Dodge Hood Ornament, altered???

I recently bought a 1934 Dodge Sedan hood ornament, since i couldnt find it on here, i went to another source.

upon arrival, since im in afghanistan, my father took pictures so i can give the person an accurate review. he mentioned how it looked like it was altered, maybe cutting some metal off the back of the base.



what do you guys/gals think? if it is cut off, is this the type of metal that a skilled welder could add some metal back in and grind back to close to stock.

 

Definitely cut off. Not sure of the composition of it to know whether you can re-weld it or not. Definitely a rare thing. I had real trouble trying to find one for my sedan. Wish I still had it!!!!.....the sedan that is

 

i have been looking for over year and half. figured it was better than nothing. no clue why someone would cut it though.

 

It is potmetal, not easily repaired.

 

The good news is that is not an original it's a reproduction. The originals have the full curl horns that are not layed back against the neck. If the seller represented this as an original then you may be able to return it if your not satisfied.

Good luck in finding another they are hard to come by in good condition.

 

That one you show is pretty much an aftermarket dust collector/display item. The one you want looks like this one that I have. The face and horns come off (notice the seam in the last photo) and I was lucky enough to score a cut off body with great horns to replace the broken one.

 

That's a nice one. To help with the authenticity fact look at picture #3 and you'll see just to the right of the seal "D P C D" in a square arrangement. That lets you know it's real.

 

They're made from zinc using the die-casting process. They can be repaired but it really takes soemone who knows what they're doing and repairs zinc trim regularly. This is because the difference in temperature between correcting a problem and creating an even larger one is very, very narrow.

EM

 

My first thought was that somebody JB welded a later Ram ornament onto the (partially fucked up) base of an early cap. It's a nice bit of garage or desk art, but it's not good enough to go on a car.

Oh, and stay safe over there. My nephew did two tours in Iraq, we all worried about him constantly, now I have to worry about you too!

Brian