well if this is the case 90% of badges in a lot of peoples collections are bad,i have looked through lots of threads of diff makers and these marks are visable on most around the pin area, as for the m1/14 badges you say the position of the maker mark is a typical 70's placement so are all m1/14's bad as all i have seen have had the maker mark in the same position.
Hi Stu, i agree, at least 90% and in general (taking all awards into consideration as well) more than 90%.
Yes, note the Fake M1/63 badge too, and the RZM logo, and placement.
have looked through my
shooting badge and i only have 1 by this maker, , im happy with it and have shown it when i first bought it to a lot of people i would trust and they all gave it
.if your method shows it to be bad that's your opinion and your method which if is correct i dont understand why its not universally recognised as the best way to spot fakes ?? i personally am happy with it.
Why? because up until a few weeks ago i have never mentioned this method before to anyone, or on any forum except here, only on my website. And that was only recently. I can see from your replies that you are getting a little hot under the collar, and thats not why i posted here, so i`ll cut this short. If you believe that what you have is good, and accept the positive responses you have had on your items, then good for you, they are your items, so that's all that matters.
Note what i said above regarding the Fantasy Unit Braunschweig badge, that everyone, including members here like Toby R, (and weitze, Hüsken, Kelly, emedals, gottlieb to name a few)all believed, and still do, that it`s real, and very rare! only recently has it come to light, through extensive, individual research, that it cant be authentic, and we are now in 2011 ! so how many are in collections and good? J.R Cones
book in 1983 went into even more detail about them, saying that there was a stockpile stolen from Germany pre-war etc etc.... So from the date they first appeared, (maybe 1960-70) untill 2011 they have become real and rare, even though they never were? What i am trying to say, is that this is a prime example of just how much Poo there is in collections, all because certain people have given certain items the thumbs up !!
Now, not to point fingers at any one person, but think about what i have written, my research with regards this Discoloring, is my research, solely for my own use and something that i have been doing for a while now, after accidentally stumbling across this method. It is
not a method that i use to determine the Authenticity of small badges at all ! I rely on many more pointers, History being the first one, rational thinking the second, and of course knowing that most of what is being offered can not be period. This was the case 40 years ago even, so today it is worse. It is simply something that caught my attention when looking at post war badges in more detail, after understanding the Production techniques, construction, the Enamel process and more recently the role that Sub-contractors, (in the case of small badges the M2 license holders, ) played in making badges using the same dies for a variety of makers. And as i mentioned above, i have only ever seen this typical discoloring on post war badges. I can nail it down a bit more too, the early Austrian Fakes, and very good (supposed early) fakes, do not show this discoloring, so imo these fakes were made by Original makers post war, or made in the 50`s when the soldering technique was still the same, or made by European makers who understood their craft. This will be a reason, why you can not use 'my method' to instantly determine all fakes :closedeyes:
Most collectors really need to wake up a little too ! The 'reasoning' part, is such:
We collect items made between 1920-1944, by a few German makers. Thats 22 years of on-off production-on-demand.
Since 1945, up until this very day, these items we collect have been reproduced by thousands and thousands of F(makers) in more countries than we could shake a stick at. That's 66 years.
Take into consideration the period items lost and destroyed as well. The math tells us that the Ratio of Good/Bad must be 90/10 if not more. That's not my opinion, that's just rational reasoning.
Now to cut down the Period items figures even more. Most items, like the HJ Shooter badge, were only made from a certain time, ie: not from 1920 through 1944 non-stop) and most Awards were made for only 4-5 years in most cases, so the ratio of Good-Bad now becomes 95/5 if not more.
The only way around it, is to collect one item, and one item only, and do as much research on that time period, and every aspect of the 3rd Reich that relates to that one item as possible. After many years, and many books, and lots of wasted cash, if you are still interested, things will start to fall into place, and dots will able to be connected. But to find such a person who is dedicated to one item, is hard today, as the collector is not really interested in history, but more in what people tell him.
Sorry to hammer this in again, but once more, we turn to the Fantasy Unit Braunschweig badge. If anyone who was really interested in this particular badge, and the History behind it, had done some homework and honest research, instead of blindly believing what people like Cone and Hüsken tell them, and publish.. they would have worked out decades ago that no such unit existed, and saved future collectors from getting burnt.
I don't think i will continue with this thread, my point was not to start a fight over who has a fake or not, or who`s opinion is better. Collectors do not like to have their items dissed, i know this, and the vast majority are happy to believe that their stuff is good as long as the right people tell them that it is. The trait though, is that if 10 people of the right caliber say it`s good, and 1 person from god knows where comes along and says otherwise, he usually gets jumped on, this is why, the modern day militaria reference books sell like hot cakes, Not a drop of Factual history in any of them, instead, many pictures to compare.