Faking Hetchins was [CR]RE: Hetchins Magnum Bonum (Bogus?) on eBay

(Example: Framebuilding:Tubing:Falck)

From: <Hughethornton@aol.com>
Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2006 17:38:59 EDT
Subject: Faking Hetchins was [CR]RE: Hetchins Magnum Bonum (Bogus?) on eBay
To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org


Actually many curly Hetchins were faked in this fair land by a man mentioned on this list a number of times, happily supplementing his retirement income reproducing high priced variants of a number of marques, as well as selling genuine bikes too. Noone is going to make a fortune this way, but it can be a handy little earner foisting tarted-up junk on an unsuspecting public. Mind you, said faker does have one happy customer who wanted a small curly Hetchins for his wife. With them being in short supply, he had HB have his framebuilder/partner in crime cut a larger one down to size -- the result is actually quite convincing, though I have to say that I did not examine it really closely for telltale signs of his handiwork.

Hugh Thornton Cheshire, England

In a message dated 21/04/2006 22:13:52 GMT Standard Time, kohl57@starpower.net writes:

A good chuckle is had by all... I was more bemused by the idea that there actually would be someone with the deviousness to waste this quality (so valued in this fair city) on duplicating a bike frame from the mid 1960s! If the Chinese and Turks don't duplicate something it's because there is too little market for it. And I might suggest a curly stay Hetchins Magn um Bonum ain't going to cut it when there are all those Louis Vitton bags to copy down to the last stitch. So relax.. we value this stuff and for all good reasons, but no one is plotting to make "phony" Hetchins or Masis. If they did, they'd never be convicted because 99.97 per cent of the jury p ool has never even heard of this stuff before.

Peter Kohler
Washington DC USA