www.925-1000.com

What do you think about this small 25 gram toad? Fake or genuine?

Hi,
It belongs to FAuxBERGE.
Was it ``a great find in thrift shop or garage sale`` ? Sorry.
Regards

Thank you for your prompt reply! I was before a purchase decision... good I had some time to consult you! :)

AG2012 wrote:Hi,
It belongs to FAuxBERGE.
Was it ``a great find in thrift shop or garage sale`` ? Sorry.
Regards

Apart from the lack of quality that gives away what other pointers gives it away as a fake?

There is a silent agreement here not to discuss why a fake is a fake. You see it fakers read these sites too. Why teach them to make better fakes?

Hi,
1.Overall poor quality and craftsmanship
2.Letter P in initials is not well rounded Cyrillic letter P but rather flat. Chinese fakers rely on visual similarity and disregard subtle differences and their Cyrillic letters are often deformed.
3.Eyes in genuine Rappaport animals always have the bezel setting he used in jewelry, too; a bezel is a single ring of metal around the entire circumference of the stone, i.e. eyes. Eyes here are simply glued into the depression.
4.Always look other items the seller offers, they betray them. Or mistakes in description because of plethora of Russian imperial silver online and it`s amazing how many ``experts`` are in the trade offering e.g. STERLING Russian items, the standard (.925) unknown to me;
91 Zolotnik which equals 947.9 (or 94.79%) millesimal fineness. 88 Zolotnik which equals 916.6 (or 91.66%) millesimal fineness. 84 Zolotnik which equals 875 (or 87.5%).Meaning, there is NO sterling fineness.

Regards

Qrt.S wrote:There is a silent agreement here not to discuss why a fake is a fake. You see it fakers read these sites too. Why teach them to make better fakes?

`
I understand the reluctance to detail how to detect a fake, the issue is for me and probably other real collectors that we do want know, apart from joining a group of other collectors and discussing and comparing notes face to face it is impossible to gain this knowledge, particularly during these times.
I do think it’s worthwhile sharing this information to ensure that Russian Silver keeps being a highly sought-after collectable, quite a dilemma really to ensure that collectors can gain the experience and forgers don’t.

This group has some real knowable people who do share their experience which I thank you all for this, as a debutant collector you all have expanded my knowledge.
I do suspect however that the forgers are aware of the deficiencies of their products and probably don’t really care that much, the forgers that can produce high value and quality products are probably well aware of what is needed to pass a fake to an unsuspecting collector, however the people who can buy these high value items tend to either buy them from a reliable seller or expert, it seems to me that the less expensive items that are the items most forged as more collectors can buy these, even with this knowledge I would not think they would be able to produce the items of the quality that would be able to pass inspection, for example the frog in this example you can see is not of great quality on first inspection.

AG2012 wrote:Hi,
1.Overall poor quality and craftsmanship
2.Letter P in initials is not well rounded Cyrillic letter P but rather flat. Chinese fakers rely on visual similarity and disregard subtle differences and their Cyrillic letters are often deformed.
3.Eyes in genuine Rappaport animals always have the bezel setting he used in jewelry, too; a bezel is a single ring of metal around the entire circumference of the stone, i.e. eyes. Eyes here are simply glued into the depression.
4.Always look other items the seller offers, they betray them. Or mistakes in description because of plethora of Russian imperial silver online and it`s amazing how many ``experts`` are in the trade offering e.g. STERLING Russian items, the standard (.925) unknown to me;
91 Zolotnik which equals 947.9 (or 94.79%) millesimal fineness. 88 Zolotnik which equals 916.6 (or 91.66%) millesimal fineness. 84 Zolotnik which equals 875 (or 87.5%).Meaning, there is NO sterling fineness.

Regards

Thanks for that infomation