Detlev Sold a Bronze Close Combat Clasp. . .

[MH184]

Allan's CCC..

[Mike Kenny]

Hi,

Until reading this thread in detail, I had thought I owned a tombak AGMuK CCC in Bronze. Looking at it much more closely, I now believe it to be zinc - VERY heavily plated zinc. It has never been cleaned and you can see 60 years of belly lint in the recesses around the swas, bayonet and granade. It's also fairly obvious that there is a fair amount of VERDIGRIS on the clasp - the general greenish tinge to the obverse and the area around the catch is real (not a scan effect). The verdigris is why I've always believed it to be tombak - I mean who ever hear of verdigris on a ZINC badge!! Along the reverse top edge of my example, there are what appears to be "chips" from some of the points. Taking a much closer look than I've done in the past, the basemetal appears to be zinc (probably good quality finezinc), with a very thick bronze plating. The area around the catch not only has verdigris, it also has the beginnings of white zincpest. The weight is 34.2 g, pretty much the same as Skips example. What's interesting to me is that most of the contention is about the small lettered versions, which I've always felt to be the earlier examples - examples which you'd therefore expect to be better finished but POSSIBLY also produced in tombak.

Regarding the silver "tombak" example imaged earlier in the thread, all I can add is that the better AGMuK repros have two mounds to either side of the backplate AND a "crimp" at the top and the bottom of the backplate - they are not done in zinc as far as I know, only various "buntmetals". This crimping configuration is also known on genuine badges though.

Here are the images of my ex-tombak, now zinc clasp;




Allan, nice clasp! What is the weight? From all I've seen and read in this thread, I'll be surprised if it's much different to the ~34 g of a zinc example.

Regards
Mike K

[IVAN]

Hi guys,

remember that in tombak or called " buntmetall " there are little parts of zinc inside.
Well, this is out of doubts, but anybody can know EXACTLY in wich quantity is inside. There were list of material type can be inside of an alloy but not the quantity of the minor components.

What is logical, early badges little quantity, middle badges more quantity.

About the verdigris is a sign in tombak, right what Mike said.

Anybody can put here some scan of PAB bronze grade in tombak , good conditions or not ?

[Allan P.]

Hi Mike,

The weight of the CCC is 33.5g.
Allan

[Brian S]

My very heavily plated JFS CCC which requires some real magnified looking to find the zinc traces weighs in at 32.92 grams.

AGMuK bronze zinc 30.7 grams

F&BL bronze very heavily plated beyond my scale slightly, so slightly heavier than 33 grams

Unmarked gold zinc 27.9 grams

[Philippe DB]

Hi Ivan,

Here are some scans of my buntmetall Wurster.

KR
Philippe

[Philippe DB]

reverse

[Tim B.]

Ivan--concur!

I think Ivan is correct in the comment about a percentage of zinc being contained in buntmetal/tombak as Detlev also mentioned that the so called "Buntmetal" is a mix of several materials and can contain up to 5% zinc.

He also thought that some makers might have used more than 5% zinc, so some items probably look "zincier" than others.


Still, not tombak in the truer sense of the term IMO.
Tim

[Mike Kenny]

Hi,

I may not have worded my previous post clearly enough. The basemetal of my badge is definitely NOT tombak (I wish it was!). I doubt very much whether it is "buntmetal". I think it is finezinc - ie a good quality zinc alloy. All the basemetals we deal with in Third Reich Badges are alloys of one form or another, none are pure metals and discussing 5% vs 10% is getting into semantics without doing elemental analysis to quantify proportions. Also, to make things a little clearer re the verdigris on my example, I think the verdigris is associated with the thick plated finish (which probably has a high copper content), not the basemetal which, where exposed, is more prone to zincpest.

Regards
Mike K

PS: I continue to loath the bucket term "buntmetal" which seems to have a different meaning/definition for every collector and dealer and can technically encompass ANY metal or alloy that is not magnetic!

[Albert]

Hi All,


With regard to the reoccurring "Buntmetall" theme: it was discussed before and I said it already: "Buntmetall" is not synonimous with any particular metal, it is a collective noun, so to speak, referring to all non ferrous metals. Consequently, ANYONE is right who calls zink clasps Buntmetall pieces. But only in a technical context, otherwise that is pure BS, because in German collector's jargon Buntmetall refers to "colored" metals, as "bunt" means colorful/colored.

