hi Hannibal74,
thanks in advance for your explanation.
You typed down some things that had already crossed my mind.
Somehow I think if this is a reproduction, why don't we find it in large numbers (like reproductions)
I can also imagine that wrongly beaten / cast badges have never been thrown away in the garbage in the past and have never been used,
but they remained in the factory / office and were still scattered after the war..
Now it is certainly not the most beautiful deutsche arbeiter jugend badge in my collection but rather a frankenstein..
I was on the point of returning it to the seller but I thought and still think he's ok because he feels/ looks period in hand.
So I plan to keep this frankenstein because it's my only one with 20 sunbeams for now.
I will also do my best to take nicer / better pictures of the badge with a decent photo camera