime example of the damage done.
http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...highlight=myth

[RedMask]

The Navy's Type 2 was an army cherry blossom helmet, but not the type 1. There really is no discussion about the identity of the navy type 1, which can only be the British-looking helmet (see post 3 of the M18 helmet thread for a photo). What is up for discussion is the M18 helmet, not the navy designations. The only reason for the navy to distinguish the 3 types was because all three were used concurrently for a time when there was a severe shortage of helmets. By the time the anchor badge came off, they were all using type 90s, so the stenciled model is merely an economy modification and there was no need for a new designation.

Does anyone have a good quality photos of the navy Type 1 helmet (british-looking)?

[Nick Komiya]

Look here http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...ghlight=estate

[Rabaul]

Thanks Nick for keeping things grounded in fact, I wish there were more like you.

I’m a geologist and have to answer questions for which there is no documentary evidence, so have to use foot slogging to get empirical and experimental data and use and adapt theories to reach logical conclusions. Very much like archeology, but for a geologist we soon get found out if we’re wrong, dry wells, barren mines, volcanoes erupting at odd times! That is why I asked for other’s views before I sent the thing out for general consumption.

I think there is a place in history to use reasoned theories to fill in gaps, but not, obviously, to make things up to sell stuff! I’ll look for documentary evidence, if I find something that refutes what I have ‘speculated’ I’ll change it, but if the information is just missing I’ll put the theories up for general discussion.

Everything I have ever collected has been donated to the Rabaul Museum, including many models I've made.

[Nick Komiya]

I always speculate during my own research, as that gives me an idea what documents I need to check in the archives. The reason I refuse to do so here is that 99% of the audience cannot conduct their own research to verify my theories, so what I say will just go down as fact. Conversely, I would not have minded sharing speculation, if there were many here like me that could dig into original documents, as more eyes on the subject are better than a pair.

[Rabaul]

Ok, I admire your discipline.

Something which may not need speculation is the date that the liners went from cloth to leather?

The reason I ask is because I have found or been shown many helmet caches in tunnels. Usually 15 to 20 in a pile or two. Of about 100 helmets seen in such circumstances there have been only two which still had remnants of cloth liners all the rest (of those with anything remaining) have remnants of leather.

Did both the Army and Navy change to leather at the same time?

[Nick Komiya]

Yes, that is a question that the archives normally should provide an answer to, but I have not come across that particular document, nor have I chased it as a theme before, so I don't have the answer. The way the army introduced material economy alternatives was to revise the spec list; in this case from "Leather lining" to "Leather or equivalent liner". There will be that notification somewhere in the archives, but one needs to screen the archives using "uniform changes" as a key word, as all versions of the word helmet did not pick up the document in question. When I have time, I will take another look in the documents. Also, army and navy records are totally separated and most of the navy records are missing, so it is unlikely that an answer could be found on the timing of the spec change by the navy.

[Jareth]

Ok I'll speculate & say that in my opinion they only experimented with cloth liners. Both army & navy continued to use leather or forms of leather right up to wars end. As to why cloth ,perhaps for climate reasons,comfort or conservation. I say this because the cloth liners occur prior to 1940 in the army type 90

[Nick Komiya]

I had a little time to kill, so I went into the archives to do some research on the liner question. So far nothing on the subject, but I did find something a lot more exciting. It is a 8-page document titled "Historical origins of the Army Star". It is a smudgy difficult to read document to be read on my tablet, so I'll have to wait till I get home tonight. A WAF mystery is finally about to be solved. I will share my findings in an independent thread.

[Ryukyutunnelrat]

Nick, looking forward to reading your findings.

Best, David.

[Rabaul]

Nick,

I'll look forward to the star history as well.

As to the way the liner was changed would similar 'spec lists' have been the way the colour was changed? and how was the colour described by headquarters? The variations in basic brown would hint at a rather vague description?

Here, the items we recover show there were tan helmets and chocolate brown helmets co-existing, I could speculate as to why, but will refrain.

Thanks for any help

[Jareth]

Paint color greatly varied throughout the war. Early helmets tended to be darker & less matte than late war. Different paint batches, likely mixed by hand, different factories etc

[Rabaul]

Thanks Jareth,

From browsing the web and seeing dated items I thought it was the other way around, lighter earlier and darker later? I know at Rabaul in (usually pretty corroded) samples which have lain where they were left in 1945 (there were 100,000 troops here at the end who just stacked the helmets and walked off), we have light tan helmets, light tan helmets over-painted darker brown, but no dark ones over-painted light tan.

Yes I’m sure there were no (munsell) color chips circulated and hand mixing to ‘close enough’ was the way.

Nick any documents? (Although it sounds like you're busy enough)

[Nick Komiya]

As Jareth suggested, paint color variation is not due to spec changes, but variations within the same spec. I have, so far, not found any reference in the archives regarding canvass liners and have exhausted my choices of where to look, so I am not going any further on this. One thing I can say is that it was not done within the context of climate acclimatization, neither tropical nor extreme cold. Tropical and cold weather prototype clothing studies are meticulously recorded (see helmet cover article) and the liner was never part of it.

[maverick87]

What is up with no original photos of stenciled navy helmet??? Besides one that was on ebay a while back, never seen another photo. A lot of stenciled helmets floating around, no pictures. What's the deal??