Club Obi Wan

Well, judge yourself!

I think the Adventurebilt Leather Co. has hit a homerun here. While Kim was working like a horse on the holsters (still is) and continuesly kept improving small details, I was lucky to purchase three mint condition vintage MKVII bags and could hardly wait to put my MBA strap on one of them. But that buckle was just sooo not what I wanted, that I started looking elsewhere. Since there are plenty of offerings to chose from and non of them looked exactly the same, I wanted to know who actually had the best one. So I contacted the Agent5 Consulting Agency and asked if Jason could help me out with some screen graps, because the things that I saw on my screen couldn't be purchased from anyone. Which was quite a surprise to me, considering how much effort had gone into this particular item over the years. Always kind and helpfully as he is, he sent some to me and I was able to examinate them a little closer.







That didn't help. To me the buckle on the screen graps looked like a piece of sheet metal!!!



So I called up Kim and asked him what HE would see... The theory became stronger and stronger and no matter how hard we looked, we couldn't see the rather thick, rounded and solid buckle that we BOTH had on our bags for the last years.

So, since we couldn't get what we want (and BOY did we want a screen accurate bag strap buckle all of sudden), we thought about having them made ourselves. So we went at it with screen graps, technical drawings and the priceless help from Jason (thanks for the countless hours discussing such a tiny piece of gear Jason). Finally, the drawings looked exactly as what we saw on screen.

So what now? - Should we have it cast? We gave it some thought and stuck with what we feel that the AB name always stood for: real gear for a real world. In this case this could only be solid stainless steal. And it hat to be laser cut!!! Not only for the kick of it, but also to guarantee a zero tolerance to the drawing that took us so long. And a solid stainless steal would guarantee that no matter how many trucks I'd be pulled behind of, no cast brass or rust would ever show up. Working for Europe's leading tool supplier, finding a firm who could laser cut the buckles from solid stainless steal was a kids play. But having 10-50 pieces made, THAT was something that would have cost as much as 10-50 complete bag straps elsewhere. Again Kim and I sat down and discussed. Could it really be that other would be as fanatic as us and like to have one of those? - It WOULD be less expensive (per piece) if we could have 100 or 200 pieces made. So we took the plunge and today they arrived. 200 custom made laser cut solid stainless steal AB bagstrap buckles.

With flash:



Without flash:



When I came home, I quickly grapped one out of the box and distressed it with some 60 grit sandpaper for ca. 5 minutes. And there it was. THAT was the buckle I wanted for my MKVII bag.



and the real deal:



Hope you like them as well (we've got PLENTY of them). Thank you John for hosting!

Regards,

Marc

Oh boy oh boy oh boy send me one I can't wait.
It looks better than I had hoped for. Yahoooo Marc, SA in my eyes.

Best regards
Kim

My dear friend. You are OBSESSED. And this obsession can only be good thing for the folks that are looking to have a replica that is more accurate than what is already out there.

Of course, this is the reason that I wanted you in the AB camp. And proud to be associated with someone who is so detail oriented.


I think you are taking this gear thing to the next level, and as I told you early on. I am behind you 100 per cent, if what AB offers is BETTER than what is already out there. So far, from what I have seen, you are batting 100. Keep up the excellent work Marc.

I am really picky regarding what we put the AB name on. And I know that you are as well. Yeah, I really chose wisely when I invited you to join the AB club, and you have never let me down, especially when we were juggling film hats and both of us working until we dropped just to get these handmade hats to the costumer so they could have hats to start filming with, AFTER we had already made half the order and Spielberg changd the specs on us!!

In case you did not get my email, I have you a brand new set of Crystal Skull blocks in hand, they arrived today, and will ship tomorrow when I make the mail run. They came too late to mail today. I think you already have a few, but now you have more. The blocks are protected and only you or I can buy more later as we wear these out. If other hatters want to copy them, we will let them do the work we did, in order to get the right blockshape. We worked too long and hard on these blocks just to supply other hatters with our blocks. If they want to copy us, it is only fair that they reverse engineer as we did. Fedora

It's beautiful!

I can't wait to get my hands on one of these.


/Jakob

How much for one shipped in the EU?

Marc is still calculating, we'll know more tomorrow my friend.

-K

Just one more thing, I'll buff one up with water sandpaper when I get some samples, and post before and after pic's.

Very nice! I just today ordered an original Mk VII bag from WPG - good timing.

you know and that actually fits with the thoughts about the original strap being modified from a rifle strap or something of that nature. those flat cut buckles like that would be very common in surplus. in fact the ones that i got for my indy 4 buckles are very similar but have the roller obviously and are slightly bowed.

man here soon ab will be a one stop shop for indy gear if you guys keep up at this pace

Great work guys! They certainly look like the best offering so far.

