Art, no offense taken.

My tag definitions for the record;

Original - This one is obvious.

Reproduction - An exact duplicate of the information taken from the original tag or if a record of the original tag information exists, or from a broadcast sheet by someone who knows how in cases where it is possible.

Custom - Made up with no intent to fool anyone, CLONE as the VON is one example. The example I posted yesterday is another.

Fake - If any data was or needs to be guessed at to make it appear as an original.

If a reproduction tag is made (see my definition above) & the car is up for sale, the seller should mention it & include both tags. I know of sales that have not gone through because sellers were not completely honest about this. If the potential buyer hears about it from me instead, they wonder what else the buyer has not disclosed.

Personally, I do not care if a reproduction tag is in italic font as long as ALL the correct data is on it including the original scheduled production date & VON.

Fake tags, & the people that want to have them made I have no use for. It was (and is) pretty obvious what someone in this thread was trying to do in the other thread. If anything has to be guessed at, I call it a fake tag.

That said.....

I did offer a service for a short while in 2005 where I would help folks with broadcast sheets with their tag layouts for a fee. In two cases I knew what was on the original tags even though they were no longer with the cars at the time & no broadcast sheet was present. Some folks send information from stuff in their collections with no intent of giving up the original or wanting their names known. I still made the owners jump through some hoops.

Once the tag layout was done I would have the tag made then send it to them. In one case a factory error was corrected that bugged the owner, it simply needed a space inserted.

No tags were made that that did not contain the correct information for the car, there were approximately ten of them total.

One of those cars was for sale a few times not long after, & folks did ask me about the tag because it looked 'new'. In every case I told them that it was a new tag with the correct info on it that I supplied from my files.

I stopped offering it as a service for a fee for two reasons;

An incredible amount of folks contacted me wanting fender tag layouts that 'can not be spotted as fake', when they had a big fat 0 to go on. This really opened my eyes to the dark side of the hobby, yes, it is real.

The other reason is that I did not like the way I felt after contact with people like that. I learned a lot from that experience.

If I were a greedy man, I could have made a lot of money. Instead, I chose to protect unwary buyers from the bottom feeders who prey on them. I have learned an incredible amount from the folks that have sent raw, original data in. I have chosen to use that education to help honest people needing honest answers. If I ever betray that trust I know the data sources will dry up.

Fake fender tags are an epidemic in our hobby. I said that a few years ago & one guy laughed at me. Most folks just have no clue how common they are.

One other note, on the occasional thread where I point out FAKE tags, the font does not enter into consideration, only historical impossibilities.

Like it or not, the good & bad among you have had a very great influence on what I do and how I do it. The good influences are used against the bad, get used to it, I am not going away.

I sleep very good at night & it has been a pleasure serving those that truly needed honest answers.

Barry Washington