I love old military. Unfortunately I don't know much about British stuff, so all I can do is draw some parallels to American jackets that may be useful.
This jacket reminds me of the B-3 jackets of WWII. Of course, WWII jackets were copied and recopied for years and years (the M-422 jacket that Tom Cruise wears in Top Gun for example), but if it's real the sky is the limit. You may want to investigate why the mouton is that color, with American Jackets the color of the mouton sometimes helps with dating. Does the zipper have a name or design on it?
In America some of the better jacket reproduction companies will even put faux military tags on the jackets and retro fit old zippers. So if it's the same in the UK you'll need to show it to someone familiar with British stuff.
Attachments
Patton Wearing a B-3
pattton wearing a b-3.JPG (27.5 KiB) Viewed 11342 times
Last edited by CRAZYBUBBA on Wed Jan 27, 2010 12:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Try looking up "zipp slide fastener company" or some variation with fastener in it. Back when zippers were new they were called slide fasteners, so that search may yield what you're looking for.
I could be wrong about the date. I'm just not familiar with that zipper brand being used in WWII jackets on this side of the pond.
Heres a reply from David over at vintage leather jackets:
nice looking jacket doesnt look like ww2 looks vaguely like a replica from the paper...dont know a whole lot about raf jackets
Jimmy J
(Please note: Legit checks I do in this forum should not be considered 100% conclusive; I'm simply giving a gut reaction based on the limited information provided.)
Thanks so much to everyone here for your help and your patience!
It probably is a repro. How much do you think it would go for at auction? I was thinking at least $75-100.
I've only recently started studying ebay but it seems to be that the market is incredibly unpredictable. I've seen great jackets go for very cheap. I think it all depends on how accurate of a repro this is, in America the good ones (McCoy, etc) can do very well.