New fake KM and WH buckles in aluminium

[Marc verstraete]

Hello to all,

New bogus aluminium W.H army and KM buckles have appeared on the European marked since a few months. The maker on those buckles is not the correct maker for the KM buckle witch was in his aluminium version only made by RS&S.
They are of bad quality but we know by experience that the fakers improve their production rapidly. Notice the grey aspect of the buckle and the very easy to recognize maker.
Beware!!!!

Marc V.

[Marc verstraete]

back of fake KM

[Marc verstraete]

fake Wh. Looks very convinsing from the front!

[Marc verstraete]

Back of fake WH, This side shows very well the grey collour and the maker is very easy to remember!!

[buckle1]

Marc,

Thanks for the cheery news and the heads-up on the new fakes. The color is wrong on the KM and the eagle's head appears to be a different shape then that of the WH. The maker mark is reallyoff-base. In any event it is very sad to see this happening. Even the bad fakes fool the beginners and they often fool the long time collectors as well. It is pretty obvious that these guys can produce pretty much any buckle they want at this point and as they make improvements as you stated they will get increasing hard to detect. In fact I think one of the WH buckles has allready made it on to e---. Sometimes I wonder if we may be making a mistake listing the errors on these buckles in a public forum These guys are not stupid. They very well may be monitoring these sites for hints of what to correct. I kow of a story regarding a long time head gear collector who said that the repros were getting so good there was only one thing that they had yet to master to make the hats virtually undetetable. That one thing he never told anyone about except very close collector friends. I do not think we have reached that stage yet but we are not far from it.

Regards,

Bill

[G.J.B]

Thanks for the heads up guys...These fakes are very good.
G.J.B

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Bill,


If we do not teach most collectors how to spot those fakes, soon nobody will collect, just by fear to buy the "devil one". It is still better to leave fakers hear what we noticed, even if we keep silent some features, and give everyone tools to feel confident to go out and buy the right buckle than saying nothing. They can improve what they want, there is still some obvious features between fakes and genuine buckles.
I remember just two years ago when it was the "CZ fake madness". Nobody was comfortable to buy a SS aluminum EM Buckle, and in fact, nobody was willing to pay the right price for any genuine SS EM aluminum buckle. Why ? because very few knew how these fakes looked like and everybody feared to buy a potential one. Collectors were suspicious by anything, it was a real panic. But fortunately few persons decided to educate others and now situation is back to normal. Yes, collectors are still buying those fakes, but most of them are now able to spot them and/or to avoid them. Prices for geniune items is back to normal and market also back to normal. No more panic.
One of those few persons willing to stand and teach was Marc Verstraete as well as you, Bill. I strongly believe that, even if our job is getting tough, no matter what those damn fakers will do, we still need to warn and educate collectors.

[Edgar Estrada]

Marc,

Thanks for the cheery news and the heads-up on the new fakes. The color is wrong on the KM and the eagle's head appears to be a different shape then that of the WH. The maker mark is reallyoff-base. In any event it is very sad to see this happening. Even the bad fakes fool the beginners and they often fool the long time collectors as well. It is pretty obvious that these guys can produce pretty much any buckle they want at this point and as they make improvements as you stated they will get increasing hard to detect. In fact I think one of the WH buckles has allready made it on to e---. Sometimes I wonder if we may be making a mistake listing the errors on these buckles in a public forum These guys are not stupid. They very well may be monitoring these sites for hints of what to correct. I kow of a story regarding a long time head gear collector who said that the repros were getting so good there was only one thing that they had yet to master to make the hats virtually undetetable. That one thing he never told anyone about except very close collector friends. I do not think we have reached that stage yet but we are not far from it.

Regards,

Bill

Pity to know this. I am with you in all you said. I am a begginer in this hobby (German militaria in general), and I am thinking already to stop it. If I do not know in what I will spend my money... it is a terrible feeling.

Sorry about my English.

Best regards

Edgar

[Rob Brown]

Likewise I am after a heer buckle and belt so Im reading all these posts to find out what the script is. Recently Ive been collecting mostly DDR militaria as there are hardly any fakes out there, I find it just too risky these days buying TR militaria. I was in Bulgaria this year, I found a stand that had a hoarde of WW2 German medals, daggers and alot of other things. Sadly to say they were all fakes, One piece EK's the lot! I used the knowledge that I had and even some pieces that I didnt know about just didnt feel right let alone none had maker marks which I always look for. Some sucker will buy these believing them to be genuine, and thus back in the vicious circle where the fakes from there will be circulated into the collecting market.