M16 freikorps Stahlhelm

[xJEZZx]

Hey i'm new on this forum and i'm dutch so i'm sorry for the bad english.

What i have here is one of my most amazing finds and it happened to me about 2 days ago. I bought a couple of helmets from a collector. And between these helmets there was a ww1 M16 stahlhelm. The previous owner said it was found at verdun and that it was painted black by him because he didn't like the rust .

So i decided to remove the paint to get it back in it's original state.

this is the helmet before the paint removal.

What i found after i removed some of the paint was incredible.


In a rush i removed all of the paint remover and cleaned it with semi warm water. And this is the current state.


The is a bit of paint left here and there but it is not so bad. I'm not going on with removing the paint because i'm affraid I will damage some of the skull.
My question now is should i let it be professionaly restored by a museum or keep it this way.
What i'm going to do anyway is remove all the late applied paint by a 'restorer' (if that is the correct word).

sorry for the long post but i had to share this with you.

[notton]

interesting helmet.

[Schmauch]

When i see that spachtel i think you have to much damage to that helmet allrady.
Fingernails and Chipcard allways do the brst result not acetone.

[xJEZZx]

When i see that spachtel i think you have to much damage to that helmet allrady.
Fingernails and Chipcard allways do the brst result not acetone.

Well i didn't use aceton i was very gentil abd btw there is still alot of black paint on the skull because when i saw the skull i stopped ammidiately so it is in better state than you can really see in the pictures.
I will post photo's of the back tomorrow because it's midnight where i live now.
There is still a perfect layer of olive drab underneath which is original.

[mcmike]

So what ever happened to this helmet? Possibly Freikorps!

[fader107]

Hope I'm wrong - but Sorry, I'm not sure I buy this.

[mcmike]

Hope I'm wrong - but Sorry, I'm not sure I buy this.

Well, you never can tell. But isn't it against the law to lie on the World Wide Interwebs. Isn't it?

[Alfred.R]

this one may be legit but verdun battle and freikorps units are two different things

[Paul.B.]

Hope I'm wrong - but Sorry, I'm not sure I buy this.

You would right fader.
A Freikorps helmet found at Verdun?
A collector paints over that TK because he don't like the rust?
Yeah right

[ROBB]

Couldn't sell the fake friekorps look so painted it black , only a special person would paint over a genuine skull ! Rob

[luftwaffenkopf]

Couldn't sell the fake friekorps look so painted it black , only a special person would paint over a genuine skull ! Rob

i'll see your suspicion and raise you a "new" one! how about just get an old M16, paint a skull on it, and THEN, paint it black. strip the black off and voila... SURPRISE!!!

seriously, there is no way to authenticate anything on this helmet except that it's an original M16 shell.

[Tora_Tora_Tora!]

seriously, there is no way to authenticate anything on this helmet except that it's an original M16 shell.

Agree.....it is quite clear that the white paint is new.

[Tora_Tora_Tora!]

Afterwards....a Freikorps helmet in Verdun? Yes like find a japanese helmet in Halbe Forest.