Steel Pot, Protective Value

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Mauserguy

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As part of my post Katrina preparations, I am putting together a survival kit. This includes food, manuals, etc. In my closet, I found an old East German helmet which I had purchased years ago to match my East German paintball outfit. At any rate, it got me to wondering just how protective it would be.

Will a steel pot helmet stop a bullet or only shrapnel? Are they any good?
Mauserguy



Hey, the helmet looks good on me.
 

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It might stop or deflect a pistol rounds but nothing worthy of the name rifle is going to be stopped.
They are better than nothing but not a lot.
Best use I ever found for one was soaking my feet.

Sam
 
Keeps the rain and shrapnel off, anything else is luck and chance, but it beats a newspaper held over your head. A poor chance is better than none.
 
shrapnel problably, maybe pistol. But it would have a lot to do with jsut what angle it was hit at. You are better off getting yourself a modern one. Still not a sure thing but much better.
 
On another site I saw ppl discussing it, and the protective value depends a lot on range, and some helmets were made out of more expensive alloys than others.

As for glancing shots, eh, when you hit the side of an empty pop can with a pellet gun, even at extreme angles, and with rounded pellets, they still dig in and plough a nice trough. So I'd have to agree that rifles would pass through it at all ranges.

But it would keep the sun and water off, and burrowing insects, and most importantly of all it would boil water if held over a flame. Not much else in the world can do that, 'cept for Don Quixote's headwear.
 
Unless it's a helluva lot better than a U.S. Vietnam era steel pot, the answer is
'neither'. The helmet I wore on an early March night in 1969 was penetrated by shrapnel fragments first by a "chi-com" grenade, and later that night by fragments from an RPG that detonated a few feet behind me.
I have no doubt that the helmet slowed the shrapnel enough to keep it from penetrating my skull, but the fact is it went through the steel pot.
I think a kevlar helmet might be a better choice.

Walter
 
I've always been a Lobster Pot man myself. :p

783_DSC00971.JPG
 
Wow, where can I get a Lobster Pot? I have recently read that the army is going to switch it's helmet design, so the market may become flooded with kevlar units soon. I don't know how true it is, but I am rather fond of the look of the communist hat, so I will definately keep it.

Walter, that's quite a story you have to tell. I'm glad your pot worked well enough for you to be with us today.
Mauserguy
 
I don't know if it would be better than nothing. It restricts peripheral vision, hearing, is heavy/uncomfortable and offers minimal protection. I have an RBR F6 combat helmet...but I never thought of wearing it in a civilian SHTF capacity...I guess it would be good. It will stop pistol rounds (level IIIA) and shrapnel and has minimal impact on hearing and peripheral vision.

I would think for the size and weight there would be a lot better choices of objects to put in a survival kit instead. Even if only more H2O or food.
 
Cover it in tin foil like I did mine and it serves a dual purpose.:neener:
Biker
 
I picked up a used USGI PASGT helmet at a gun show, with a woodland camo cover, for about $40 a few months ago. With the MICH helmet being used more and more often, or upgrades to the more heavily armored PASGT helmets getting around, the standard PASGT is going to become more available.

There are also German and British kevlar helmets out there in the milsurp industry to be had for under $100.
 
I got a ricochet 30 cal in the head once with a modern kevlar helmet on. I'm not sure exactly where it hit but the left ear piece was blown to splinters and my ear was cut. That's all I got thankfully! It was two bullets coming off the ground and one got me in the body armor on my left chest and that other one went up in the side of my helmet somehow. I walked away. Well got carried away but only because I was trying to go after the one who had the "accidental discharge" . My weapon was open and cleared as I had ordered the rest of the line fortunantly for him.

We wore steel pots in the Navy the whole time I was in. I can't say I ever saw one take a bullet but I do know when you are hauling butt down a passageway in the dark to a fire and you thump your head on a Water tight door frame they do work! Done that a few times.

One time here me and my son had to go out to the barn when we saw a tornado coming. We had hail stones the size of soft balls and so I told him to grab his helmet. It was a ww2 army steel pot. I had my kevlar on. We ran out and turned all the horses loose and then took cover under the house. When it just barely missed us we came out to more hail but there was lightening all over too. I quickly thought about it then told him to throw me his helmet and I gave him mine. Steel helmets and lightening are a bad thing.
I have seen a man killed from that. Another man I know got killed just from the steel button on his navy ball cap providing an exit for the electricity from a lightening strike.

Be careful in bad weather with steel on your head!
 
IIRC, the old Pistolero magazine (remember Fat Phil?)shot a few steel pots, and without the liner a .32 acp penetrated it.
 
Steel helmets have a nice ring to them when hit with a bullet.

With the wrong camo or paint job, they make good targets.

I can't imagine a civil breakdown scenario that would mandate a helmet. Might be nice low intensity military operations, if you can honestly see yourself involved. If you do forsee this, call me so I can go the other direction.
 
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