But - in the beginning Gahr probably didn't know how many rings there would be in total. Initially it was only a small number as a gift from Himmler planned. A complicated die would not have been worthwhile? I don't know...
When did the point come, that the "old" procedure was no longer practical? Maybe it was already too late to change the work.
Really difficult. I hope Antonio sheds more light on this. The x-rays he spoke of, would be very interesting - I hope...
my opinion is that both '30 and '40 pattern were made by stamping in a die, because at the beginning anyway some dozens of SSHr were requested......I suppose.
'30 pattern had a less tridimensional looking of band reliefs, so they needed to highlight them by hand finishing and that was a time consuming step. Then to answer to a drammatical increase of SSHr demand, Gahr started production of the so called '40 pattern that didn't need hand finishing of band because of a more tridimensional looking of band reliefs.
