Unmarked painted RG34

[KroniK]

Hello,

This kit came in this week.
It appears to be an unmarked painted RG34.
Price was normal. Came with postwar contents (black phenolic oiler and 90° rotated chain).

As a read that this could be a rare find, I would love your thoughts on it.

 

[Slash]

Your behälter was made by Gustav Appel. It is wartime, most probably circa 1941 - '42. These unmarked cans are found with some frequency. I have a couple of them in my collection. Not particularly rare in my experience.

 

[KroniK]

Great info, thank you.
Any speculation as to why there was a run like this?
Does it have the regular cnx WaA20 marked content?

 

[dot]

Personally, I only have two cans like this in my collection, and in my humble opinion, they are not very common pieces. The ones I have, I would date from 1943 onwards.
As for their existence, it's difficult to know why, as everything points to the code was normally marked at some point during the lid manufacturing process. Perhaps the change in position (closer to the indentation) of the cnx code on the third variant of Gustav Appel's painted Behälter has something to do with it. One conjecture could be that they were manufactured without the code for a brief period during the aforementioned changeover process. But again, this is just a supposition and another unknown.
What is clear is that, despite not bearing the manufacturer's code, they were used by the Wehrmacht.

Antoni

 

[pwcosol]

Though uncommon, Rg34 behalter have been observed with two named/coded lids as well. A fellow collector has dual-marked lids on a tan Rg34... "arr4" on one lid and "rco44" on the other. All components appear commensurate as to paint finish, wear and overall condition. It seems likely this was the result of a production error. So, the odds might be close to the same occurring with a worker mistakenly assembling a hull with two blank ones. Also, one can't rule out the possibility of a worker running out of either the named/coded lids or blank ones and using two of the same to meet his assembly quota for the day, too... Likely such a indiscretion would be overlooked or hard to pin on any one worker if discovered...

 

[Slash]

Some examples of the behälter oddities mentioned by @pwcosol above are shown and discussed in this thread:

Unusual rg34 Behalter Thread

Starting a thread to document strange or unusual rg34 cans (behalter). The late war kits assembled by G. Appel utilizing parts and components transferred from Hawig and Mundlos have been discussed in a number of postings here on the forum. Here is an example having the CNX stamping with Eagle...

www.k98kforum.com

 

[pwcosol]

It occurred to me one other possibility could be due to a field armorer replacing a damaged lid. I would not be surprised if G APPEL was the exclusive supplier of Rg34 armorer replacement components to the Heer, etc. However, with the S84/98 T3, we know several firms supplied armorer replacement parts, thus G.A. might not have been alone in doing so...

 

[dot]

...Hahn & Kolb and Polte-Werke for example.