Relic Stokes Mortar Restoration Project

[peregrinvs]

Hi,

Purchased yesterday at Beltring for 25, a mostly complete dug Stokes mortar round which I have taken on as a long term restoration project. These are the pictures I took before I started cleaning - I then proceeded to bash off the worst of the rust and concretion with a hammer and it has now started a long soak in Deox-C rust remover.

I would be very interested to here from anyone who has restored one of these. I'd particularly like to know any tips and tricks for dismantling the pistol and unscrewing the base end.

Whilst I won't be needing it for a while - can anyone recommend a good substitute for the WWI British mustard yellow HE colour? I'd also like to know about the colour bands and stencils.

Thanks,

Mark

 

[ben2000]

Hi Mark,That's not a bad buy, I have couple of relic ones I reprinted ( ill post some pics tommorow) one thing to know, if your going to paint it as a WW1 version then they were painted grey not yellow, anyway you'll see in my pics when I post them. Ben.

 

[peregrinvs]

Grey huh? Interesting. Kind of a shame, as I prefer the yellow - but historical accuracy comes first.

Looking forward to seeing the pictures.

Thanks,
Mark

 

[Snufkin]

Display example in the Imperial War Museum.




Tom.

 

[peregrinvs]

Thanks. I've since found a reference that the body colour is "Dirty White" plus red and green or pink filling rings. Would bog-standard Magnolia be a reasonable match?

Thanks,
Mark

 

[ben2000]

Here's my two re-painted relics. The one with the always fuze i painted as a smoke shell. Ben.

 

[peregrinvs]

Thanks for that - very impressive. May I ask where you got the details for the markings from and how you did the stencilling?

Cheers,
Mark

 

[ben2000]

Hi mark,Just noticed your earlier post too, magnolia is a little on the yellow side but I've not seen a stokes bomb with original paint to know exactly what dirty white looks like the markings for the smoke one I was provided with on this forum in one of my old posts, the other was from looking at lots of period photos in books etc. I didn't make a stencil (though would prob have looked better) so I painted it all by hand. Ben.