Anyone familiar with this thread?

[luftwaffenkopf]

http://sammler.ru/index.php?showtopic=106266&st=0

saw this while digging around the net trying to confirm authenticity of some of my rare Soviet medals (Odessa/Sevastopol/Belgrade/Partisan) and was astonished to read this post by one expert on that forum showing some very good fakes out there that i would never suspect; not all of the ones he posted, but a few. now i'm doubting some of my rarest medals... opinions, we all have them, but this expert is highly regarded on that forum. what are your thoughts on this piece of information?

[Komandir RKKA]

This is very usefull link and reliable site.

[luftwaffenkopf]

This is very usefull link and reliable site.

i'm of the same opinion, although now that i am paying strict attention to MonDvor pictures i see subtle variations even on medals that are not considered rare or worth anything, such as Koenigsberg, Berlin, etc. MonDvor also omits reverse side pictures of later variations of some medals which is not helpful when trying to authenticate since the dies for later medals were obviously different from the early ones... just my 2 cents worth

[GREIF]

Mondvor is very good site, but incomplete .

[luftwaffenkopf]

Mondvor is very good site, but incomplete .

incomplete is one thing, but i think there is more... take a look at reverses of Caucasus, Stalingrad, Leningrad and Odessa type 1. they are the same. take a closer look at the K, the U and the YU in SovetsKUYU, you'll see what i mean. now take a look at same type reverse of Sevastopol and Moscow, you see a subtle difference in the K U YU... there are other examples of inconsistency in their examples of originals.

i don't have any reason to doubt the authenticity of MonDvor examples, but am now lead to believe that there had to have been multiple dies for reverses of these medals, and even perhaps obverses as well, with very subtle differences in font designs. what do you think?

[GREIF]

i don't have any reason to doubt the authenticity of MonDvor examples, but am now lead to believe that there had to have been multiple dies for reverses of these medals, and even perhaps obverses as well, with very subtle differences in font designs. what do you think?

This is why I said that the site is not complete there are several matrices
and as you say sometimes the differences are subtle.

If you look at "Sammler" and you learn to observe and "read between the lines"
then you will learn many things, there has remarkable collectors on this website

[NavyFCO]

Couple of things to remember:

1. If there's a dollar to be made in anything, people will make it. That's why there's a lot of effort put into making fakes of these rare medals.

2. When I was living in Russia and collecting awards back in 1996, a was being "mentored" by a fellow collector who was extremely knowledgeable. Even back then, almost 20 years ago, there were fakes of medals and badges that would have fooled MANY collectors - in some cases, I couldn't tell the difference between the original and copy, even when held next to each other! Needless to say, I didn't make my collection based on some of those awards...

And that was 18 years ago. Fakes have come a long way since then!!

[GREIF]

Even back then, almost 20 years ago, there were fakes of medals and badges that would have fooled MANY collectors - in some cases, I couldn't tell the difference between the original and copy, even when held next to each other! Needless to say, I didn't make my collection based on some of those awards...

Same time much less documentation than now .