Thus, you have either a zink piece, then it is not "Buntmetall", by above mentioned convention, or you have a "Buntmetall" piece, then it is not zink. Regardless of the percentage of whatever whereever.

Best regards,
Al

[IVAN]

Thanks Philippe for your scans.

I would like to see more examples.

I ask it because I want to have some tombak pieces in bronze grade to compare with Allan's CCC in this thread and return to discuss about tombak and zinc.

Okay, I show me too a piece in tombak ( look the verdigris ! )

As we can see , material look closed to Allan's CCC.

[IVAN]

Hi All,


With regard to the reoccurring "Buntmetall" theme: it was discussed before and I said it already: "Buntmetall" is not synonimous with any particular metal, it is a collective noun, so to speak, referring to all non ferrous metals. Consequently, ANYONE is right who calls zink clasps Buntmetall pieces. But only in a technical context, otherwise that is pure BS, because in German collector's jargon Buntmetall refers to "colored" metals, as "bunt" means colorful/colored.

Thus, you have either a zink piece, then it is not "Buntmetall", by above mentioned convention, or you have a "Buntmetall" piece, then it is not zink. Regardless of the percentage of whatever whereever.

Best regards,
Al

I agree, Buntmetall is a used term in collectors world

[Greg]

Boy, I wish I had been faster on the fingers when Detlev had that small "w" Wurster PAB on his update!

Thanks, guys, for clearing up what "Buntmetall" means to European collectors.

Regards,
Greg

[Paul Massucci]

Hi,

Regards
Mike K

PS: I continue to loath the bucket term "buntmetal" which seems to have a different meaning/definition for every collector and dealer and can technically encompass ANY metal or alloy that is not magnetic!

Hi Mike and all,
I agree 100% with what you wrote above. I think the term Buntmetal has developed into a "catch all" phrase to describe items where the true base metal is not known. These can include a range of metal alloys ie; the german silvers ( neusilber and altsibler) , cupal, leichtmetall, wiessmetall, even tombak, as both Albert and Ivan previously pointed out buntmetal is just a collective term for a non-ferrous metal.
I've been trying to search the web for more difinitive answers and still haven't found anything more useful than what I already have but did come across some interesting results. While doing a search for buntmetal the #1 result was:
http://lbmilitaria.homestead.com/
gee, I wonder whose site that is , in fact most of the results were 3rd Reich
Militaria sites.
Another interesting one was;
http://www.tclayton.demon.co.uk/metal.html#NiSi
where I found this definition for tombak
Tombac

Alloy

Tombac is a brass alloy famous in numismatic circles for its use by Canada in the emergency 5 cent coins of 1942 and 1943, but more generally known for its use in cheap jewellry. The particular alloy used by Canada was 88% copper with 12% zinc.

It seemed ironic that while Germany was cutting back on using tombak and using higher zinc based alloys the Canadians started using it to replace what was used in their 5cent coin.Even more ironic that they used 88% copper while the Deutche Industrie Norm called for only 82%.Also from the formula I gave earlier for tombak from the DIN they also called it rotguss or red brass which gives some indication as to the apperance of the alloy, which is appaerent in the PAB's Philippe and Ivan posted.

So I don't know if we'll ever come to general consencus on the differnt alloys but one thing for sure , ther's alway more than what meets the eye as you showed us with your CCC, I'm sorry it wasn't a tombak one, that really would have caused people to rethink some things

[Luftm40]

I've always thought that we badge collectors get terribly wrapped up and confused wrt materials. Perhaps it is easier to just say "high quality"...ie the nickel, tombak etc alloys and "lower quality" which encompasses the metal we call "zinc". With all of the badge makers, I'm sure there were hundreds of slightly different alloys used in production. Some "zinc" badges are made of highly refined alloys and hold a finish quite nicely (like some of these CCCs). Others were made of very rough alloys, and normally have the "painted" lacquer finishes. I also think it is possible that some badges made of nicer quality "lower quality" metals were given a very thin plating in copper or some other metal to make the finish adhere better..kind of like the cupal (another definition!) of a light DKiG. This might account for verdigris on a "zinc" badge.