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Bracelets Made from Wings


Paul S
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John Cooper

Paul,

 

Very nice FS bracelet! maybe it is some lucky charm..? BTW what did you think of the AMICO WASP that just sold on Ebay?

 

John

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  • 3 months later...

My hair hurts to see such silly stuff like the BIN $550 "priceless" keepsake shown in the recent thread, so I thought I would bring this thread back up with a new arrival.

 

It's one of those "G" jobs, as I like to call them, that was most likely made by one of the sheetmetal mechanics on one of the WWII airbases. The cuff is usually from .032" +/- aluminum which was the thickness of the skin on B-17's and B-24's. They are far less common than the wing bracelets fitted with chains.

 

This one is a triangle mark, A.E. Co. pilot...the mark is actually visible after some contortions because the mechanic that made this one apparently forgot his class in BENDING SHEETMETAL 101 which teaches that the two pieces, the wing and the cuff, do not share the same radius when wanting them to lay flat, one on the other.

 

The result is that he clearly couldn't get the wing to conform to the cuff and tried to draw it down by drilling a couple of extra inboard holes to rivet the thing down tight...didn't work, though...he was still confounded by simple geometry limitations and the result is a rather cobbed-up effort. See post #22 in this thread for a first class job on one of these cuff bracelets.

 

I find this one kind of amusing and charming nonetheless, but I'm fairly sure that I wouldn't have wanted that guy turned loose to patch up my plane. I guess it wasn't quite such a treasure to the seller as it was something less than 10% of the other rarity.

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post-3515-1251300187.jpg

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Another interesting find Paul! I am glad I am back from vacation to enjoy it! Every time this thread surfaces it makes me want one lol. I will have to show you a desk name plate made by someome with sheet metal experience and I think did a good job.

 

Cheers

John

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  • 1 month later...

Here is one I saw while surfing today. The seller wants $350 for it. I've always struggled a bit with how to value these things...one approach would be to value the underlying wing as if it were severely damaged and add the cost of adding a chain. But that approach fails when some of these bracelets sell for well beyond what a nice straight wing would bring. Odd, isn't it?

post-3515-1256609204.jpg

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Tough call Paul - this seller IMHO just might get it due to some of the crazy prices I have seen lately. In fact I saw a GHQ patch go for $152! I am not patch guy but that is out of control IMHO.

 

John

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Thanks for showing your Dad's bracelet. It's uncommon to find a post WWII wing bracelet...seems to have been more of a WWII era fad, although you do find some made pre-WWII also.

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militarymodels
Here is one I saw while surfing today. The seller wants $350 for it. I've always struggled a bit with how to value these things...one approach would be to value the underlying wing as if it were severely damaged and add the cost of adding a chain. But that approach fails when some of these bracelets sell for well beyond what a nice straight wing would bring. Odd, isn't it?

 

I agree, I've seen quite a few. I guess it just depends how badly people what them. In any case, the wings are gorgeous though!

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Thanks for showing your Dad's bracelet. It's uncommon to find a post WWII wing bracelet...seems to have been more of a WWII era fad, although you do find some made pre-WWII also.

 

A few months ago, I made myself a bracelet from current Master Navigator wings. I have seen other people wearing similar bracelets, but it's not too common.

Pete

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A few months ago, I made myself a bracelet from current Master Navigator wings. I have seen other people wearing similar bracelets, but it's not too common.

Pete

 

Pete,

You can create yourself a real heirloom with that bracelet if you take the time to have a local jeweler engrave your name and s/n on the back--there needn't be any more than that. The wing will outlive you by many decades and there you will still be, on the back of that wing for others to discover and have their wonder stimulated. Cost is nominal, perhaps $5 or $10. Very few WWII generation guys thought to do that, leaving us today to wonder about the former owners and to deal with the latter day frauds who are busy adding bogus information to old wings.

 

A short story...some years ago I picked up an old silver cup at a local auction. It had 3 English hallmarks on the bottom and no one in the house, including me knew how to read them. When I got it home and took a few days to research those marks, they told me that James Walker had made the cup in Dublin...in 1701 ! Now, that revved up the imagination...think of all that had transpired since that old cup had been hammered out in Mr. Walker's shop so long ago. Where had it been and how had it survived all those years?

 

A few years after that I told the story to the master silversmith at Colonial Williamsburg. His reaction showed a similar wonder as mine, but with an interesting twist. Having spent his life forming metal into various shapes, he wondered about the metal that went into making that old cup and speculated that it might well have been made from Spanish pieces of eight before they became a silver cup!

 

Anyway, without those marks the story would be much less interesting.

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Paul,

I've been thinking about engraving my name and former rank on the back of the wings. I have my own jewelry business, but the only engraving I've ever done was with using the engraving machine when I worked for a jeweler. I just might bring the bracelet in to have it done by my former bos...

Pete

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Here's a one piece Command Pilot bracelet with an AECO hallmark. I would have preferred to have found it without holes and the pin and catch still intact...but it still makes for a neat little piece of aviation history.

WINGS_2009_196.jpg

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Here's a CBI made pilot bracelet with a pattern similar to a Juarez style wing. It has a unique chain assembly attached to the back.

WINGS_2009_221.jpg

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Here's a Curtis Flying Service bracelet with A.A.C. style wing and the pilot's name inscribed. The two-inch Flight Engineer bracelet is made from a one-piece LGB hallmarked wing.

WINGS_2009_211.jpg

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Rustywings,

Those are all very nice. I like to study the construction of them; I like those that have two or three chains, very sturdy, tight curb link chains.

Pete

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Here's a couple of Flight Instructor bracelets inscribed to the same Captain. The two bracelets are similar in design, but distinctly different in pattern. I believe the top bracelet pre-dates the bracelet below.

WINGS_2009_213.jpg

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