romanian re carol helmet

Hello guys
I hope you will forgive me for my english because I'm typing from Italy.
What do you think about this helmet?. It is a gift from a romanian friend. Can you tell me a price ?
Special thanks
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/862/hpim0289.jpg/
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/543/hpim0288s.jpg/
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/717/hpim0291z.jpg/

For what you need a price considering is a gift from a friend.
Anyway is a rare romanian dutch helmet with carol badge still attached.

The helmet is a mix, th cypher looks original but I have the feeling that it's reattached to a communist refurbished helmet. The liner is 100% not original looks like the ones fitted in the communist era. The rivets holding the chinstrap are not brass like the originals. Also the cypher looks dented on the sides signs that it was removed from a helmet and reattached by gluing to this one. Now considering that the helmet is not an original it is a perfect candidate for a high quality restoration.

thank you for your answer.
But the paint is original? why do you tel me that is repainted? he proposed also another two helmets: the first one had a different green colour. The inside was black.
The second one had the badge but the inside was german.
can i have your opinion? I made the righit think?

The first coat is original but the helmet was clearly repainted after WWII inside and outside. The story of this helmet is probably like this: somebody found an ground dug helmet with the original cypher then removed it from the rusty shell and glued it to this "run of the mill" communist refurbished shell to increase it's value. Yes you made the right decision the helmets with black interior paint are probably Dutch police helmets refurbished after WWII, not uncommon in western europe. The other one with the german liner it might have been more original, with the original liner.

Your helmet is made from a original romanian shell and a original cypher if you restore it correctly it would by a nice helmet, like this it has 0 collectors value as it's not a communist refurbishment and not a original WWII shell.

Mihnea,

Look carefully to the picture, is 100% dutch helmet model (not comunist model73).
The back side is much wider as common only to dutch helmet model.







This post has been edited by Cantacuzino on July 01, 2011 07:40 am

@Cantacuzino: ?? What do you want to say? Read carefully what I wrote: "communist refurbished helmet" that means that it's a refurbished Dutch made helmet, it's hard to confuse a communist made helmet with a dutch m34 or m27, the main difference is the absence of a rolled lip on the communist and the much smaller size, among many other details.

Mihnea,

I wanted to point that the shell is an original WW2 dutch helmet ( no matter that was refurbished or will be in any times). It s still has a value of a ww2 item and not as a comunist item. Ofcourse the details like rivets or interior liner wil make the shell more or less valuable but not "0 value" like you point.



PS:

Sorry, "communist refurbished helmet" it could means also communist refurbished M73 helmet or communist refurbished russian helmet.

This post has been edited by Cantacuzino on July 01, 2011 08:08 am

It has 0 collector value as it's a communist refurbished helmet that had his cypher removed in WWII or after. The cypher you know see on was glued, not soldered, recently. The parts have a value but as a collector it's not communist authentic and it's not WWII authentic and not even a good replica. So... it has a monetary value but it's collection and historic value is very close to 0.

I have see no communist (md 73) helmet refurbished. The ssh40 were refurbished as they were WWII vintage. Please don't confuse WWII helmets and communist ones.

This post has been edited by mihnea on July 01, 2011 09:40 am

The confusion was from your part not from mine, when you reffered to refurbished communist helmet and you did not explained from the begin that was about refurbished dutch helmet ( ww2) and not a refurbished russian helmet ( ssh 40) or romanian made helmet md73 ( wich by the way if you haven't see refurbished that doesn't mean were not).
Even the word communist for the helmet is not appropriate (better RPR or RSR helmet). Like german helmets considered by many people "nazis helmet" wich is exagerate too.
To stop the misunderstandings we can conclude that "razvanraul" had original dutch helmet shell and original Carol badge. For the rest of the details ( paint, rivets, interior liner) he must do a restoration job to get the original look of a romanian WW2 dutch helmet.

Yes I use common terms as used by many romanian militaria collectors:

casca comunista (communist helmet) = romanian made md 1973 helmet
casca de parasutist (paratrooper helmet) = communist paratrooper helmet (all types with and without netting, etc)
casca de salt (jump helmet) = WWII leather paratrooper jump helmet (but some were also used in the communist era)
casca olandeza (dutch helmet) = dutch made helmet used in WWII by romanian army (but also used in the communist era including in the fights from december 1989) mostly m34 but also m27
casca olandeza cu cifru (dutch helmet with cipher) = dutch made m34 helmet with Carol II cypher most had the cypher removed when king Carol abdicated
casca olandeza cu interior german (dutch helmet with german liner) = dutch made m34 helmet with part of the liner of german type the chin strap is also german (the padding and part of the liner and the fixing rivets are of dutch type)
casca germana (german helmet) = german md 34, 40 or 42 used by romanian soldiers in WWII
casca ruseasca (russian helmet) = russian ssh40 helmet used by the romanian army in the communist era up to the fights from december 1989
casca Adrian (Adrian helmet) = french made md 1915 helmet used in WWI by the romanian army with the Carol I and Ferdinant I cyphers overlapping and in the inter war and WWII without the cypher (although there are exeptions).
casca germana de parasutist (german paratrooper helmet) = german paratrooper helmet from WWII used by the romanian paratroopers in WWII
casca israelian (israeli helmet) = Israeli made kevlar helmet, the first modern helmet used by romanian army in the 1990 for the first international peace keeping missions.
casca de kevlar (kevlar helmet) = romanian made kevlar helmet similar to the american PASGT helmet used in the foreign theaters of operation by the romanian army.

This short dictionary will help you and other that read my incomplete posts regarding romanian used helmets.

OFF-TOPPIC: Regarding the existence of refurbished md73 I have serious doubts that in cca 20 year of serious use any got so wore out that there was any program to refurbish them (refurbishment in this case is translated as replacement of the liner, chinstrap and repainting). A simple repaint cannot count as a refurbishment it's only a repaint and I have seen repainted md73 helmets.

Oh and fyi all the helmets used in the RPR era were also used in the RSR era so in this case RPR=RSR=communist era.

As you see none of the two contain the name "communist" ( Popular or Socialist Republic) indeed like in the case of Germany where only one party ( NSDAP) took the power also in Romania was only one party ( the communist party) that doesn't mean that all romanian had "carnet de partid" to call them communist with communist helmets ( in the Army).
If you follow the same logic, how you will call the md 73 helmets, communist or capitalist helmets? ( they were used in both periods)