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Weird, experimental? Blue/woodland sterile BDU


polecat
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So a guy brought this by my gunshow booth... Asking if I'd be interested. I figured I'd take a gamble.

 

At first glance I thought it was a surplus store special. The guy I bought it from, (dealt with him before, everything has been legit, no reason to this he is FOS) said that he had a buddy that was in the marines check it out, and said that he saw a bunch of force recon types running around in it for a short time in the 80s at Lejeune.

 

There are ghosts of a BOS and name tape, a left shoulder patch, and a shield type patch on the left pocket. Seems more consistent with maybe an AF type, given their history with weird blue stuff and the pocket patch.

 

There are no markings or ghosts of markings on the interior.

 

Another weird thing, it is made out of a herringbone type material.

 

Standard BDU buttons.

So great wizards of USMF, can anyone confirm this is a legit piece?

post-24139-0-77936000-1428828917.jpg

post-24139-0-16316400-1428828901.jpg

 


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So a guy brought this by my gunshow booth... Asking if I'd be interested. I figured I'd take a gamble.

 

At first glance I thought it was a surplus store special. The guy I bought it from, (dealt with him before, everything has been legit, no reason to this he is FOS) said that he had a buddy that was in the marines check it out, and said that he saw a bunch of force recon types running around in it for a short time in the 80s at Lejeune.

 

There are ghosts of a BOS and name tape, a left shoulder patch, and a shield type patch on the left pocket. Seems more consistent with maybe an AF type, given their history with weird blue stuff and the pocket patch.

 

There are no markings or ghosts of markings on the interior.

 

Another weird thing, it is made out of a herringbone type material.

 

Standard BDU buttons.

 

So great wizards of USMF, can anyone confirm this is a legit piece?

attachicon.gifexp camo 2.JPG

 

attachicon.gifExp camo1.JPG

 

 

If you don't mind my asking, how much did you pay? I'm curious

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$200.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay not really. $30. Which may be a little high, but I figured I'd take a gamble. If it turned out to be a stinker, I'm out less than a decent dinner for two. If it's some super neat experimental piece, then I'll clear a decent profit. Either way, if no one wants it, I'm happy just hanging on to it.

 

Thanks for everyone's input! Still on the search for a definitive answer.

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$200.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay not really. $30. Which may be a little high, but I figured I'd take a gamble. If it turned out to be a stinker, I'm out less than a decent dinner for two. If it's some super neat experimental piece, then I'll clear a decent profit. Either way, if no one wants it, I'm happy just hanging on to it.

 

Thanks for everyone's input! Still on the search for a definitive answer.

Not bad, although it seems to be on the higher end. As you said though, its not a large sum.

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Yup, I ventured outside my knowledge base and took a gamble and knew that was probably on the high end. If anything, I'll wear it for the upcoming OPFOR rotations I have.

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Yup, I ventured outside my knowledge base and took a gamble and knew that was probably on the high end. If anything, I'll wear it for the upcoming OPFOR rotations I have.

id wear it, kind of my style lol

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There are lots of possibilities for this.

 

I seem to recall some of the Balkan countries having darker camo like this.

 

You need to get a hold of Owen, aka. Kammo-man.

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Thanks! Good suggestion!

 

Oh paging kammo-man! (link sent via PM)

 

ETA: Or not. his inbox is full.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Is there evidence that it's been dyed? Reason I ask is that when I was at Fort Polk, LA, for JRTC in 1993 and again in 1997 for pre-deployment to Bosnia, some of the OpFor (Opposing Forces - the guys pretending to be the enemy) had either DCUs or BDUs that had been dyed a very dark blue or black. The effect was that the lighter colors on the BDU turned that brown or blue color and everything else was darkened. Since those appear to be HWBDU's (hot weather) which had a bad habit of fading and wearing, they would take to the dye very well. I guess the best evidence of dying would be if the labels on the inside also appeared to be dyed.

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I have thought long and hard about this piece before posting a response, I have made a couple observations about the jacket:

 

1, The jacket lacks shoulder straps that are normally seen on foreign camouflage uniforms. Obviously that is not a steadfast rule, but is something I look for when trying to identify whether a uniform is US or non-US.

 

2.This particular uniform has take up straps on the lower bottom portion of the jacket. This was a feature on US uniforms up into the late 80s or early 90s. My bet is that this uniform would be from the 1980s time period.

It might be helpful if we could see close up pics of the area where the patches were orignally. As of right now, this one has me stumped. If possible, could we get clearer pictures and some close up of the ghosting from where the patches have been?

 

Did anyone consider the possibility that it could be from a movie?

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Not bad, although it seems to be on the higher end. As you said though, its not a large sum.

Not trying to be antagonistic, but why would you say that this price would be on the "higher end"? $30 would be about what I'd figure for something like this to go for at a gun show. At this point we don't know if the jacket is foreign used, commercial from a surplus store in the 80s, an experimental pattern, an OPFOR piece, etc. I think $30 was a fair price for an oddity like this and I would have paid what Polecat did. Who knows, this might turn out to be something extra special.

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I really feel like this one is either South American, or SE Asian. I have been digging through my archives but I have yet to nail this one down yet. I will post if I find it.

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Sorry I disappeared for a minute...
Thanks everyone.

Doesn't look like a dyed BDU. And there are no tags and no ghosts of tags.

I'll post up better patch ghost pics.

The Thai AF looks kinda close...

 

And Arch, that's what I was thinking when I paid $30... If I needed to flip it, I could probably break even. If it turned out to be some crazy experimental stuff, I'd make big money. If anything though, if it turns out to be nothing special, I'll use it when playing OPFOR.

 


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automatic

Not trying to be antagonistic, but why would you say that this price would be on the "higher end"? $30 would be about what I'd figure for something like this to go for at a gun show. At this point we don't know if the jacket is foreign used, commercial from a surplus store in the 80s, an experimental pattern, an OPFOR piece, etc. I think $30 was a fair price for an oddity like this and I would have paid what Polecat did. Who knows, this might turn out to be something extra special.

Didn't mean to offend anyone, I would have paid that price too. I really do like the jacket, and I hope he got the buy of a lifetime. Looking back, my comment on price seemed kind of rude, sorry. I guess I meant I would have tried to talk the seller down a little, but that the price still wasn't over-the-top, if that makes any sense. Probably not haha. Anyway, again, sorry for any misunderstandings or offenses.

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Believe it or not but the camopedia entry for Thailand may not necessarily be comprehensive. Back in the early '80s I bumped into Kent Spalding from K&S books in a militaria shop in Hong Kong. He'd just come back from a buying trip in Thailand and was pulling out some pretty weird patterns, some of which aren't featured on the camopedia entry. I recall a strange darker pattern somewhat similar to this one which he attributed to the Thai Border Police, but I also recall, back then, all Thai stuff was either in OG-107 utility or jungle fatigue cut, not BDU style.

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