N.S. Meyer: Real vs. Reproduction, Maker marks, "Tells"

[The Rooster]

Special thanks to Dr Frost who raised an early red flag on this for me.

[mghcal]

No worries it's tough out there. We all have a junk box with fakes/repros that we've been suckered into lol. Just wait until you want a Meyer Technical Observer Balloon badge! They're nearly impossible to find original and the repros are very very good. With the Meyer wings the original dies have been used for reproductions, just the reverse if the repros as John graciously explained are a bit different. The findings are another tipoff. I'm glad this one worked out ok so you can receive your money back..

[B-17Guy]

I use a term borrowed from a friend, my box of junk is my -Box of Tears-.

[pfrost]

These fake wings have been around a LOOOOOONNNNG time. Back when I was first collecting, I had found Duncan Campbell"s phone number. I gave him a call and he very politely spent about 45 minutes chatting with me about wings. He gave me some advice about patience and how there was a difference between "collecting" and "buying". One thing he did talk to me about was this type of balloon wing fake. He said that he thought they were either good castings or restrikes from NS Meyer (first I had ever heard about restikes). This was back in the early 90's and he said these balloon fakes had already been around since the 80's (if not earlier) so that they had all acquired a patina of age and wear.

 

The things he said were the most obvious issue to look for was the pin and the circular flaw on the front.

 

Since then, I have literally seen and handled 100's of these wings. There may be one or two "vintage" NS Meyer balloon wings floating around in that mass of dreck, but I wouldn't count on it.

 

It is good that you were able to get your money back. I have found that most eBay dealers can be reasonable.

 

P

[B-17Guy]

In light of recent comments and questions on Meyer wings, I thought I would bump one of the more informative threads back to the top.

[Kilroy56]

Thank you for your time.

[beef]

I’ve had these since around 1990. They are different than the fakes above in many ways, similar in some. Difference:  Pin is different, sterling on opposite side.
Same: Sterling stamp not fully indented. Not sure what circular defect is from above pictures, so IDK if it’s there. 
 

Are these good? Another version of fake? Opinions?

 

Reverse 

 

Reverse

 

Sterling stamp

[donaldnol]

56 minutes ago, beef said:

Sterling stamp

i would like to weigh in on this but i don't want to make a bad judgement

[beef]

Please, weigh in. That’s why I posted it. 

[rathbonemuseum.com]

Dear @beef. I am afraid i also think your balloon is a restrike which flooded the market at the time you purchased it. I bought them, too. I am only one opinion and you may get other opinions. In general, lack of detail, the way the pin hinge is constructed. Check here for more pictures of balloon wings http://ww2wings.com/wings/usaaf/usaafballoon.shtml and search this wings forum for "balloon" and you will see more discussions.

[beef]

Thank you, guys! The lack of detail mentioned above made me think they were restrikes. The few differences made me hope they weren’t. Wings aren’t my area of expertise (do I really have one??) so I wanted some learned opinions. 

[rustywings]

For this growing “Meyer’s” reference thread, I’d like to share a couple of two-inch wide shirt-size Glider Pilot wings which I believe are both authentic WWII era examples, but have varied hallmark strikes...

 

Both have identical fittings with cam-stop pins; Identical raised “STERLING” marks; And small raised marks for hinge/catch placement. Both hallmarks are raised, but have distinctly different size shields.

 

If there’s a chronological order of production (IE early war vs late war) please feel free to add your thoughts and opinions...

 

 

[pfrost]

Lord JoeDemort (AKA HeWhoShallNotBeNamed) once told me (via an unsolicited email) that the NS Meyer was not, strictly speaking, making all their insignia. Rather, they had multiple wholesale manufacturing companies making insignia, that is why there is such variation in the type and placement of their hallmarks.  Or maybe he said that they simply had multiple dies that they would run out when making a run. I had also heard that the company had front dies and various pusher back dies. They just mated them up as needed--I suspect without any rhyme or reason. Either way, the large amount of variation in hallmarks is just a feature of this company.

 

As for "early vs late" war, I know that these ideas have been kicked around for many years, with there even being a "guide" to hallmarks and dates that periodically rears its head.  I have always taken that with a grain of salt as I have yet to see any concrete evidence (like records from the company) saying something like "This hallmark set up will be used up to the third Tuesday of February, 1943 (in our "early war phase") and those will be made until it will be changed in March of 1944, (as we are now entering "the late war time period").  I suspect that they just made up dies and used them, willy-nilly.

 

At best, you may be able to get a general time frame as to when the patterns were first proposed.  The PELICAN beak glider wings seem to have been designed during 1941 or so, until the became obsolete by 1945.  Some wings (say aircrewman wings) were worn into the USAF time period of the KW and beyond. But you never see NS Meyer first pattern (the Adams style) wing in these auxillary ratings and you never see the Pelican beak wings in strictly pre-war wings (like the balloon or airship ratings).

 

 

 

[The Rooster]

It seems like some Meyer Wings were never Restruck.

I have never seen a Meyer restrike of a gunners wing or a pilot wing,

or an observers wing. Just balloon wings, TO wings, and S and L wings.

I have never seen a Meyer 2 inch wing restrike either.

Those Glider wings look good to me.

[rustywings]

Patrick and Rooster, I appreciate your responses and shared insight.  

 

Yes, I’m very aware that during WWII N.S. Meyer, Inc. farmed out a large number of their badge and insignia work orders to other wing manufacturing companies for completion.

 

I’m certain both AMICO and Robbins Co. produced wings for Meyer, INC. What other competing companies were involved?  I suspect Gemsco?

 

And I agree with John Ferguson that the hand-sketched Meyer graph depicted back in entry #32 of this thread, which shows the progression of Meyer  hallmarks thru the years, is in need of correction...

 

Thanks Gents!

[Bull Moose]

I picked up this USN/USMC aviator wing over he weekend.  It has a lot of odd features.  Not sure what to make of it. 

 

Raised Meyer Metal mark 

Raised Meyer logo with backwards Meyer and New York

Floppy 180 degree pin, fitting appear to be recently silver soldered 

No gold finish, appears to be bronze with a chocolate patina.

Die struck, not cast.

 

I looked for references to Meyer restriking Naval Aviator wings but couldn’t find anything. 
 

My guess would be a wing blank, die struck by Meyer and never finished with the proper fitting and gold finish.   Fittings we added at a later date.

 

Any thoughts on what this might be?

 

 Could this be HeWhoShallNotBeNamed special?

 

[Bull Moose]

Backward Meyer Logo

[dmar836]

I think "Meyer Metal" is typically considered pre-war.

Dave

[Tesla]

I was able to find a real NS Meyer Balloon Observer over the weekend!  I want to thank Russ for the incredible thread he posted showing what to look for on these.  My camera isn't the best, but the Meyer shield is raised and Meyer is reversed.  

[Tesla]