Method of removing dents from steel shells

[The Rooster]

Greetings all. I wanted to pass along a method I use for removing dents from M1 steel helmets.

You prob would not want to remove them from a real nice expensive lid. But for those 120 dollar WW2 or Korean lids

that you might have that are dented......

You can easily get rid of the dents without damaging the paint etc..

You take the helmet and put it upside down on the carpet in your house. Then take a wooden baseball bat

and place the fat end directly over the center of the dent you want to take out.

Then hit the small end of the bat with a 3 pound sledge or something heavy until

then dent smooths out. Do it slowly and feel between strikes of the weight to judge

the progress. It does a great job and the wooden bat does not scratch the paint.

Ive picked up some front seam shells with straps that had large and small dents and this worked great to remove them.

This will ruin the bat eventually so use a donor bat, but it works great.

[Jean-Loup]

I would strongly advise against removing any dents except if the helmet was used as a toy post war or something.

 

I was recently shown a magnificient camouflaged paratrooper helmet from southern France, that originaly had several shrapnel holes in it. The finder bent all the holes back shut. I couldnt believe a collector would do something so stupid, but he did.

 

 JL

[stratasfan]

Thanks, Dave! That is super interesting! I'd definitely try this. I I have something with no history or anything to tell you where it was from . . . I'd restore it! 

 

I won't use my nice Slugger, though! Thanks for the tip! I might have something to try this on!

[huntssurplus]

I would have to agree with Jean-Loup that unless you know the dents are from a post-war mishap, i would prefer they be left as is. A lot of dents on helmets are probably from post-war use, but we can't really verify from what. That dent might have occured during war time for all we know. 

 

As collectors are job is to preserve. While you can do whatever you want to something you buy, I think for the collectors of the future they would all prefer items to be left as close to how they were when they were last in use. 

 

That's just my opinion though. 

[MattS]

If I have a $20 shell with no straps, bales, and a huge dent on top so large a liner won't fit in it, I can absolutely see repairing it.

Not every one of the millions of surviving M1 helmet shells is collectible and needs to be preserved complete with dirt, rust, and dents just because it sat outside on a pallet in a surplus yard for decades. Just my opinion and I'm sure there are those who will disagree. 

[stratasfan]

4 minutes ago, MattS said:

If I have a $20 shell with no straps, bales, and a huge dent on top so large a liner won't fit in it, I can absolutely see repairing it.

Not every one of the millions of surviving M1 helmet shells is collectible and needs to be preserved complete with dirt, rust, and dents just because it sat outside on a pallet in a surplus yard for decades. Just my opinion and I'm sure there are those who will disagree. 

 

That's it! I will only ever have a helmet with no known history or reason to preserve a damaged helmet or one that needs repainting, etc. Why not restore them so that it is nicer. And rust . . . stop the rust! That totally will devalue your collectible helmet! Makes your piece super temporary to leave rust or tarnish on it. 

[MattS]

There's a wide spectrum of collectors from the "don't ever touch it" crowd to the "it's mine and I'm gonna repaint it as a 2nd Ranger officer on D-Day" people, and the two extremes tend to disagree a lot.

 

I had a helmet shell given to me that was found by a highway worker who found it in the side ditch of a county road in Indiana. I chose to not 'preserve' it as found. 

[The Rooster]

I suppose its up to the owner. And yes I would not do it to some painted valuable helmet. Or something you got from a Vet...

Just the ones where you have a nice period lid and theres a round type dent messing with the way the liner sits etc.

A helmet that would be real nice if you could remove a dent or two.

Thats why I posted this.

And when I was in the Army Guard back when these M1's were worn, I saw them used to pound in tent stakes....

I even saw my LT put his helmet on a stick of dynamite and blow it 40 feet into the air. Just the steel not the liner.

 

Some of those helmets were WW2 helmets.

So when you see those large and small round dents....

Instead of arriving because of battle damage, its more than likely those dents got there by some GI using it

to pound stakes, being dropped etc. etc etc.

Not to mention all the steel pots that were dented in Basic Training

on the rifle range by DI's whacking people on the top of the helmet with those wooden paddles.

I saw a lot of dented lids in boot camp.

[huntssurplus]

45 minutes ago, The Rooster said:

I suppose its up to the owner. And yes I would not do it to some painted valuable helmet. Or something you got from a Vet...

Just the ones where you have a nice period lid and theres a round type dent messing with the way the liner sits etc.

A helmet that would be real nice if you could remove a dent or two.

Thats why I posted this.

And when I was in the Army Guard back when these M1's were worn, I saw them used to pound in tent stakes....

I even saw my LT put his helmet on a stick of dynamite and blow it 40 feet into the air. Just the steel not the liner.

 

Some of those helmets were WW2 helmets.

So when you see those large and small round dents....

Instead of arriving because of battle damage, its more than likely those dents got there by some GI using it

to pound stakes, being dropped etc. etc etc.

Not to mention all the steel pots that were dented in Basic Training

on the rifle range by DI's whacking people on the top of the helmet with those wooden paddles.

I saw a lot of dented lids in boot camp.

 

Are those dents brought from pounding stakes, being dropped, etc not original military use of the helmet? Are pounding stakes not part of history? Yes we all like battle damaged helmets, but there is a lot more the everyday life of a soldier than combat that should be preserved. I would say I'm pretty far to the side of the "don't touch it crowd" but making a historical artifact look "nice" for my own eyes just doesn't sit right with me. 

 

Yes there were millions made, but how many will remain 100 years from now? How about 200? Think about how many items from the revolutionary or civil war remain that weren't dug out of the ground or found covered in a bunch of rust. As collectors, when we get an item we should do our best to keep it as close to how we got it so people in 100, 200, or how ever many years in the future can also see the item as close to how it was when it was used. Imagine if there were collectors during the civil war that preserved all of the uniforms, sabers, cannons, etc as best as they could. imagine how many more would be available for collectors and museums of this age to display and enjoy. 

 

[MattS]

There are thousands of surviving CW swords and sabers and the market for them (as I've heard from dealers) is dead. So what if in 100 or 200 years no one cares what a M1 helmet is and doesn't want to own one? The hypotheticals are endless. As nice as it would be, we can't preserve them all nor do we have any control on what happens to these items after we are all gone. I know we'd like to think they will be preserved and cared for, but I also know of many collectors who passed suddenly and had all their well cared for items unceremoniously thrown into a dumpster. 

[The Rooster]

The military  knocked dents out of M1's and repainted and refurbished them through out the 40

year usage of the M1 helmet. Many more were melted down and made into various products.

I respect everyones opinions on this matter.

This post is for those that want to fix offending round dents in their Steel shells.

As an aside, anyone who went to Basic Training back in the day can attest to the drill instructors use of the heavy wooden paddles. (Those caused different shaped

dents... lol)

and most likely at some point during the course of their service have seen the literal use of Helmets as hammers !!!

If this is not what you want to do with your M1 helmets, please skip it.