Pins on Tinnies

[Greg]

There's a thread over on Technical Advice Forum about fake tinnies, and I got to thinking about pins on tinnies. Someone pointed out to me once that the pointy end of the "safety pin" type pin on tinnies invariably is very sharp and tapered, like a pencil from a pencil sharpener. The pins are not clipped sharp. I have about 200 tinnies, and went home and looked at the pins, and the guy was right. They all looked like that (or all of them that I pulled out to look at, anyway).

But I once saw what was an obvious fake of the Reichsparteitag 1933 day badge at a show in Germany, and it had a "safety pin" on which the point had been clipped sharp. This pin was flimsier than normal and real shiny, like it was chromed or nickel.

Anyone ever seen the "safety pin" attachment on a tinnie that had the point clipped sharp instead of the smooth tapering sharp point?

Greg

[Rick Research]

Nope. Clipped point and flimsy poor quality steel wire is a dead giveaway of former Communist Bloc manufacture, to me. Check out some of the Soviet and Chinese etc postings on International for similarities.

They still can't make good quality wire.

[stuart c]

Greg
Got me thinking there,so I went through my collection and your right,all have the sharp tapered point.Something to check for in the future.

[Eric Stahlhut]

The other part of the pin!

Another thing to look for is the catch assembly on the tinny. I'll post two pics which describe just exactly what I am writing about. As soon as I can rustle up a fake tinny! This is very important when inspecting tinnies, as the better quality fakes do have pointy pins, but the fakers for some reason cannot yet replicate the universal style that was used on original period pieces.