www.MG42.us

Do you think this is original paint?

TC

IS THAT BLACK OR JUST THE PIC?

here is a "post war" one i got from marstar a while back no waffen or date but ww2 grey

yes tom, it is black. and it appears it is the only layer of paint. no other layers or primer underneth. just bare metal.

TC

It is not the original paint.

since we are on the basket here anyone know what the small hat channel on the side of the baskets for?left side in my pic

Starter tab goes under it when loaded with a full belt.

ahh now i see, thanks

Looks like I will have to paint that too when I re-paint my barrel carriers, and ammo cans.

TC

They are not hard to restore. Here are a couple of photos of one I restored not long ago. I disassemble them to strip the paint, then prime them with red oxide and paint them. The example in the photo was painted with 1944's Ordnance Tan.

I think I will try walnut shells in my new bead blast cabinet. I hate using stripper. Where did you source out the correct red oxide paint color?

TC

red oxide is just some rustolium primer, there was a link here to a company that sells the ww2 german colors in rattle cans, little pricy but was supposed to be good

btw the tan looks great, i have not restored any of my stuff cause i cannot decide tan or grey

Tom,

Why not do both?

got enough ammo cans for that , i will need to pick up another double basket carrier I guess

Here are some photos of drums that also appear black.They are in a museum in Camirillo,CA,and were brought back from Europe right after the war.

The set above has been miss-presented as a saddle drum in the Museum text. Anyway. this set was manufactured in tan, and then repainted by the troops to Panzergray. This practice was not uncommon, as many troops prefered the darker color. You can still see the original paint shining through.

Berg-these were at an air museum,and I think this display was an afterthought.A lot of stuff was mis-marked and with wrong parts.I am going back in April,and will talk to them,maybe I can help fix it I am going to give them one of the belts I got from you for their mg34,A pic is in our 34 photo section.Maybe I'll even give them a correct bi=pod! ---bil

It looks like my drums are painted red primer, then dark grey, then tan, and then post war OD

I took the cover off one, and under there where it was covered from later paintings, it's dark grey/black. The inside is grey over red too. There is a little patch of tan where it was oversprayed with the door open, and tan under the OD.

Here's a look.

MikeD

I have also owned original drums that had not been through a repaint that did not have the inside painted with anything other than red oxide primer. The outside was drunkelgrau 7021.

Here's what the inside of that basket looks like...mostly red with some Dunklegrau overspray

The mailman just dropped off a box from Canada....my "post war" carrier set from Marstar. The carrier is a "bph 1941", and the dirtier trommel on the left is marked "ddf" with no date, and the right one is unmarked, except for a Yugo-type letter in a square on the bottom. The "ddf" basket looks just like the wartime ones I have, but the Yugo-looking one has detail differences, the most obvious being the "corrugations"....but I'm sure they'll all work. What I'll probably do is combine my WWII Trommels with the WWII carrier, and use the others singly

What's the group's opinion on the Marstar colors?

Enjoy,

MikeD