Felinar M.A.N., The romanian flashlight

[mihnea]

I bought this Romanian WWII gas lamp about two months ago. Even tough it cost me a lot it was in good condition, complete with two small problems: it was completely painted in silver (a special paint that is fire proof and also very poor quality, my grandmother uses it on the metal parts of her stove) everything was painted including the mirror that is corroded. So after a bit of scrubbing it was nice and clean of the old and ugly paint job, the metal beneath was galvanized and most of the rust is on the handle.

The other small problem was the oil canister that was missing about 1/3 of the welds so I decided to give the canister to an "expert" in restoring metal things to weld it, as I don't know to weld.

The "expert" (also works as a restorer at the MMN) told me that it was an easy job and that in a few days it will be done.

After a week the oil canister was "restored", shining as a mirror and with a small modification: the front edge was not bent up so it was the door of the lamp was not closing. I was angry and asked him what he done to it, he proudly answered I disassembled it in all it's components then I put them in a acid bath for three days to clean the rust (even though it was initially galvanized and it had absolutely no rust) and now it didn't had the thing that protected it for 60 years and after two days it started rusting everywhere so I quickly spray painted black. The sad thing is that the inside is also rusting and I can't paint it, but I filled it with oil lamp and this summer I'm going to re-galvanize it.

However even with this problem I’m very proud of it. I don’t know too much about it, only that it was used in WWII by the Romanian soldiers, as flash light was never issued in the Romanian army and that there is an other model that has the oil canister made from copper instead of galvanized steal.
So any info is welcomed.

The only marking is the stamped M.A.N. (Ministerul Apararii Nationale) meaning National Ministry of Defense.

I would be very thankful if somebody could post some pictures with Romanian soldiers and this kind of lamp.



PS I'm sorry for the long story .

[mihnea]

...

[Mannlicher]

Found a similar item in great shape while strawling through the flea market. I didn't knew that this kind of lamp was used by the army until I saw the pictures of yours. And because was cheap as dirt, I thought that it would make a nice addition to my militaria colection. Thanks for the "heads up"

[img=http://img17.imagevenue.com/loc459/th_70438_IMG_29071_122_459lo.jpg][img=http://img42.imagevenue.com/loc349/th_70462_IMG_29081_122_349lo.jpg][img=http://img151.imagevenue.com/loc444/th_70467_IMG_29111_122_444lo.jpg]

.... and along a postwar lamp that was in my family for a long time. The design is almost identical, only it has glass openings all around and the construction workmanship is sloppy.

[img=http://img111.imagevenue.com/loc396/th_70907_IMG_29121_122_396lo.jpg][img=http://img159.imagevenue.com/loc390/th_70923_IMG_29151_122_390lo.jpg][img=http://img28.imagevenue.com/loc438/th_70928_IMG_29271_122_438lo.jpg]