However, one thing I've noticed in the above screen grabs is that the top two Cairo scenes' buckle appears to have a slight bow in it positioned curiously towards the top of the sides rather than the middle. Yet I can't see this at all in the bottom close up of the flying wing scene's buckle. Could they have used different buckles on the different bags in the same movie?

Also, is it possible to polish your buckles up a bit to be more shiny looking like the ones in the screen grabs?

And did you use the MBA strap? If so, how do you undo it without damaging it?

Y'know, the more I think about it and look at these pictures, the more I think that these buckles look just like Lee Keppler's new bagstrap buckles (viewtopic.php?t=22609). It's great that we have so many vendors offering screen accurate gear, right down to the buckles!

My dear friend. You are OBSESSED.

Obsession, the new fragrance by Adventurebilt International. A mixture of felt, leather, sweat and campfire

Thanks my friend. I know you mean this as positive as possible.

you know and that actually fits with the thoughts about the original strap being modified from a rifle strap or something of that nature. those flat cut buckles like that would be very common in surplus.

Absolutely! In fact I got two brand new G3 rifle straps from Heckler & Koch and asside from being too short for a bag strap, they're pretty close.

However, one thing I've noticed in the above screen grabs is that the top two Cairo scenes' buckle appears to have a slight bow in it positioned curiously towards the top of the sides rather than the middle. Yet I can't see this at all in the bottom close up of the flying wing scene's buckle. Could they have used different buckles on the different bags in the same movie?

I think what you see in the two SOC graps is what most people mix with a rather "full shape" (for the lack of better words) than the flat surface. If you look on the left side of the buckle (or your right side, being the viewer), you'll see that it's plain straight. Why? - Cause no shirt is in the way of seeing the edge

Also, is it possible to polish your buckles up a bit to be more shiny looking like the ones in the screen grabs?

It only takes a couple of minutes to buff them up, so I think that everyone can decide themselves, if they prefer a polished shiny version or like me a scratched and distressed one. Kim will post some pictures of what they look like after a good polishing in a couple of days.

And did you use the MBA strap? If so, how do you undo it without damaging it?

Yes, that's a MBA strap on which I drilled the pop rivets on to "open" it. They can be replace by either new ones or chicago screws.

Y'know, the more I think about it and look at these pictures, the more I think that these buckles look just like Lee Keppler's new bagstrap buckles

You think? Just by comparing the pictures I find a lot of differences. Which is absolutely ok, as I believe that everyone has their own vision of the perfect buckle and I have nothing but the highest respect towards Lee. Being one of the very first vendors in this hobby and still being around speak volumes to me.

Here are the differences as I (personally) see them:
The corners are rounded differently
Lee’s buckle is perfectly square, while we believe that the Raiders buckle was ALMOST square
Lee had the bridge in the middle attached to the back, thereby creating a rather „framed“ look of the strap, while ours is in the very middle to create that fold as seen in the screen graps posted above
Ours is solid stainless steal, while Lee’s is chrom coated (at least it appears to be to me), so I ASSUME it was die cast

Again: there is absolutely nothing wrong or less right with Lee’s bag strap buckle and going by the „studies“ we did, his came closest to what I wanted anyway.

Oh, btw: I spoke to Kim this morning and since this was a little fun project that we did inbetween the rather time consuming pieces of gear we’re working, we decided to sell the buckles for our cost price, plus the German sales taxes that I have to pay wether I make a profit or not. So we’ll make this a non-profit item for the fellow fans, who are as fanatic about small details as we are.

Price: 3 Euro per piece plus shipping. I don’t know what an envelope to the different contries cost, but will check that later today. If you know of other fans in your area that would like to have one, it would be an idea to collect the order and only pay shipping once, but that’s up to you. Of course, if you have a hat, holster or shirt on order, I could pack one or some buckles into the package as well.

Regards,

Marc

Strider wrote:Y'know, the more I think about it and look at these pictures, the more I think that these buckles look just like Lee Keppler's new bagstrap buckles (viewtopic.php?t=22609). It's great that we have so many vendors offering screen accurate gear, right down to the buckles!

I was actually thinking the same thing. I just recently got one of Lee's new bagstrap buckles and the thing looks nearly identical to me.
It's awesome when a group gets together to scrutinize and replicate the minutia of one small piece of gear.

-Rabittooth

Well done Marc and company!!!!!!!!! Let me be the first Tasmanian to say "I want one." When you have it all figured out of course:)

Regards
Christian

Thanks Taz. Incl. shipping an envelope to Australia it would be 4.79 Euro in total via Paypal.

Regards,

Marc

Cool. I'll send it over after I get some cash in the ole paypal:)

Regards
TAZ