Could this be a legitimate Japanese plane part from Pearl Harbor?

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R

Redwood

Recruit
3
5
Oct 19, 2025
I recently bought a truckload of vintage electronic equipment and parts from an estate sale and found this part in the bottom of a box full of mica domino capacitors. At first I thought the letters "SDCH" stamped on it meant it couldn't be of Japanese origin but after much Googling I landed on a thread in this forum that included the info in the last photo here, indicating that in fact those letters could have been stamped on a Mitsubishi plane to indicate the type of heat treatment the part received.

While I handle a lot of vintage electronics including WW2 era stuff, I have no expertise in aviation or general military memorabilia so I'm just hoping to get any comments regarding the authenticity or lack thereof pertaining to this part. If it is in fact likely from a Japanese plane that attacked Pearl Harbor, is there any way of identifying it more specifically?

Much thanks!
 

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First question is why you would think it is a piece from a PH airplane. No real way to determine, as I have seen pieces with "provenance" that are provable to not be PH related
 
Why would I think it is a piece from a PH airplane? Um, because it's literally written on it? Sorry the photo posted upside down but it literally says "12/7/41 Pearl Harbor Jap Plane" written in the old style cursive of somebody probably a lot older than I am, and I'm over 60.

And as I further clarified, it's stamped with a code that I couldn't find reference to anywhere until I stumbled across it on this forum, and assuming the info I found here is accurate, that code is consistent with it being Japanese.

Beyond that, again, as I said, I DON'T KNOW. And I don't just not know, I have literally no experience nor expertise in this kind of thing so I figured this would be a good place to ask, given that this is where I found the code and that this is literally the WW2 aircraft forum. It just didn't seem like the website I go to for fishing advice was going to get me anywhere.

Sorry for wasting your time.
 
mjfur said:
Unfortunately while the part does exhibit signs that it is Japanese there is no way to prove who or when the text was written on the part or if it is accurate.
Could have - possibly. Proof positive - No.
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Thank you. I figured it would be tough to authenticate it with any confidence but thought I could possibly at least determine if there was just no way it could be legitimate. Seems if it is for real then there must be other parts from the same or similar planes floating around out there so something to compare it to would be helpful.
 
Apologies, on my small pad the pix were hard to see, that said, the fact there is nothing more than just the cursive writing to validate it is speculatory at best. No waste of time art all, what the site is for. I will say that the exterior color seems to be bit intriguing in that it is grey. I have pieces of Hirano's wreck from a Pearl Harbor a survivor and a man that was akin to being my second father. That gray color is more in line with my pieces than the touted gray-green so often spoken of. Much more grey than green. As to provenance, without some better form of validation it is impossible to say it or isn't conclusively. My pieces came pictures of the wreck, from the Colonel, at the time of PH an army Captain responsible to inspection at the various army sites around the island that day and the next few.
 
In a million years the truth will only be speculative. There's a quote: "There's a sucker born every minute", and it very well could apply to anyone who assumes that accurate info was added to the part. Or even if the info is accurate, the interpretation of the detail is just a guess. I am convinced that it is definitely from a Japanese aircraft that DIDN'T take off on 12/7/41 and, thus, came nowhere near PH. I know it has to be true and couldn't possibly be misinterpreted info.
 
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