Kassel show news.

[Marc verstraete]

As every year I was impatiently waiting for the former Dortmunt show to start. This show, now in Kassel is probably the best one in Germany. After 10 hours driving and an empty wallet I came back home as lucky owner of a few interesting and nice buckles.

Two imperial navy buckles, 50m/m and 45 m/m
A very nice private purchase JG
Nice private 40 m/m Wuerttemberg
Mint condition SS brocade with paper tag (A bargain)
Aluminium Weimar buckle?????
Nice W.H with tab (A bargain)
A extremely scarce ORIGINAL Hannover infantry 50 m/m on its original belt

And the top of the cherry……………. An ultra rare SS enlisted!!

All by all not a bad day.
Unfortunately they’re where also lots of new fakes, especially LW and W.H buckles in aluminium. Stamped and not moulded any longer!!!!! As well as very nice fake rare WWI insets such as imperial navy insets soldered on original buckles.

For the SS freaks, I have seen five SS brocades on this show of which two black Allgemeine SS ones. Price for a black one: 2500€. (3000$+)

Lets wait and see the results of other collectors present at the show. Christian?? Any luck with HJ buckles???

Marc V.

[Marc verstraete]

....

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

[QUOTE=And the top of the cherry……………. An ultra rare SS enlisted!! [/QUOTE]


This SS buckle is NOT ultra rare. It is just one you did not have yet in your collection but several others had been found in collections since the last time we shared results of investigations and showed you mine (so we are talking just within a year). One of them had been obviously ground dug and so I no longer need evidence this buckle been original even if, as usual, I could not tell it was until further evidence than just having the buckle in hands (since it was the only one we both knew at this time even if the previous owner swear he kept it for 25 years before selling it to me). At least we can be confident now (I guess) this buckle been original.
But based on updated datas, currently three other early SS EM buckles are remaining much rarer than this one since for each only one remains known. I unfortunately cannot post photos of them since they belong to the righteous owners but they will be realised to the public in a short while. I do not recall having seen those in your collection (at least not until a year ago).

What would be interesting is to know if this one (your) also bears the RZM/SS contract marking for Assmann on the side or not (does it?). Based on the shape of the prongs and the fact than some of those buckles are bearing this secondary Assmann marking for delivery to the SS, I still believe those SS EM buckles were made by Assmann with the Overhoff marking been only there to legitimate Overhoff was the righteous owner of the patented design (there is already many nickel silver buckles, not for the SS, which are showing the same association between those two makers - and others by the way). What I still do not understand is why this SS EM buckle is not pictured in any original (or reprint) Assmann catalog I was able to see. The early SS EM Buckle listed as number 21294 is obviously not this one!!

For forum members I am uploading again photos of mine.
Some major points of differences which makes the particularity of this buckle are:

Front:
- Curved and smaller wings
- Superb detailing of the eagle's head (eye is gorgeous)
- Much longer rope visible behind eagle's head

Back:
- Distinct Overhoff marking (straight line on G's are nicely rounded) and all the marking is clearly & deeply stamped.
- Curved/folded prongs (I call those Assmann prongs since all the Assmann production regarding SS buckles I saw until today has that shape)
- Additionnal early marking (on some) with an Assmann RZM/SS contract number on the buckle side.

Readers could maybe also check those features on SS buckles in their own collection to realize they maybe have this scarce buckle and tell us if it bears or not the secondary marking - and which exact one it is on their.

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Detail

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Back

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Prongs

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Prongs 2

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Patent marking (notice straight vertical bars on g's)

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Assmann RZM/SS contract marking

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Detail on Assmann marking

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

155/36

[buckle1]

Marc,

Very nice finds. Especially the Hannovarian buckle. As you know I also got a 50 mm 2nd pattern Reichsmarine and a private purchase 108 out of Germany a couple of months ago. I am a bit concerned about the fake face plates being attached to good bodies. If the face plates are that good how were you able to tell that they were bad? Condition? or ??? No need to answer here if you want to keep the method off the internet. Just get back to me when you get time. About the aluminum Reichscheer buckle. It looks to be two piece. I have a two piece with a scoop catch and tab dated 1935. Yours is only the second one I have seen. A not to common buckle. Also nice SS brocade and EM buckle.

Bill

[Kurt Doench]

Marc, congrats on your buys in Kassel. I’d planned to go myself on Thursday, but at the last minute couldn’t get leave from the office. Tough.

Buckle1, you have a two-piece aluminium Reichswehr with tab? Wow!! That is something really special, as the tab indicates a service buckle (which, of course, should be one-piece stamped per regulations, and stamped of Neusilber at that). I have once seen a Wehrmacht Heer two-piece alu with a tab, even painted field-grey. Sadly, it didn’t come to live with me.

Attached are pictures of my Reichswehr alu two-piece (no tab, unfortunately). I didn’t realize they are that rare.

Re Imperial faked roundels on original buckles, these were one thing to beware of back when I started collecting/researching in the early Eighties. What was done at the time was making a mould from an original roundel and then casting new roundels in copper. These were then coated silver by means of the galvanoplastic method (I did learn about that at school once but am a bit hazy now; it seems to involve sticking your copper roundel in a silver bath and by means of electric current, an even thin coating of silver adheres to the roundel). Copper was chosen as base material because it lends itself particularly well the this process (something to do with ductivity but don’t question me too closely). These fakes would be all the more convincing as the original roundel wasn’t disattached from the (original) buckle by melting down the solder, but by carefully lifting the roundel off. If properly done, the result was a perfect original reverse with a perfect-looking new roundel. These were easy to spot however by scratching the roundel – the red shine coming through gave the game away.

In those days, the run-of-the-mill Imperial buckles were very cheap, so this only concerned the really rare ones, Saxon JG and GG for example, but even back then also Reichsmarine buckles. One knew and took precautions. I remember ordering a rare Saxon buckle in those pre-Internet days, having explained all this to the dealer on the phone, on condition that I would be allowed to scratch the roundel and return the buckle if I saw copper. I did, and the dealer (God bless him) took it back at once.

Hannover buckles are a lot easier as they don’t have the exactly same dimensions of M47-type Prussian etc. buckles and their construction is different also.

Regards,

Schleppfux

[Kurt Doench]

... and here's the reverse:

[Marc verstraete]

If someone who study SS buckles all day, every day of the year, at home, in shows and trough the internet with worldwide access has only be able to locate 3 off these buckles, I definitely believe they are very rare, ultra rare, scarce, not common, seldom seen or whatever the word might be!
If in the excitement of coming back home from a good show where I bought some nice buckles I use the word “ultra” rare to describe a buckle I have never seen before in 30 years of buckles collecting this is my prerogative and I should not have to consult the dictionary or the inventory of the known existing buckles to decide what word I have to use!
There are many SS and other items that are considered by advanced collectors as unique, ultra rare, exceptional, ect… and of witch there are many known in collection. This is a hobby and supposedly fun. Maybe some people forgot but there is life outside the SS buckles!!
If there are other SS buckles that are more seldom seen as this one, why not share this knowledge with the group? Using someone else pictures has never been a problem in the past. Just use the “no reproduction allowed”
And to answer the question, No, the back in not the same. Marking and prongs are different so it makes this buckle not ultra rare but UNIQUE.
Marc V.