Any idea how much this driver is worth?

[mvmac]

I would think they would be better off to be building fake R1s or something.

You can get more for some Honma drivers than you can for an R1. There are Honma irons that sell for 4 grand.

[MS256]

You can get more for some Honma drivers than you can for an R1. There are Honma irons that sell for 4 grand.

Yeah, I realize that. I wouldn't think you could sell enough of the fake 4 grand clubs to pay for the operation before the cat was out of the bag. But I could be wrong. I don't know anything about maximizing profits in the fake club industry.

[Hammer 4]

I am now officially intrigued...

Me 3...For sure let us know what the outcome is on that club.

[Mitch360]

I've emailed honma in the UK as the Japanese email address isn't working. Probably be Monday now before anyone gets back to me. The whole head and face is supposed to be titanium which apparently doesn't attract a magnet. I've tried this and a magnet will not attract to any part of the head, so looks promising. According to the internet, this is a sure sign of a fake. Apart from aluminium, I can't imagine what else it could be made of? It's certainly not steel cos that would definitely attract a magnet. It's all very puzzling.

[Mitch360]

Also, as mentioned in another post, if they were making fakes this good, surely they would make countless copies? Which doesn't explain why I can't find a single one like it. I thought it maybe it's had a new hosel fitted as some point, but this can't be true as it still has the 'original' 18kt gold ring around it.

[RFKFREAK]

Either way, you have a pretty good story thus far. Good luck!

[Mitch360]

Ok, so in case anyone is interested, Honma In Japan came back to the UK agent who forwarded me the email. The Club and shaft look original. Because the hosel does not have a serial number it cannot be an original 4* Hosel. They cannot confirm that it is counterfeit. Although "it does not appear that all parts of the club originated from their factory in Japan". The agent said "that is not to say its an attempted forgery as sometimes people tinker with their clubs I.e re-shafting etc. The only way to get the club properly authenticated is to send it to japan for formal scrutiny. I can't believe some one can fake a high quality diver so well that even the factory cannot identify it by Hi Definition images! Seems a bit odd.

[Hammer 4]

Ok, so in case anyone is interested, Honma In Japan came back to the UK agent who forwarded me the email.

The Club and shaft look original. Because the hosel does not have a serial number it cannot be an original 4* Hosel.

They cannot confirm that it is counterfeit. Although "it does not appear that all parts of the club originated from their factory in Japan".

The agent said "that is not to say its an attempted forgery as sometimes people tinker with their clubs I.e re-shafting etc.

The only way to get the club properly authenticated is to send it to japan for formal scrutiny.

I can't believe some one can fake a high quality diver so well that even the factory cannot identify it by Hi Definition images!

Seems a bit odd.

Honma might be trying to cover their a$$. One one hand If they said it was a fake, and it turned out Not to be, and you sold it for XXX number of money, then down the line you found out it wasn't fake, you may have legal recourse, ect.

I also think that someone may have had nothing better to do than to copy a great looking club, and maybe try to pass it off as a original Honma, this of course is because of no serial number, then again, is it p[ossible that someone at the factory forgot to stamp the serial number..?

So...you gonna send it to Honma..?

[Mitch360]

I may well send it. Thing is... Don't want to play with it and ruin it in case it's real, but can't sell it cos it's unfair on the buyer. Probably will send it. I've removed the grip tonight looking for further evidence :-) and it's revealed a code on the shaft. So I'll probably send this to honma and see if it's an internal code that they're familiar with. Chances are if the shaft is legit, so is the club (it's the shafts that are the expensive part apparently). Now that the grip is off, I've noticed it does have a weave of carbon lace all the way to the end, and there's a series of tiny metal strands running all the way to the tip (you can see they are metal when you look at end of the un gripped shaft) Seems like a lot of effort to counterfeit. But the Chinese are an innovative bunch.. Wouldn't put anything past them ! If I ever find out more ill post it here.....

[colin007]

Please keep us updated. This is super interesting.

