Thanks Sloan! And Dan - I think you might be over thinking this - pull the damn trigger already! ( please take this comment in jest, no offence meant - Houston brand is a fine & a cheaper alternative to the more expensive BR's and RM's )
I bought a BR N-1 through Rakuten earlier this year. BR do two versions, the cheaper one I think with the grey lining and the dearer one (Demotexed) with brown real alpaca lining, possibly a tougher shell and I believe Talon zips. I got the dearer one and am very happy with it. I've not noticed any shedding from the lining.
Mine came with the small USN stencil, but I rubbed it off with warm water and prefer it that way.
As for Rakuten, I've bought maybe 10 items this year and I think 4 got through customs with no fee.
Looks good. Those jackets didn't keep you very warm though. They were not deck jackets per say. Those blue ones were issued to every sailor regardless if you went to see. The green ones with corduroy color and wool lining were considered foul weather jackets and usually only issued to deck hands. Now days deck jackets issued to BM's are from a company called Mustang. I think they also makes foul weather jackets for the USCG. The crow you have sown on is not correct, I think, for that jacket. Unless the Navy changed it before I joined, it was a generic crow with no rating above the chevrons. Just my $.02
R/ David
I guess you mean impermeable A-1 deck jacket.
You are very much right about the Navy regulation on putting only generic crow on utilities, but I've seen some photos of sailors wearing crow with specialty mark on their utilities and all I got was such type..
I recently decided to replace the crow with one of darker background color (this time quartermaster specialty) to match the jacket better.