Real or fake - what do you think about this chinstrap?

Sandmann

Sandmann

Well-known member
Hello together,
I found this chinstrap on ebay and wonder if it is original or fake?
www.ebay.fr

jugulaire casque à pointe éléments blancs | eBay

Les meilleures offres pour jugulaire casque à pointe éléments blancs sont sur eBay ✓ Comparez les prix et les spécificités des produits neufs et d'occasion ✓ Pleins d'articles en livraison gratuite!
www.ebay.fr
To the best of my knowledge, the middle bars of the buckles on chinstraps should never have the same height as the frame. But this is just something I've read on other forums, so it's not 100% proven. However, on this one the buckles seem to have been pressed out of a piece of sheet metal in one step. That's what makes me wonder.
But the leather seems to be old and the thread and stitching looks also fine in my opinion. The stitching is close to the middle bars and the leatherends are thinned out, as real saddlers would do.
I would be happy if you could share your opinions on this. Thank you all for sharing your knowledge.
 
Hi,
To my humble opinion, it looks original to me....But always very difficult to tell without it in the hands...
Philippe
 
Sandy I already talked about this belt with a colleague from Gdansk yesterday. According to him, the leather of the belt is old, but it has a contemporary cut.It is difficult to say unequivocally,only in person you can properly evaluate.
 
My only observations are that the metal looks brass coloured in most pictures, except the last two, and that the sliders seem to move to different locations in a couple of the pictures. I.e. the distance between the two is closer or farther apart in different pictures. Especially the last one where they appear silver. I don’t know about others but this type of leather is usually such that moving the fittings around repeatedly risks tearing the leather. To me it almost looks like two different chinstraps and given the earlier comment about a new cut on old leather it seems like a remake to me.

Just my zwei pfennig.
 
Hi Sandy,
I'm watching this one too :)
The title on Ebay is "éléments blancs", which I interpret as "white metal", which seems fitting for the last two pictures but not for the rest of the pictures where it seems more like brass.
It seems the sliders have been moved, so the leather doesn't lie as flat near the "hinges" as it normally does on original chinstraps, which removes one of the possible checks of originality.
Together with the uncertain colour of the metal, I will not be bidding on this one.
Regards,
Lars
 
I believe we are at the point where a properly done reproduction is indistinguishable from a real one. I saw some reproductions from Czechoslovakia over 20 years ago that were perfect. Aged and everything.
 
ottodog8 said:
I believe we are at the point where a properly done reproduction is indistinguishable from a real one. I saw some reproductions from Czechoslovakia over 20 years ago that were perfect. Aged and everything.
Click to expand...

Sadly I don't think your far off in saying this.

With all the wonderful reference books showing close up details of original items as well as the information on the internet that is intended to help and educate collectors sadly its also being looked at and studied by the fakers making the struggle to distinguish a reproduction harder then ever.
 
I think it has less to do only with the many sources on the Internet or from the books, because fraudsters don‘t want to invest a lot of time and effort for their fakes. But it will be hard to identify an older good fake as the leather gets older every year and it will eventually start to look antique on its own.
 
I respectfully have to disagree which is fine we all have our opinions but IMO if you think fraudsters don't want to invest time and effort into their fakes you are sadly mistaken.

I'm not just talking about chinstraps here, patches, uniforms ,helmets, medals etc etc..are all faked.

Sadly most of the fakes don't make it on the market long enough to get under the educated eyes of experienced collectors. Another sad part of the hobby is that some dealers know their "clients " and sell accordingly.

We all know reputable dealers and support them but for every good dealer there are many more bad. I'm talking down to the guys setting up at the local flea markets with tables full of fakes knowingly selling to kids.

This goes across many eras of collecting even the Civil War. Think about this next time you go to a military show try and find a WWII German greatcoat they are never around. They are quickly bought and turned into several M43's and sold for thousands. Its a scary world for collectors and most have no idea, even some of the dealers who are convinced they are buying from the "family members" Its a BIG BIG racket.

These guys even use antique sewing machines to replicate the stitching amongst other "techniques" its a constant battle to find and buy original items.

Especially for the collectors who can't afford to go shopping on high end auctions, I really feel for collectors just starting out.
 
Last edited:
Hello Sandy,
This chinstrap is genuine. I have written several studies on fake chinstraps and copies of cocardes on French forums.
To put it simply: To this day, copies of buckle are always stamped in a sheet of brass or sheet steel. In this case, the loop is completely flat. On authentic ones like this one, the axis is either marked or shifted towards the back. The leather is authentic, the left seam is 0K, but the right seam is a "repair".
 
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