Romanian helmets

hallo, i'm from holland and i've been collecting dutch helmets for quite some time now. i collect helmets from the model m16 to m95. i've got 31 now and always trying to get interesting helmets. i'm planning to buy? a romanian ww2 helmet in the future. i've been reading some topics and noticed that there are some questions about the dutch helmet. now i'll trie to explain about the models that were in use by the dutch at the beginning of the war and that ended in romanian hands. the most common model was the m34. this is the model(with dutch liner) that was orderd by the romanians befor the war started. when holland capitulated, germany sent a lot of captured helmets(m27NM and m34) to romania. all these helmets had the dutch liners. the company that produced these helmets(verblifa=verenigde blik fabrieken) was orderd by the germans to keep producing the m34 model for the romanian army and they did this till the end of 1942. these helmets had the german liner. on my next message i'll post the specifics fore each model and how to recognize them. i've just started a blogspot on my collection. i'm planning to put my whole collection on this site with some information. adress is http://artaid812.blogspot.com. it's in dutch. i've posted items about the differences between the models m27NM, m34 and m38.

Welcome to the forum dutchhelmets.

The info you provided is very good and answers some questions. Also your blog is coming along nicely.

I have a few more questions:
1. Why were some helmets with brown liner and others with black liner?
2. Did Verblifa produce German helmets?
3. Why did the production of the Dutch liner ceased and was replaced with the German one, in my opinion the Dutch liner is better?
4. How many liner / helmet sizes exist?

Here are my Dutch helmets one is an m27NM the other is an M34 with German liner.



Last summer I bought theses two helmets from Wings and Wheels (for a good price as I intend to repaint them and use them for reenactments). The seller told me that they were repainted and the liner changed for the police but were never used, I doubt this story as the liners look very new and the helmets are not identical, also one is painted black the other dark blue-gray. What can you tell me about them?

hi mihnea, thanx for your reply. i'll try to anwser your questions. starting on the liner colour, the dutch military liners are always black. there are some models with brown liners,but these are'nt the official liners. these liners were made in order of rich military(mostly officers!!!) only to show of. thats why there are some military models with brown (unofficial) liners. after the war a lot of helmets were redone in order of the dutch goverment for use by many different govermental organisations except by the army. a lot of these helmets had new brown liners. as far as i know all helmets that went to romania which were produced after holland capitulated,had german liners and they were brown. why these helmets had german liners, i dont know. possably because these liners were already mased produced and plenty in storage. i dont belive that verblifa made german helmets. i've never heard that before. they did produce the m34 until the end of 1942, the m38 until somewhere in the 60's, the dutch mkII in the 50's and the m53 from the 50's to the end of the 80's. as far of the size of the liners for the m27NM and m34, i mailed some other collectors to help me find an answer to that question. my opinion is that there was only one size helmet and liner. the reason i belive that is because i have 7 m34's and they all have the same size helmet and liner. the same for the m27NM. when i get an answer to that i'll let you know. the 2 helmets you bought from wings and wheels, where do they come from, romania or holland? if they are dutch, the black one has a typical post war liner from a firefighter helmet. these helmets were also redone after the war for the fire brigades and were painted black. you could try to see if there is any green(military) paint under the black paint. i have no idea what the dark blue helmet was used for. it looks like it has a pre-war liner exept for the neck piece. are there any stamps in the leather?

Hello and welcome to the forum dutchhelmets.

So this helmet was worn by a rich military ( a high rank officer)

hi claudiu1988, i cant see if it's a former dutch military helmet or one produced for the romanian army. if it's dutch, probably it is indeed a helmet with a liner made in order from the former (dutch)owner. these helmets were named "buitenmodel", meening "outside model". did the romanian army have brown (dutch type) liners for there helmets?

Yes they had, here is an other example with brown liner. This helmet has the Carol II emblem. This helmet was worn by an officer. It's ANDIS helmet.










This post has been edited by Claudiu1988 on March 15, 2007 07:19 pm

Thank you for your answers, Wings and Wheels is a militaria fair in Belgium; I bought the helmets from a Dutch dealer he had about another 10 Dutch helmets for sale. Both helmets had at some time the cipher erased as the marks are still visible on booth helmets, also under the black/dark grey paint is nothing but clean metal, the restorer did a good job removing the original paint from them. Only one is marked on the liner: 415 . In my opinion these helmets have been restored recently as the paint looks new.

hi mihnea, i found some information about your police helmets. the seller was right. they are indeed police helmets. the dark-blue one from the marechaussee (military police) and the black one regular police. these two helmets were most likely redone after the war for police use. the difference between police and firebrigade helmets are the rivets. police helmets have black rivets (painted together with the shell) and fire brigade helmets have chrome rivets. these two helmets should have had markings in the past. the marechaussee helmet normally has a white grenade with a flame on top on the front of the helmet. the police helmet a white star with a simalar grenade as the marechausse one in the middel, also to the front of the helmet. i would'nt repaint them for reanactment but use helmets in a bad condition. i really like andis helmet. a very nice example of a m39? helmet. if i'd want to buy such a helmet,wat would the price be in €?

Last year, a similar helmet (except it had black leather liner) was sold for 700 lei, which is smth. about 200 Euro.
These helmets are quite scarce around here though.

thanx andi for your reply. i would pay €200,- for such a nice helmet. if you ever want to sell it or you know of such a helmet for sale, please tip me. yesterday i got a m34 helmet but without the normal folded edge. i've heard of this model before and even seen a picture of one on the internet, but i don't have an idea why these helmets were produced. someone once told me that this model is the m40 and the last m34 clone made by verblifa. i'll put some pictures on my blog. any info about this helmet type is welcome.

Thank you once again for the info, I'm hoping to get some helmets from the army stocks, then I will save them. Dutch helmets even in bad condition are expensive here compared to the price I paid for these two.

Late post for romanian m73 paratroopers helmet.
Here is the "uncut" version of the m73 helmet. Attached to it is a leather "neck" approximatly 40cm long.
Also, this leather protection has a lot of straps, don't know what for though...

According to the book "Weapons of the war: The AK 47" by Chris McNab, these soldiers are romanians. What kind of helmets are they wearing ?

They are not romanian soldiers. As for the helmets, I don't know.
But my pick is that they are bulgarian soldiers (looking at their arm patch) wearing m51 bulgarian helmets...

This post has been edited by ANDI on March 29, 2007 11:59 am

These soldiers look Albanian to me. The arm patch seems to be a black eagle on a red field.

The guy in the middle wears a Chinese helmet. The others might be Russian Sh40 or so.

Well, a bit late, but my pennies worth!

Regards,
Emile