Fake Bars

[Nick]

I will link this topic both in the Imperial and Third Reich Section as it applies to both.

A couple of years ago a few very dangerous looking fake bars were coming out of California. I did get my money back on this bar but it was being sold on ebay along with a few others. I managed to get the photos of the other groups off of ebay at the time, so I can't comment on the originality but I will let you guess the rest.

From photos these bars look pretty good. The only thing I was unsure about at the time was the eagle on the RAD award, but I was happy with the rest of the bar. When it arrived it was another matter.

Not only is the bar fake ALL the medals bar the 1914-1918 Honour Cross were cast fakes. It was so light it would have blown away in the wind.

[Nick]

Reverse

[Nick]

Some Imperial from ebay a few years ago I will let you decide.

[Guest Rick Research]

Ah! I remember the sudden rash of Good Looking SCANS totally cast fakes-- it seemed for a time they were going to be everywhere...

then they all seemed to disappear.

Word travels fast, thank goodness. Or maybe the faker just ran out of interest once they stopped selling.

I never saw one of these bars "in hand" here in New England-- if anybody still HAS one, it would be interesting to get close up scans and detailed descriptions.

Why anybody went to the enormous bother of crafting common awards that were blatantly wrong once in hand... only the faker knows. They did look good as scands from the front, aside from incorrect ribbons and ribbon bar devices on medal bars. Always, the urge is to excess, to "Where Eagles Dare."

These turned up at about the time monstrous Frankenstein medal bars started appearing with literally 15 or 20 all dirt common junior enlisted sorts of awards. Obviously hundreds of ordinary real bars had been butchered to create nonsense fauds-- one that I remember would have stretched crotch-to-throat, and could not have even been WORN, let alone the stupidity of Gefreiters with more awards than the Red Baron!