Kriegsmarine unmarked minesweeper with smooth borders and dome-head hinge pin

[Norm F]

Hello all,

RichardT from WAF and on GMIC as well has allowed me to repost these photos for discussion.

This is another variety of unmarked Minesweeper which I hadn't seen before but of which Richard has seen photos of several examples. It's quite unusual in that on the reverse you can see completely smooth margins as marked in the photo. The eagle on this example looks a little rough to my eye.

Aside from these unusual features I was intrigued by the hinge and dome-headed hinge pin. So far I have seen dome-headed hinge pins only on the tombak unmarked minesweeper discussed in the previous thread, http://gmic.co.uk/in...showtopic=40890 and also in Schwerin early tombak badges.

So my questions about this badge are:

1) Is this recognized as a period maker, even if identity is unknown?

2) Are they always tombac, and if so are they thought to be early production? Perhaps before switching to a different more detailed die leading to another recognized variety?

3) Given the scarcity of makers using dome-headed hinge pins, could there be a connection either geographically or in a business sense between Schwerin, this maker and the other maker of unmarked badges mentioned earlier?

I'd welcome any thoughts and comments.

Best regards,

---Norm

Edited November 25, 2009 by Norm F

[Norm F]

Reverse showing the remarkably smooth borders as marked.

[Norm F]

Reverse showing the remarkably smooth borders as marked.

As it turns out, I now believe this badge fits into the discussion on the "Juncker-style minesweepers" I posted here.

Don Doering at WAF made the observation that the smooth edges result from a failure to remove the flashing around the wreath in the die stamping/forging process.

I then looked more closely at the features of these photos, comparing them to the "Juncker-style" minesweepers.

Looking at the composite attached below, several correlations are noted:

1) similar hinge blocks with dome-head hinge pins (not commonly used by other MS makers)

2) similarities seen in the reverse - namely, the cutout eagle shoulders (marked with green arrows) and the short acute-angled lower portion of the water plume (circled in the photo below). Whereas other makers may look similar in either one of these area, the combination of the two features I see only in the so-called "Juncker-style" minesweepers.

3) the flat-wire catch on this smooth-bordered MS is similar to those seen on other marked Juncker badges, and also in unmarked "Juncker-style" U-boot badges.

Best regards,

---Norm

Edited December 19, 2009 by Norm F

[Norm F]

So I now believe this badge was made by the same maker as the so-called "Juncker-style" minesweepers, if not actually by Juncker; one could speculate it was from a later batch that was mis-stamped and a later flat-wire catch applied. On the other hand depending on which you think came first, round wire catches or flat-wire catches, maybe it was an earlier run that they hadn't quite got right. Please note that my analysis as posted is based on seeing only this one photo example of the smooth-bordered Minesweeper with a flat-wire catch. I'd be interested if anyone has other examples, or opinions on this topic.

Best regards,

---Norm

Edit: The discovery of a zinc "Juncker-style" minesweeper with the flat-wire catch now indicates that the flat-wire catches were later than the round-wire catches, and suggests that this round-edged tombak was a transitional late tombak batch, combining the earlier block hinge and dome-head hinge pin with the later flat-wire catch.

Edited December 21, 2009 by Norm F