Is my propeller a fake?

[Beautybank]

Hi all , I have an SE5a propeller which I bought at a professional auction over 30 years ago. I have just been told it is a fake because the word "Wolesley" on the hub should be spelled "Wolseley"

Can this be true? Were the Chinese (or whoever ) making fakes 30 years ago, or did Wolseley employ a few dislexic stamp operators?

Regards
Peter

[Dave]

It could be, but it wasn't all that uncommon for factory stampings to have mistakes like that on them.

If it's the one currently on eBay, there are several other errors of some concern, notably "SUIZAR" instead of "SUIZA", and some of the other stampings don't seem to totally follow the general pattern of stampings from that era.

[Bob Gardner]

Peter,

Spelling mistakes on WW1 hubs are comparatively common, by which I mean that I come across several a year, although to put this in context I probably see hundreds of props and sometimes thousands, a year, during my research.

If we are discussing the SE5A prop currently on eBay, the layout of the data on your prop is fairly normal, although as Dave Bahnson observes it's not absolutely correct. It is also stamped for the RAE, which dates it to 1919. The Royal Aircraft Factory designed the SE5A. They were known as the RAF. When the Royal Air Force was formed in April 1918, they too were known as the RAF, so the Factory was renamed as the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE). This name better described its role as an experimental establishment; it had not been a great success as a government run factory.

I don't believe the SE5A was still in production in 1919. This might be a replacement prop made for the RAE for an SE5 they were still using.

With kind regards,

Bob