Left Facing Heer

[Ssteve]

Hello,
Though I would share my latest pick up. A MINT 40mm, stamped nickel, left facing Heer. Waited a long time to find one of these! Any opinions are welcome. Thanks

Regards,
Steve

[Ssteve]

Reverse...............

[David North]

Fabulous and rare 40 mm size WH buckle Steve.

Note the lack of "ears" to the box.

The claws look remarkably like "Overhoff".

Hope that you are going to remove the trace of the "sticker" via say a very light application of "Zippo" lighter fuel, as no damage can be done.

Regards,

David

[Ssteve]

Thanks for the advice and kind words David I wasn't sure what would be good to clean that off with.

Yes, I must say to me the buckle does look kind of "weird" without "ears" , but the rarity and condition makes up for it. Now if I can just hunt down a right facing one I'll be all set.

Steve

Fabulous and rare 40 mm size WH buckle Steve.

Note the lack of "ears" to the box.

The claws look remarkably like "Overhoff".

Hope that you are going to remove the trace of the "sticker" via say a very light application of "Zippo" lighter fuel, as no damage can be done.

Regards,

David

[Ric Ferrari]

Hello,
Though I would share my latest pick up. A MINT 40mm, stamped nickel, left facing Heer. Waited a long time to find one of these! Any opinions are welcome. Thanks

Regards,
Steve

Steve,

very nice buckle and quite scarce as well.

Ric

[Ssteve]

Hi Ric,

Thanks for the kind words.

Steve

Steve,

very nice buckle and quite scarce as well.

Ric

[Peter H.]

hello steve,
great buckle i think i have the brother of your buckle in my collection
peter

[Peter H.]

back

[Ssteve]

Look at that Peter..I think their twins! Very, very, nice buckle!

hello steve,
great buckle i think i have the brother of your buckle in my collection
peter

[GLM]

Hello All,

Steve and I got into a very interesting discussion on a different Forum about these "left facing" Heer buckles and I wanted to bring this thread back to the top.

I was wondering how confident the buckle collecting community is that these full nickel buckles are original. There are several red flags that I would like addressed, starting with the unfolded ears. Can anyone prove to me that this technique was used during the 3.R? These two buckles are the first I have seen with unfolded ears and to have them both in mint, unissued condition at the same time bothers me. Does anyone have other 3.R buckles with unfolded ears? Secondly, the two solder points are very reminicient of the two flat rivet fake aluminum "right facing" Heer buckles that came out of Eastern Europe about a decade ago. The riveted buckles were of the highest quality and if they hadn't shown up on the market "en masse" with naked aluminum, mustard yellow and feldgrau finishes, I would have guessed they were a newly, undiscovered type of original buckle I hadn't encountered before. They are convincing! Because the nickel buckles have the same craftsmanship and I might add, the same stainless steel prongs, rollbars and pins as the riveted examples, I am wondering if these "left facers" have been encountered by other collectors recently?

I would really like to be proven wrong on these two buckles, but because they are so close in construction to the riveted, known fake buckles, my gut feeling tells me they might be coming from the same folks in E. Europe?

Regards,

Gary

[Scott A. Hess]

GLM..when you refer to ten year old repro RIGHT facing two piece aluminum..are you refering to THIS buckle with ears..and two riivits? I've been told that this buckle...is a repro..and that the DRGM is inconsistent with this type of buckle..opinions? The detail is rather lacking on the eagle and interior pebbling..as well as the oak leavesand the four center "dots" at the bottommiddle of the oakleaves

[Scott A. Hess]

reverse.two rivets...jfs marked.and DRGM marked

[Scott A. Hess]

reverse

[GLM]

GLM..when you refer to ten year old repro RIGHT facing two piece aluminum..are you refering to THIS buckle with ears..and two riivits? I've been told that this buckle...is a repro..and that the DRGM is inconsistent with this type of buckle..opinions? The detail is rather lacking on the eagle and interior pebbling..as well as the oak leavesand the four center "dots" at the bottommiddle of the oakleaves

Hello Scott,

Close, but not quite the same buckle. The riveted buckles I am referring to had an almost flat appearing frontplate with very crisp, very well done highlights. When comparing them to an original two-piece, four-tab Heer buckle, they were quite scary. Your rivets are almost identical, but the perforated catches weren't quite as big as yours. The prongs, rollbar and pin were all stainless steel, not rustable steel like yours. The prong tips weren't cut as sharp, but identical to Steve and Peter's "left facers." The naked aluminum riveted buckles I saw were very shiny, white aluminum, but if you cover them with mustard yellow or feldgrau paint, you would have pretty much the same buckle you show, except for the hallmarks, catch and prongs. Yours could very well be an earlier attempt by the same people who made the ones I am referring to? I think the D.R.G.M hallmark was a dead giveaway that something was definitely wrong and that has been corrected? Anyone else have riveted buckles I have just mentioned?

I also forget to mention in my last post, but does anyone find the stress fractures on the edges of the perforated catches on both nickel examples alarming? Has this been observed on other 3.R nickel buckles? Needless to say, it's obvious both Steve's and Peter's buckles were made by the same person and seeing two minty examples at the same time for an extremely rare buckle really scares me. I am really hoping it's just a case of paranoia on my part and I'm totally wrong on these buckles, but I'd really like to see other unfolded ear 3.R buckles from some of the collectors here to calm my fears. Also, examples of stress fractures during the manufacture of nickel buckles.

Regards,

Gary

[Peter H.]

hello gary,
here a pic from another buckle with these ears.
sorry, but i think that you are wrong i acnt see any red flag on this left facing buckle.
peter