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If I purchased a very high priced A-2 repro, and noticed that the stitches per inch vary on certain areas of the jacket, is that a major issue? Or should an expensive A-2 repro have perfect, uniform stitching with consistent stitches per inch?
Military spec for jackets was between 8 & 10 stitches per inch I read on the old VLJ. A hand made garment pre-computer era it was not at all unusual for there to be an off count. Part of the charm of a hand built jacket.
No jacket is completely 100% uniform in the stitching unless it was somehow made by robots. The originals varied because they were fed and sewn by hand on single needle belt-driven industrial machines. I have found inconsistent stitching on all the repro's I have examined, including Eastman, just depends on how hard you want to look.
Personally I like it, shows that the jackets were made by hand and not a robot. The fact that I am making my own jackets these days and know how damn hard it is to make everything absolutely perfect when making them from scratch, and with a period machine to boot, has nothing to do with it
Cheers
Mark
Here's some stitching from my wartime Irvin - not all that precise. I don't suppose they could have imagined an afternoon's work would be getting checked over again 65 years later! I think it adds character, but that's just my own view.