an interesting early gasmask

Hello to all

Thought I would share this with the fieldgear-guys here...

I just got this beauty in. It is named : a certain ' Uffz Rubner '. the gasmask itself is dated 1937, as wel as the straps ( REP 1937)and the canister. The name of the unteroffizier is also found on the straps.

The canister has a mouse-grey color, so I wounder by which branche it was used? Is this just an early color or could it be used by küstenartillerie or in a Blockhaus?

another interesting thing : the filter is dated ' juni 44'.


Greetings

Jan

name on the strap

date on the strap, somebady knows what the 'REP' stands for?

date on the filter...

[Johannes Schoen]

Hello Jan,

I would say the colour is not early. The earliest canisters of the Wehrmacht had a different lock: a snapping-construction instead of the common spring-construction. These canisters, which I have seen only with 1936-dates so far, are also only 25,0 cm high. Your canister should be 27,5 cm high.

These early canisters are the only ones which had a different colour from the factories than the rest. The colour is more or less the same as the apple-green of the Heer/Marine M 35 DD used until 1940. Later canisters have a darker colour I would describe as field-grey or darkgreen (I have to look if I can find the shade in the RAL colour-charts). (I am not sure about the Luftwaffe).

Has Your canister in the interior of the lid the same grey colour as on the outside of the canister and is the inside of the canister (upper edge and bottom) of a different colour (some shade of green) than the outside?

Does the mask have a WaA-stamp with eagle? You can find it in the inside, on the back of the leather trimming. It should be on the left when You look inside the mask. You have to pull the trimming a bit to the outside to see it.

Are You sure that the canister is also 1937-dated?

BTW, nice to have the straps and the mask in such a fine condition

Johannes

[Johannes Schoen]

I forgot something.

Are You sure about the stamp on the straps. Is it REP or could it also be BEP. I have the same stamp with different dates on straps, but I have never been able to see if it is REP or BEP, due to preservation of the stamps.

Has the Anschlußstück (snout where filter fis srewed in) the same grey colour as the canister? It seems so on the picture.

Johannes

Hello Johannes

First of all, thanks for the detailed information. I must admit that I'm not a expert at all on these kind of things (apart from the general knowledge).

Now, concerning the canister : It is not marked 1937 but 1938. closer inspection reveals that there is indeed a sort of apple-green ( like an early M35 dd) color under the mouse-grey! The inside has also that same early color. There seems to be a serial number outside painted in black, and another one in white over the black number.

The mask: is indeed marked with a waA-stampon the left and some other markings ( numbers and symbols : I think serial nbr and makermarkings) - The mask itself is dated 1937.


Could this be a late war re-painted gasmask, due to the mouse-grey color. It seems that with the different numbers on the outside and the different layers of paint, that the canister at least has seen several owners?


greetings

Jan

... the marking on the strap is indeed REP1937 and not BEP...would like to know for what this stands for

The 'Anschlußstück' is not the same color as the canister but rather darker green like the the filter...

[Johannes Schoen]

Hello Jan,

the colour in the inside of the canister is probably not applegreen of the M 35 DD but feldgrau. I have found the early light colour only on 1936-dated canisters with the special lock and 25,0 cm hight so far. I wold describe the colour of the 1936 canisters as RAL 7009 Grüngrau, whereas the later ones (1938 the earliest for me so far) are painted Feldgrau RAL 6006 (Grauoliv today). As far as I can judge from the photo Yours has in the inside Feldgrau, too.

Does the eagle of the WaA-stamp of the mask have a swastika? I am asking because I am thinking that the grey paint might be a job done postwar. The early DDR used old Wehrmacht gasmasks with the canisters painted grey and the stamps with swatikas removed. This wouldn’t be the case if the Filter with eagle is original to mask and canister of course.

A Gasmask I had, had blue-gray Luftwaffe painting on the outside of the canister and on the Anschlußstück (snout) for the filter. The canister was dated 1939, the mask 1943. The same 4-digit number in black was stenciled on canister and snout. And canister and mask had WaA-stamps with swastika. So both belonged together and the repaint was done 1943 the earliest (all the remaining of the metall-parts were left Feldgrau). I believed it to be Luftwaffe.

Could Your mask actually have Luftwaffe colour? The civilian Luftschutz had differente canisters of more or less the same fieldgray colour as the army.

I think the best is to contact the owner of the following


Webpage

which is dedicated to gasmasks from all over the world from the beginning until today. The page ios from a Gasmask-museum in Vienna. The page also has a link to a “Gasmask-collectors-forum”.

I am also not an expert in Gasmasks. I learned the things I know from literature, the mentioned webpage and almost two dozens of gasmasks I have owned ofer the time.

Hope this helps a bit.

Johannes

Hello Johannes

Thanks for the additional information.
I really have my doubts that it is luftwaffe bleu, the story about that the DDR reissued these sounds logical and could be , I didn't know that...

The WaA-marking printed in inkt inside the gasmask shows the ' swastika', but could be forgotten to de-nazified post-war?

As you can see on the pictures below it really has that honest look, with some deep rust spots,anyway, I certainly will contact the owner of that website and ask him to judge this piece. Here are some more additional images...

Again thanks for the help so far

Kind regards

Jan

another details, here you can see the feldgrau under the mouse-grey color...

inkt WaA stamp

last one - dust build up. I got the mask in from a friend who bought it on a fleamarket several years ago .

[Chuck McLemore]

Hello Jan and Johannes! I love field equipment and that gasmask website was great. Thanks

[hcliffe]

Great thread guys. I really like gas masks and have about 8-10 with original straps and masks at this time. I have several that appear to have been painted over during wartime. Your thread made me think that perhaps there were orders issued to repaint the canisters to different shades, similiar to orders that I have read about to repaint helmets. Any thoughts on that?

Also, I have a mask that is marked with a Luftwaffe eagle.

Finally, any idea about the small name tag that you showed sewn to the strap of the mask? I have seen several like this as well. Just a way to identify the owner?