SS Decal Variations, an Informational

Compendium.

This section presents an overview of mainstream decals used by the SS from

1933-1945. If you are familiar with or own my books, you will see these same

decals laid out in detail as to origin, correlation to helmet manufacturer, and

approximate time period used.

During my 51 years of collecting German helmets, I have identified several decal

variations, and note that among the nearly dozen possible, there were five basic

types that were manufactured and used within the mainstream production of SS

helmets. These are: 1) CA Pocher, Nuremberg, 2) FW Quist Pattern, 3) NS or

Champagne Rune, 4) EF Pattern and 5) ET Pattern. Each of these decals except

Pocher had internal variations, albeit slight. Review these often for reference

when comparing helmets you are considering buying out there in order to avoid

getting stung. I hope you download this document for your use and sharing. My

intellectual property has already been shared unofficially on forums and other

means for over 12 years since my SS-Steel books came out, so feel free to

continue doing so with this brief, but structured document. For any questions, I

am available anytime at kellyhicks@hotmail.com

I.

Early SS Decal Variations (see SS-Steel vol. 1 and 2 for details)

The SS used several variations of helmet insignia until they settled on their main

production styles. Some of these included the SS-VT circular runes and mobile

swastika, the scalloped LAH decals, the Fat Runes decal, the Austrian Pattern

runes decal and the Round Bottom runic shield.

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i) SS-VT helmet insignia. Here is an original hand- rendered set of SS-VT insignia,

on a helmet found in a Minnesota barn in September 2015.

ii) Fat Runes decal from an ET M35

Helmet. There is no corresponding

party shield; ET and Pocher styles were

both used with this shield. Fat Runes

are a face-up decal.

iii) Austrian Pattern SS Decals, found on special Earth Brown transitionals and at

least one Sicherheitsdienst M34 helmet.

iv) Round Bottom Runic and Party shields, found on SD-Related RZM and M34

helmets. This rare variant appears to be face down decals, lacking the celluloid

film.

II.

Mainstream Production Decals used by the SS between 1935-1945.

1) CA Pocherdesign approved by Reichsfhrer-SS in July-August 1934. Worn by

the SS on a large variety of helmets throughout the entire period up until 1945.

CA Pochers are face-up water slide type decals.

2) FW Quist Pattern (Narrow Q). Believed designed and authorized by early 1938.

Used on Q helmets exclusively through end of production in 1943, through to the

end in 1945. Quist decals appear to be face down decals, lacking presence of

celluloid film. Lack of examples of this rune still on the paper noted.

FW Quist Wide Pattern Rune.

See SS-Steel Expanded Edition for detailed

reference.

3) NS Pattern or Champagne Rune. These appear in a wide and a narrow

variation, in very small number on a variety of M35, 40 and 42 helmets. These

insignia are less understood and not universally accepted as original Third Reich,

due to the amount of fakes that exist. Speaking about the original examples I have

handled, here is my analysis from since my first encounter with this decal in the

1970s; and excerpts from my 2010 publication of the updated edition of SS-

Steel. Below is a wide style champagne rune decal on an NS M35 Helmet, and a

narrow style on an NS M40. The decal on the left has the celluloid carrier film

visible (face up); the narrow pattern does not (face down). Lack of unapplied

decals (still on paper) noted.

*See Footnote at the end for more information on Champagne Runes

4) EF Pattern Runes.

These appear to have been designed and approved sometime around 1941, and

with two known m-40 exceptions, appear on the EF M42 helmet almost

exclusively. Here are examples of the EF rune and party shields.

EF Pattern runic and party shields. These party shields are distinct from stock

party shields found on other SS helmets and are found universally on EF M42

Polizei helmets. The runic shields appear to be face-down decals. Lack of

examples of these decals still on the paper noted.

5). ET Pattern Decals. These are probably the most abundant version of original

SS decals encountered. They began to appear universally on ET-produced helmets

in 1938; and then on M40 and M42 helmets through until the end of 1943 from

ET. The runic shield on the M35s is different from that of the M40 / 42 and are

pictured below for reference.

Top left: ET Runes on an M35; right ET

party shield on M35. Right: ET runes

on M40. The M35 pattern are face-

up decals. The M40 pattern may be

face down.

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Footnote:

*My viewpoint on Champagne Rune Decals.

Based on having seen these decals since the 1970s, my viewpoint has always been

that they are real. They were not plentiful, but they appeared occasionally over

the years, on M35, M40 and M42 shells. Back in those days, our analysis was very

thin, consisting mainly of first and second pattern decals, but frankly not even

that sophisticated. I did not even differentiate them visually back at that time,

because I saw so few SS helmets available anyway (this was based on my

observations starting 40-50 years ago). In subsequent years, as I encountered

them in the field, I considered recognized them as part of the SS decal pantheon.

Friends of mine over the years sometimes expressed doubt in their originality, so

in my early SS bookswhile I picture themI do not specifically say they are

different, even though by 1993 I definitely had noticed they were made

differently. And of course there are fake ones, just as there are fake Qs, ETs and

Pochers. Many fake champagne runes, (two of which Ive had in my hands) were

said to have been done by an American and sold on ebay.

Evidence supporting my viewpoint on Champagne Runes:

As I show in SS-Steel, I vet purchased two of them in the early-mid 1970s. In my

first book, SS Helmets, published in 1993, I show one or two M35s with

champagne runes. One is an NS and one is an ET. There are color closeups of the

decals, which show the celluloid underlay and other characteristics of

mainstream decals of a more conventional manufacture technique. So from the

early-mid 70s to 1993, I had collected a total of 4 champagne rune bearing SS

helmets, along with probably thirty five Q, and ET helmets. I did not even see my

first EF pattern decal helmet until 1994, and while I thought it was inherently real,

I had no point of reference on it. This was how asunder the analytical body of

evidence on helmets was back then. With the internet the way it is today, you can

learn 20 years worth of hard earned knowledge in about six months. (You can

also un-learn a lot with the equally fast pace of mis-information nowadays.) There

is no substitute for experience.

Long after I had come up with my catalogue of SS decals and their correlation to

helmet makers, which I did in the latter 1990s, I published the first edition of SS

Steel to advance my theory on NS pattern decals. I actually got the idea for the

term Champagne Runes decals from my mentor, Al Barrows, who in more than

one conversation shared with me that he also thought there was a subdued

version of the SS decal, which had a champagne like look to it.

I first featured champagne runes as a decal variation in my first volume of SS-Steel

in 2003. As I was preparing to publish SS Steel Expanded Edition in 2008-09, I

had begun more earnestly cataloging and studying champagne runes. Collectors

had been sending me their champagne rune helmets for my analysis. I noted that

some had appeared from such remote corners of the earth, yet bore

characteristics of already known examples, so I realized my hypothesis was

bearing out in the physical evidence.

In 2010, I encountered XRay Florescence technology, which I embraced as a

potentially valuable authentication tool based on the purity of the technology. I

participated in the creation of a large database of scans of all the SS helmets

decals I could get my hands on, approximately 200 examples over a several month

period. When we had more than three hundred examples in the database, we

developed a mean, a signature of the key elements that each decal was made of.

This included champagne runes, which bear nearly the identical signature as a CA

Pocher, with the exception of the presence of about 3% copper. I was astounded;

this was to me the element that possibly accounts for the bronze color of this

type of decal.

The way it basically works is the surface of the object, in this case decals, is

bombarded with xray energy from a hand-held device. The device reads the

molecular, non-organic (metals basically) materials that make up the decal. These

can be distinguished from the underlying helmet metal and also from the paint.

The amount of certain elements in the dec