CraigS no longer offers these; something to do with the DBAG lawyers.
They indeed did come from Germany, as he had sourced someone who made them one at a time using the acid-etch method, which is the original method used to make them when new. When they were being offered, however, they were offered with the last few numbers of the VIN inscribed into the blank field, which isn't correct; the correct method was embossing.
I got mine from Craig some years ago before the lawyers got involved. I ordered mine blank, and contacted a domestic firm here in the USA that manufactures embossing machinery to make things such as military dog-tags. For a small fee they embossed mine. The results are darn near flawless, but unfortunately unless one wants to investigate and invest in the necessary acid-etch process and materials (n.b. this has Wallace Wheeler written all over it!
) and do them ONLY for themselves, I think it is a lost cause.
I did manage to put together the Classic Center in the USA with the Classic Center in Germany some years ago in parallel to getting my other tag made. Finally, they were offering them, but they didn't quite match the originals. The process wasn't identical (it was a photo method, not acid etch) and instead of having many of the fields pre-filled in, most of them were inscribed. It was also pretty costly, not surprising, but with it not being correct, it was not for me. You'll note that things like the tire size and capacity are "pre-filled in" data, not embossed or inscribed. In fact, ALL of the data except for the last few digits of the Chassis Number (in my case, 12-007262) is pre-filled in, and just those last few numbers are embossed. I used a wholly original data tag still attached to a car as an example to get it correct.
It's been posted before but here is a photo of my replacement VIN tag, which is a reproduction, unauthorized, but spot-on accurate. Note also, that I riveted it in place which is how I've seen the originals of this vintage. To show you what I used as an example of an original, both for appearance, embossing, and fastening, there's a photo of an original one in place on another car.