[Lihu]

You can get more for some Honma drivers than you can for an R1. There are Honma irons that sell for 4 grand.

4k for a driver? Are they that much better? If so, wouldn't it be tuned to the user for which it was originally built/customized? What happens when you get your first dummy mark? In regard to another posters comment about fakes, a local club expert told me that the fakes are starting to look so good and feel so good that it is really hard to tell even if you have it in hand. Most of the factories are in China, and most of the makers need to go to multiple foundries to keep up with demand. The smaller foundries tend to leak information about the tools. Thus, they can make the same titanium driver heads with the same inserts and no design cost. This is why fakes are not really knock offs, but the real thing without the brand name and without properly paying the designer of the club.

[Spyder]

Please keep us updated. This is super interesting.

Yes, I am definitely sucked in now.

OP, please keep this updated!

[colin007]

This is more mythological than Miura-san's bastard child working for Warrior Golf...

[achadha7]

*popcorn* *beer* and wait for the story

[mvmac]

4k for a driver? Are they that much better? If so, wouldn't it be tuned to the user for which it was originally built/customized?

4K is just for the irons, I think it's because they actually put some gold in the cavity.

What happens when you get your first dummy mark?

They sue you

[Dave2512]

There are some great fakes out there these days, fake everything not just golf stuff. The lack of serial number wouldn't concern me. I've seen so many inconsistencies with things like that. Companies say it should be in a certain spot and it's not. Went through the same thing with Cleveland for used irons I bought on craigslist. They said serial number should be on a band on the 7i and only the 7i because they mix sets with hybrids in 6 and longer. The band on the irons I bought was on the 6. Several emails later the said it was a factory mistake. I took the grips off and the shafts were engraved Cleveland and had stickers. However another inconsistency was found. The set was supposed to have Traction 85 shafts and the shafts in the irons were marked CG16 100g. Several emails later they again admitted factory mistake claiming it was an early run that used shafts from the previous model. Had serial numbers in different places on Cobra gear I bought new on the same day.

Those factories are overseas with who knows what for QC. Most employ low wage workers manning machines spitting out hundreds of whatever every hour. Stuff like this comes up all the time with guitars. Years ago before guitar fakes got big I found some pictures on-line of factories in Korea. They were so unorganized it was amazing. Racks and stacks of half finished product on top of finished stuff. Workers using ancient hand tools. Everything was a mess, seriously looked like one of those hoarder shows on cable. I made the effort to find those because back then people would argue my brand is better than your brand and I knew that most of it came out of one or two factories, Samick and Cort regardless of how the guitar was labeled.

[colin007]

Those factories are overseas with who knows what for QC. Most employ low wage workers manning machines spitting out hundreds of whatever every hour. Stuff like this comes up all the time with guitars. Years ago before guitar fakes got big I found some pictures on-line of factories in Korea. They were so unorganized it was amazing. Racks and stacks of half finished product on top of finished stuff. Workers using ancient hand tools. Everything was a mess, seriously looked like one of those hoarder shows on cable. I made the effort to find those because back then people would argue my brand is better than your brand and I knew that most of it came out of one or two factories, Samick and Cort regardless of how the guitar was labeled.

I just put together a beautiful 7 string beast from Warmoth.

[M2R]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mvmac

4K is just for the irons, I think it's because they actually put some gold in the cavity.

Only once saw one sort of like that which got left behind on the side of the green.  I remember the medallion was a little different more like a half sun burst or cog? ala MG700. Returned it to the owner and they were not even concerned it was missing, very casual about the whole thing. Speaking of MG700 ...

Quote:

The standard production MG700 is a 2-Star grade (MSRP $370/club) up to the ultra-elaborate 5-Star grade ( MSRP $4,605.00/club ) featuring Pt1000 Platinum, 24k gold plating, medallions, hosel rings and ion plated shaft.

Holy cow that is $4600 per club if I'm reading that correctly? Anyway on their website they give a warning about grey market and counterfeit clubs but I suppose that could just be standard disclaimer stuff.