Anzac16 Posted 31 December , 2005 Share Posted 31 December , 2005 Hi, sorry I haven't got back sooner, email me your postal address and I will send you a copy of Marcus Cotton's article ( a mine of information on British Brodies) Best regards Malc email...... malcnicholson@Wight365.net. I looking for that artical aswell is there a posebillety that i can have that articel aswell? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
corkhead100 Posted 31 December , 2005 Author Share Posted 31 December , 2005 I looking for that artical aswell is there a posebillety that i can have that articel aswell? Sure, email the address. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lassuy Posted 1 January , 2006 Share Posted 1 January , 2006 I resisted posting on this thread earlier, but since it keeps coming up, I thought I'd throw my question in as well, just to stir the pot a bit. I have a British made helmet, with British liner, with a smooth finish--no sand, no sawdust. The exterior is painted a very dark green, which has darkened considerably with age. The underside is still painted the yellowish khaki color. I have seen one reference that this might be a US Marine Corps helmet, painted in the USMC forest green. Any idea when this would have been done? Most post-war USMC helmets I've seen are US M17 helmets, sawdust finish and khaki painted, with the globe and anchor emblem on the front. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Haslock Posted 1 January , 2006 Share Posted 1 January , 2006 Hi. I thought I'd add this to the discussion. I have a raw edged Brodie shell (unfortunately no liner).Where the paint remains, it has a sort of mid grass green paint finish and a very lightly sandy texture. It appears to be the original finish. The mark on the rim is FKS 15. Could this number give me any sort of precise date? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john in minnesota Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 I resisted posting on this thread earlier, but since it keeps coming up, I thought I'd throw my question in as well, just to stir the pot a bit. I have a British made helmet, with British liner, with a smooth finish--no sand, no sawdust. The exterior is painted a very dark green, which has darkened considerably with age. The underside is still painted the yellowish khaki color. I have seen one reference that this might be a US Marine Corps helmet, painted in the USMC forest green. Any idea when this would have been done? Most post-war USMC helmets I've seen are US M17 helmets, sawdust finish and khaki painted, with the globe and anchor emblem on the front. That could be a Canadian used helmet - they often repainted theirs in a dark forest green. I have also seen some US Army helmets repainted such a color - especially units that served in the British sector, such as the 27th Division, but I have not seen any USMC attributed helmets repainted in dark green. Are there any name or numbers written inside? John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Sweeney Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 Hi. I thought I'd add this to the discussion. I have a raw edged Brodie shell (unfortunately no liner).Where the paint remains, it has a sort of mid grass green paint finish and a very lightly sandy texture. It appears to be the original finish. The mark on the rim is FKS 15. Could this number give me any sort of precise date? Jon, The FKS is one possibly one of the marks used by Thomas Firth and Sons (FS being the usual). The 15 is not a date but is known as the heat number. The heat number is something like a lot number, but tracks not a batch of steel but the usage of the furnace. So this helmet would be made by T Tirth in the 15th heating of the furnace. Firth made helmets from Sept 15 through 1919. Since it is a rimless helmet you know it was made sometime between falkl of 1915 and summer of 1916. You'd have to know how many heatings and duration of each heating were made during that time for a more precise date to figure when Firth had his 15th heating. As a guess maybe early 1916. Joe Sweeney Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris P Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 Joe. Just to maybe fill a gap in the research, here's a pic of some interesting markings on a helmet rim. It's a 2nd pat liner, bound edge, with a clear stylised MYRYS stamp.........never come across one like this before. Chris. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Sweeney Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 Chris, This one is new to me. May be some odd derivative of Mirris? Joe Sweeeny Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Krithia Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 I've seen the MYRYS stamp before, but also in the dark on this one as to the details behind it. I'm another forum member must know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lassuy Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 John-- The only marking readable is the one stamped on the helmet rim--- BS 87 There is the remains of the ink stamp on the liner, but unfortunately, it's illegible. The size stamp, 7, is on the leather strap that goes across the top interior of the helmet. Other than that, no such luck. I dug it out to examine it, and I can tell it used to be sanded, there is the odd bit of texture here and there, but not much--it's mostly just smooth, with a very heavy coat of dark green paint (it's almost a greenish-black from age, I can only really tell it's green from where it's scratched) brushed on. The reference to USMC use is from a picture in a book I have, World War One Uniforms in Color or something like that, by Laurent Mirouze (don't have it in front of me, so I'm not entirely sure about the title or spelling of the author's name). Not sure how correct that is, either. Thanks, Rod Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris P Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 Joe, Krithia.....Others I've spoken to have only ever seen MYRYS spelt as such....I would guess the MIRRIS spelling, or variations thereof is just an assumtion. Interesting as M.Cotton lists Myrys helmets as being unmarked, & also lists MLS as an unidentified maker, as this one combines both of these. I do have a few others that don't fit his research as well, so I guess there's still more to come, & some updating to be done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Haslock Posted 2 January , 2006 Share Posted 2 January , 2006 Jon, The FKS is one possibly one of the marks used by Thomas Firth and Sons (FS being the usual). The 15 is not a date but is known as the heat number. The heat number is something like a lot number, but tracks not a batch of steel but the usage of the furnace. So this helmet would be made by T Tirth in the 15th heating of the furnace. Firth made helmets from Sept 15 through 1919. Since it is a rimless helmet you know it was made sometime between falkl of 1915 and summer of 1916. You'd have to know how many heatings and duration of each heating were made during that time for a more precise date to figure when Firth had his 15th heating. As a guess maybe early 1916. Joe Sweeney Thanks Joe. Do you think that each of the heatings would have been to produce steel for the manufacture of helmets, or would some have been made for other purposes? Would steel for other purposes have had a different series of identification numbers? I presume that if Firths records still exist and if early 20th century heat numbers recorded the same information as modern heat/cast numbers, it should also be possible to trace the analysis of the steel and from that, assess the likely properties of the helmet under stress. Cheers, Jon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Sweeney Posted 3 January , 2006 Share Posted 3 January , 2006 Jon, Not really sure if the steel used in each heating would be used for anything other than Helmets. Not sure what info would be captured in that period. I once interned at RIA, where they were taking molten steel samples from the furnace for analysis. The steel was going towards the manufacture of 155mm carraiges, and breeches, also for 120mm Breeches. So the stell was used across quite a bit products and a very detailed data base was maintained. If your looking for stress testing of Helmets quite a bit was done on WWI helmets. The details of the tests were published by Bashford Dean in "Helmets and Body Armor in Modern War". Joe Sweeney Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Sweeney Posted 3 January , 2006 Share Posted 3 January , 2006 Joe, Krithia.....Others I've spoken to have only ever seen MYRYS spelt as such....I would guess the MIRRIS spelling, or variations thereof is just an assumtion. Interesting as M.Cotton lists Myrys helmets as being unmarked, & also lists MLS as an unidentified maker, as this one combines both of these. I do have a few others that don't fit his research as well, so I guess there's still more to come, & some updating to be done. Chris, My input was only a guess as I have no idea what MYRYS stands for. I'm curiuos now because looked through me helmets and I have one marked that way too. Joe Sweeney Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lammy Posted 19 December , 2018 Share Posted 19 December , 2018 Me TOO...! Magnetic rimless brodie with war office doghnut liner MYRRYS LS18 The LS is a very different font type than the MLS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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