Hi Wayne,
Glad you piped in on this particular bayonet. You are much better at etched blades than I am and this is an interesting example.
I agree with you about the hilt not being an Eickhorn product. Ron makes that point as well and he believes it to be a typical Curna hilt. That much seems clear so this does not seem to be a red flag after all. That leaves the blade.
I suppose there are three possibilities: First, the bayonet is a fake. Second, the bayonet was assembled by Curna with an Eickhorn manufactured etched blade. Third, the bayonet was made by Curna and the blade was etched with the Eickhorn template.
The questions, it seems to me, are would Eickhorn have poorly etched this blade and then sold it to Curna as a "second" quality because it failed quality control? Would Eickhorn have etched someone else's blade blank for them as a sub-contract? Would Eickhorn have leased the template to Curna for them to etch the blade?
It seems to me that Johnson has correspondence in the WKC and/or Eickhorn files that indicates these two makers (at least) did sell parts back and forth.
George
