Help needed

[Barry Churcher]

I am trying to make up a bit of a display to go with my Swiss Army bike and I would like suggestions from the insightful members of MLU. I have acquired a number of boxes that are similar in style to the large wooden 19 Set cases and would like to stencil them. My question is what would be the proper or reasonably close wording to use. I also have a nice aluminum case to use for tools. Below is my Google version but would be in capitals. Any constructive help would be appreciated.
Barry

Mlitärfahrradteile
MO-93
der Kasten 1/3


Militärfahrradteile
MO-93
Werkzeuge

[Jakko Westerbeke]

I’m a little confused. Are you trying to find out what would really have been on the boxes, or are you making up stencilling that looks real enough without attempting to actually be the real thing?

In any case, der Kasten 1/3 IMHO makes little sense — that means something like “the bin 1/3”, so which bin? More likely would be that it says what the bin is for, I would think.

[Barry Churcher]

Thanks for the reply Jakko. Sorry I didn’t make the question clearer. In the past when I have displayed my bike it has been just sitting by itself on a patch of grass. The boxes are just meant to be background filler. I couldn’t imagine anyone having an original box, crate or whatever so I could make something. I would just like the stencil to say that this is one of three (1/3 ) boxes of MO-93 bicycle spare parts. Ersatzteile ??? The next will say 2/3 and so on. This is as close as I could get with Mr. Google. It is for entertainment only and not a museum display and could be covered with a camo net. My question is to help me make this look as realistic as possible. I need someone like you to say this makes no sense so it doesn’t look out of place completely...
Barry

[maple_leaf_eh]

My preference is not Goofle Translate but Bing Translate. I find it has a better sense of the vernacular.

So Bin 1, Bin 2 and Bin 3. Good neutral idea, except why would a mountain bike be associated with a supply unit? I'd prefer to see something relevant to its use as a dispatch rider, or an infantry mobility helper.

Finally, Switzerland is officially tri-lingual - German, French and Italian. Anything you stencil has to be done three times.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Hi Barry,

If you’re not going for accuracy, then why not stencil it with what it is?

E.g. Truppenfahrrad Unterstützung Kasten = troop bicycle support box.

Can’t imagine there are many Swiss army bikes in Canada!

[Jakko Westerbeke]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Hi Barry,
E.g. Truppenfahrrad Unterstützung Kasten = troop bicycle support box.

Except as one word, since compound nouns are never separated in German¹ Well, except for line breaks, which is probably necessary if you’re putting text like this on a box. I would suggest Truppenfahrrad-Unterstützungskasten with a hyphen, which likely will also form a good point for the line break.


¹ And, incidentally, in Dutch too, despite the ever-increasing Engelse ziekte.

[Barry Churcher]

Thanks guys for the input. I will probably have to separate the words to get it all in the space available. Unfortunately these boxes I have are not as large as the 19 set spares boxes. How about this?

Truppenfahrrad
Unterstützung
Kasten

Hanno I don't think there are a lot of Swiss bikes in Canada. An allotment of the MO-93 was split up among some US surplus dealers and are all sold out now. I was lucky enough to get mine a few years ago. Unfortunately the very few trailers they got were sold out quickly. I guess I will have to make up a trailer at some point. Most of the military bikes in Canada are the folding bikes.
Cheers
Barry

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Jakko Westerbeke

Except as one word, since compound nouns are never separated in German¹ Well, except for line breaks, which is probably necessary if you’re putting text like this on a box. I would suggest Truppenfahrrad-Unterstützungskasten with a hyphen, which likely will also form a good point for the line break.

You are right, of course. Do you know what the longest German word is? Try to pronounce
"Rinderkennzeichnungsfleischetikettierungsüberwach ungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz"
It is so long spaces are automatically added by the forum software

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Barry Churcher

Thanks guys for the input. I will probably have to separate the words to get it all in the space available. Unfortunately these boxes I have are not as large as the 19 set spares boxes. How about this?

Truppenfahrrad
Unterstützung
Kasten

Looks like a workable solution - people may actually be able to decipher this.

Hanno I don't think there are a lot of Swiss bikes in Canada. An allotment of the MO-93 was split up among some US surplus dealers and are all sold out now. I was lucky enough to get mine a few years ago. Unfortunately the very few trailers they got were sold out quickly. I guess I will have to make up a trailer at some point. Most of the military bikes in Canada are the folding bikes.

Always surprised to see esoteric European equipment finding its way into to North American collector's market. Think of the 1950s Dutch DAFs, like the YA314 you have. Some YA126's were imported for film work I think, one can see them in various American movies mostly acting in non-US MV roles.

[Jakko Westerbeke]

Originally Posted by Barry Churcher

Truppenfahrrad
Unterstützung
Kasten

I think I would add a hyphen at the end of the first two lines:

Truppenfahrrad-
Unterstützungs-
Kasten

Note the connecting <s> at the end of Unterstützungs, too. For safety, you may want to go with all uppercase, BTW, to avoid the issue of whether the second and third lines would be capitalised or not.

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Do you know what the longest German word is?

Like in Dutch, there is no limit: you can always string more words together into a single compound noun. And IIRC, German doesn’t even have the spelling guideline that Dutch does, to use hyphens to visually separate parts of the word for legibility if you think that will be beneficial.

[Barry Churcher]

This is what I got the idea from.
Barry