Granatwerfer 34 8CM Mortar

[Bjørn]

Very nice stuff here
I recently helped my childhood friend Roger with restoring yet another mortar. This is a late war model that originally was tan coloured.
The base plate is the one that I posted pictures of earlier.
Here is what the Zweibein looked like. It was ground dug.



















The axle for high elevation was very corroded, and even bent. It could not be saved, and had to be reproduced. Luckily, the internal gear and elevation transmission was entirely undamaged, and in near mint condition.

[Bjørn]

Here, we have dismanteled the zweibein, and I have carefully sandblasted and cleaned the parts:

[Bjørn]

Here, the parts has got a coat of red primer, before we filled in the pittings from the rust with filler:















Here is the new axle for high elevation to the right. It's a perfect copy of the damaged original one:

[Bjørn]

Here is the mortar tube, or the Werferrohr.
There was no original paint on this tube, only Norwegian postwar green:

[Bjørn]

Here are pictures of the very first assembly of the Mortar, and the proud owner, Roger



















Original sight, the RA 35

[Bjørn]

Unfortinently, the top colour on the baseplate was so damaged, that Roger decided to restore the top of the plate. The underside is in so good condition, that the original paint will be kept as is.

Here are pictures of Roger's mortar, after the restoration. Only the white stripe on the groundplate is missing. The police helmet is also Roger's.

[Bjørn]

At the 72 year anniversary of the German invasion of Norway, at April 9th there was a special exhibit on our local museum. I put up a display with some German uniforms, equipment and weapons from my own private collection, including both mine and Roger's Mortars. Two genuine Granatwerfer 34's are rarely seen displayed together these days



















And with danger of drifting a little bit off topic, here are pictures of the rest of the things I displayed there:


















And I also displayed two original, but restored Abwehr Flammenwerfer 42's from my own collection:







Hope you liked the pictures

Best Regards
Björn

[Bjørn]

Another originals ruined.Feldgrau cup had more than 60% of original color before "restoration"...

I respectfully disagree with your statement, jiipee76. originals did not have the "ball" end of the cup painted.
I believe that the shown cup, was either overpainted, or stripped and repainted.
Here are some pictures of the end cup on my tube, wich I believe retains it's original colour:







Original wartime pictures seem to conform to a bare metal ball at the bottom of the cup.






Best Regards
Björn

[makisraf]

ruined.... ... i dont see how.. correct feldgrau from Zib and the item itself is what it is...

[djpool]

Wonderful display!

At the 72 year anniversary of the German invasion of Norway, at April 9th there was a special exhibit on our local museum. I put up a display with some German uniforms, equipment and weapons from my own private collection, including both mine and Roger's Mortar.

Hope you liked the pictures

Best Regards
Björn

[Draoich]

Mortar Sight Block

Hi,
The mortar restorations are really good! I note the MG 34 in the tripod mount as part of Bjorn and Rogers' display and this reminded me of something that I would like to know - Is the Sight Block on the MG 34 Lafette made to the same dimensions as the Sight Block on the GrW 34 8cm mortar? In other words is the dovetail the same size? There are reproduction MG34 Sight Blocks available from the Kriegsende website in the USA. These are described as 'early war' and are made from aluminium.

The elevation screw that had to be remade because the original was beyond salvage (badly corroded and bent) makes me wonder if bent elevation screw bars were a common problem on GrW 34 bipods. I have seen several that are slightly bent. I wonder if this problem was commonly the case during normal use?

Draoich

[Aktivisti]

Superb display!

[Simon O.]

Great job guys. You need to get a LW feld Division uniform together for the museum seeing as the 14 LW Feld Division was based in your area.

[floriskok]

I'll post some pictures of my mortar in the near future.

I found a bipod and sight in the meantime and I'm having
everything painted in tan.

I'll keep you guys updated!

[Frans H.]

Bjorn, you and your friend did a great job on restore the mortar. Wonderfull display!!