Kriegsmarine L/18 U Boat Badge

[paul w]

Hi Guys,I have a B H Meyer u boat badge in tombac and always regarded that as the example of that maker in my collection but when I saw this little beaut I couldnt resist,cheers,

Paul

[paul w]

Back.

[paul w]

mm.

[Gordon Williamson]

Nice example ! Strange that they would change to an entirely different design when moving from Tombak to Zinc.

[Martin W]

Nice example ! Strange that they would change to an entirely different design when moving from Tombak to Zinc.

And an ugly design at that Gordon,especially after looking at the tombak design?

Cheers,Martin.

[Norm F]

Nice example ! Strange that they would change to an entirely different design when moving from Tombak to Zinc.

Presumably something happened to the Schickle master die making it unsuitable for zinc production, forcing them to come up with another source of die?

Regards,

---Norm

[Gordon Williamson]

Actually, the "Schickle" design does also exist in Zinc so there doesn't appear to have been any technical difficulties in using the original dies. If Schickle went out of business long before Zinc was used, and Mayer chanmged to this other design for their Zinc badges, then the "Schickle" design in Zinc may well have been from Zimmermann, the other firm that used this style.

Of course the original tooling may have become damnaged at some point forcing then to use a new die.

[Norm F]

Actually, the "Schickle" design does also exist in Zinc so there doesn't appear to have been any technical difficulties in using the original dies. If Schickle went out of business long before Zinc was used, and Mayer chanmged to this other design for their Zinc badges, then the "Schickle" design in Zinc may well have been from Zimmermann, the other firm that used this style.

Of course the original tooling may have become damnaged at some point forcing then to use a new die.

Hi Gordon,

Very interesting reasoning. I like the idea of Zimmerman for the zinc version since it makes sense it would be someone who rarely marked his badges. Apparently Mayer would have been tempted to mark one here and there as was his wont, so the absence of Mayer marked zinc Schickle-designs would seem to rule him out of the picture. Maybe Zimmerman got Schickle's master die while Mayer only got a production die which wore out...who knows.

Cheers.

---Norm

[paul w]

Thanks for the comments on this badge guys.You've also answered a question I had in mind regarding this maker,that is,how come the maker marked zinc L//18s were so different to the tombac design particularly as there are zinc badges around with the same design, so Zimmermann or Schickle maybe?I have to disagree with Martin on the eagle,I think its quite a nice design,I like the 'grim'look to it.Another noteworthy feature is the weight,its a very light badge and you can actually feel the difference in hand when comparing it to another maker such as Souval or Karnath,cheers,

Paul

[Gordon Williamson]

Paul,

The Zinc badges in the Schickle design can't be from the Schickle firm as the firm went out of business in 1941, long before the use of Zinc.

So, either Mayer used the Schickle design in Zinc initially then changed to this other design, or Mayer used the "new" design for Zinc and Zimmerman used the "old" Schickle design.

[paul w]

Cheers for clarifying that Gordon.While we're on the subject,theres a u boat badge in tombac with the 'shield'shaped chest,looks very much like the zinc L/56 but the hardware on the back consists of a flat protruding hinge and catch with a flat pointed pin that kind of hooks over the hinge block

.Thomas Huss has one on his site at the moment.I'm sure this type of badge has been discussed before and a possible maker suggested but I cant find the thread and cant remember the name of the maker,any ideas,thanks,

Paul

[paul w]

Back.

[Martin W]

The obverse design and the hinge suggest to me that this badge is the "Petz & Lorenz" type,although i do not recall seeing an example with that type of pin and retaining catch before?

Regards,Martin.

[Norm F]

The obverse design and the hinge suggest to me that this badge is the "Petz & Lorenz" type,although i do not recall seeing an example with that type of pin and retaining catch before?

Regards,Martin.

Yes, it looks like a good match to the Petz & Lorenz posted by Philippe on GCA, with the hardware that looks like their Sport's badge. The pin on the one posted by Paul is slightly more square and shorter and the catch is slightly thinner on the direct view of the reverse, but same basic design. The side view of the catch should look something like this:

Edited March 24, 2010 by Norm F

[paul w]

Thanks Martin and Norm,Petz and Lorentz was the maker as I now recall.I've seen one other u boat badge with the same hardware setup a few years ago but I guess they're pretty rare.Cheers,

Paul

[nesredep]

Hello!

Interesting.

All the best

Morten.