WW2 US Pineapple Grenade what colour was it painted

Olive drab, with a yellow ring at the top of the body.
Trainers are painted blue with NO yellow ring.
Throwing dummies are painted black

Even though they are about the same weight, it's quite a different feeling when they hand you a live one at the range and you pull the pin!!!!!;)
 
What JS said although I saw some strange looking gold colour ones before.

I heard even dewat grenades can no longer come in from the US, so get them while you can.
 
Has it got an RFX stamped in the cross sections?
I've got a yellow painted on as well. I've been told it was a training dummy. the pin assembly is metal. So it was loaded to spark and fuse and then just lay where it fell. Seems it was easier to find the yellow dummies after throwing them.
Mr Clark thats a great PBASE page. Long Branch is just down the road from me here. I've never seen the history in the walls of the Long Branch plant.
Thanks
 
earlier in the war they were painted all yellow. Someone eventually figured out that bright yellow things weren't very good for camouflage
 
Mk VII said:
earlier in the war they were painted all yellow. Someone eventually figured out that bright yellow things weren't very good for camouflage

Yep. The story goes that the Japanese would see the yellow ones in the jungles, and throw them back. Later in the war, they still had large quantities of the yellow ones, and so many were issued first to be used up. I've read several accounts of yellow painted grenades being issued for D-Day.
 
Last edited:
I have several early Mk2 and they are painted grey to almost black in color. At least one is grey with yellow traces. From memory, it looked painted yellow aver the black. These are Mk2 with the lead filling plug in the bottom, not the later Mk2 with the solid bottom. And their fuses are made of lead, unlike the later Mk2A1 fuses.

Early Mk2A1 were painted all yellow... (if you want to know why, I seem to remember yellow meant HE filling.) Of course, it was quickly found that a yellow grenade was not a good idea so OD colored grenades with a yellow ring (so it was clear the grenade was still filled with HE!) at the top was adopted.

Most, if not all, "pineapple" grenades you will find at surplus store are cheap Korean knock-off of the US made training grenades... The cast iron body is made in korea as a novelty item and the fuses are surplus M228 training fuses as used with the M69 "baseball" training grenade... BTW, the cast-iron bodied "baseball" and "lemon" type grenades also found in surplus stores are cheap korean knock-off as well as the real grenades are made of steel...

Hope this helps!
 
MRCLARK said:
I,m thinking of picking up some dewat pineapple grenades from the local surplus store and was wondering in anyone had any pics or knew what colour they were painted back in the day.

Soylent Green! ;)
 
^^^^
MRCLARK said:
Sounds like my boxers after this weekend
Soiled Green!




I wish there was a surplus store around here...I'd love to pick up a few things like this. The last one close probably 10 years ago. :(
 
The blue practice grenades had a live fuze, a very small bag of black powder and a cork plugging the end. Just enough to blow the cork out and emit a puff of smoke.
 
Back
Top Bottom