Denazified badge restored

[Ammersee]

I bought this shooting badge that had the swastika removed on eBay a while back. It seems so stupid to attack a symbol on a piece of metal. Like the Taliban blasting the Buddhist statues in Afghanistan a few years ago, this does little to address the idea of Nazi-ism or Buddhism.

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I studied metal engraving in Italy 25 yrs ago where I learned to engrave guns in the traditional hammer and chisel style. Putting a new swastika on this badge wasn't too hard to do. The metal is either aluminum or zinc (?) and was easy to cut. The "Meisterschütze '43" lettering was bashed up pretty bad so I touched it up as well. I would never alter a fine badge or medal, but in this case, I think I helped the thing a bit.

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A few months after I cut this swastika, I saw a similar badge that had not been altered. I got the swastika right, but behind the swastika were crosshairs and the rings of a target. Oh well, still better than a ground up badge. Ammersee

[Jody]

Shooting badge

Hello,
Well done I am impressed!

Regards,
Jody

[Gene]

That is superlative!

[Van]

WOW.. Nicely done, what a huge difference..
Van

[SurvivingPanzer]

Very nice engraving work.

[Chet Sowersby]

Well done!

chet

[Josh Beckett]

beautiful job.

[Gary Cain]

Very nicely done indeed!

Gary

[DZR]

How did you restore the gold finish? What did you use?

It looks terrific!

[Ammersee]

Thank you for all the compliments, I really appreciate it. I may have to look for another denazified item to work on.

DZR...there is no gold finish, it is just the inadequate indoor lighting I used that caused it. I would like to learn how to do gold leaf, and I seriously thought about using this badge for practice. A gold eagle and swaz with a silver oak leaf wreath around it might look neat...or not!

Before you engrave something, you have to polish it first. After I smoothed and polished the area where the swastika was ground off, the contrast between the polished area and the rest of the badge was too much. I didn't want to bright polish the whole badge so I hit it with a wire wheel. There is still a difference in the finish between the badge and the swastika and lettering, but eventually the aluminum (zinc?) will oxidize and hopefully match up better. Ammersee

[Huntzman]

Nicely done !!!

I know that some people complain about "altering" period pieces, but in my opinion whenever you restore a "damaged" piece back to it's original state, you preserve that part of history which can be passed down.

Kudo's !!! (From a fellow Illini)

Andrew

[Jonathan M]

Impressive handiwork

[Jens Thune]

Nice work

//Jens

[File21]

So, you can call it a renazified badge , know that i mentioned it, can you actually renazifie any denazified badge?

[SurvivingPanzer]

Thank you for all the compliments, I really appreciate it. I may have to look for another denazified item to work on.

DZR...there is no gold finish, it is just the inadequate indoor lighting I used that caused it. I would like to learn how to do gold leaf, and I seriously thought about using this badge for practice. A gold eagle and swaz with a silver oak leaf wreath around it might look neat...or not!

Before you engrave something, you have to polish it first. After I smoothed and polished the area where the swastika was ground off, the contrast between the polished area and the rest of the badge was too much. I didn't want to bright polish the whole badge so I hit it with a wire wheel. There is still a difference in the finish between the badge and the swastika and lettering, but eventually the aluminum (zinc?) will oxidize and hopefully match up better. Ammersee

So is it like restoring the serial numbers on a firearm that have been ground down?