Gemsco Aircrew wing soldered over pilot wings

[Eric]

I have very little knowledge on this subject, I got these wings in a lot of miscellaneous items. I noticed the aircrew emblem is soldered on top of the wings or at least it looks that way. The back also shows the shield. The pin is missing and it is marked Gemsco.

 

Are these original ww2 wings? 

And out of curiosity, what value would you put on the wings in this condition? 

 

Thank you 

[The Rooster]

Hello, Yes WW2,

If it were not for WW2 taking place, they prob would never have been produced.

Cool wing. I have one myself. Mine is an amcraft pattern observers wing with an aircrew shield soldered on.

The reason you will find these is that they needed a whole heck of a lot of aircrew wings and they needed them quickly, so they converted a lot of different wings that were overstocked into aircrew wings by adding the Aircrew shield.

Was probably faster than stamping out new wings ? Or it was a way to get rid of excess wings already produced ?

Or both reasons?

I feel, it is my opinion that these are harder to find than regular aircrew wings. I think they are rare compared to normal ones.

I havent seen many for sale. I bought the one I saw.

Cool wing ! Good score !

[The Rooster]

this is the one i found

[The Rooster]

 

I dont really know what price to put on them. ? Your wing

is just missing the pin. Value depends on who wants them as well.

Nice example. Notice my pin has a repair. Im guessing that when able, an aircrewman who had a pair of these, might just get rid of them at some point and buy a reg pair. My guess as to why you dont find many ????

My wing is abnormally thick at the center. It juts way out.

If it was mine back in the day, I'd invest in a new one. And get rid of this one.

[MikeK]

When talking about 2-piece wings, ie those with a separately attached central device;

 

It is common for an Observer base wing to be used for Air Crew, Air Gunner, Navigator, Bombardier and Flight Engineer wings.

 

It is common for the Pilot base wing to be used for the Service/Liason/Glider wings.

 

It is imo very uncommon for a Pilot base wing to be used for an eg Air Crew wing or and Observer base wing to be used for a Pilot/Service/Liason/Glider wing.

 

That's imo a very interesting variation imaged in the 1st post, despite the broken main pin!

 

Regards

Mike

[The Rooster]

I call them rare because I hardly ever see any up for sale. I see regular crew wings all the time. These kind... Not so much.

I never saw a Pilots wing like this one converted into an aircrew wing. Thats a first for me.

Like Mike said its usually observers etc etc...

[Eric]

Thank you for the information! It was found in a junk box!