Soldier's KIT FAQ

A hundred and fifty-five quid for fake gear !?!

 

Having said that, if you were to buy repro/postwar kit piecemeal, you'd probably end up spending about the same. Having looked on the SoF site, this would appear to be the case - of course their repro stuff comes unissued and therefore in better condition.

Still, when all else is said and done, you have all the gear ready to go at once and it could form the basis for a "loaner" set to any rookie, once you have assembled a better set for yourself.

 

Well, I'll believe you - it went for £175.00, which still seems a lot to pay for fake stuff....

 

It is a question of whether it is 'fake' or 'repro', what I mean is that fake stuff tends to be shoddy, the kind of thing that will fall apart under a strong glare, let alone in use. Repro stuff is accuratly made and generally tough, just the kind of thing we are after!

 

I see your point, Stefan - just seems weird to me that the repro stuff is costing almost as much as the real thing, if you're prepared to hunt it down....

 

Thats the other issue Martin, how willing would you be to wade through a river wearing original kit (ok, fair enough, not many people are willing to do it anyhow but thats besides the point)? I doubt many people would want to risk damaging their kit if it was original, I know I wouldnt!

 

OK, OK - I see the point !

( That's the trouble with being a collector and not a re-enactor.... )

 

I think you're both missing the point here if I may say so...this is movie star prop stuff... people pay thousands to have the terminator's red glass eye then it does not surprise me that possibly the best war series ever made (as far as production quality is concerned) would fetch the price it has.

I would expect the buyer of this to mount it on a dummy somewhere at home with the framed certificate of authenticity somewhere close by

I have my own "band of brothers" wehrmacht belt and that was a tidy £30.

 

Band of Brothers is a bit of a joke to re-enactors simply because the amount of stuff they sold off and the poor quality of a lot of it, why pay an extra £20 for a belt that may have appeared in the background of one episode for 20 seconds? The other thing is that a large number of retailers are simply taking some crummy kit off their shelves and sticking 'band of brothers' on it thus enabling them to sell it for far more than it is worth. If it was something like a uniform with a name in it (a couple of people I know have uniforms that appeared on some of the major cast members) that would be worth paying a fair bit for, however, why pay 40% more for a moderate quality reproduction just because there is a chance it was in a frame or two of BoB?

 

I don't know where you get your belts from mate but the ones I've seen (new repro and non-bob) are about £20-25 (cheap)

So £30 wasn't too much to pay for mine and it looks good

 

I have 4, 2 post war black leather ones (one cost £5 and one £12) plus one nice repro canvas one (£20) and an original canvas one (£35). It all depends where you look I suppose.