To Soak Or Not To Soak

any opinions?

A lot of the older hinges peel easily. If so, peeling them should suffice.

If not, you can carefully cut/slice the hinge from the page (not the stamp). Then a minimal amount of moisture will release the hinge.

But, to give you a simple answer, since these are all used and hinged, a soaking won't hurt them.

You can use the search button at the top of this page and find lots of discussions and tips on soaking.

KirkS

Make sure you press them. I just love that Pan American expo set you have up there! Yes I agree with Kirk, a dip wouldn't hurt none.

I would soak them even if just to flatten them out.

Dianne

Thanks all...I'll be brave and soak them! keep you posted!

Splish-splash I was takin' a bath......

edit* ALT codes for the music notes didn't work properly, so I nuked them

Cold water! just enough time to wash the gum
then into the book press :)

I've recently begun resoaking all my used stamps to put them in actual mounts. I bought a showguard stamp drying book that works great.

So far I've made it up to about 1901 and will probably continue until about 1930 or so. Most of the stamps I have after that point are mint anyway and already in mounts. It's a bit more pricey than hinges but presents so much better with each stamp in a mount with a nice black background.

After that, I'm gonna create a website to display every album page kind of like I did with my sports cards - http://home.comcast.net/~zeppelin33/index.html

I still promote my budget "freezer bag" sandwich
drying book method.

Prof stamp drying books here on the weekend were AUD$35

I just use a paper towel and a piece of old watercolor paper inside a couple heavy books...I know I'm a cheapskate..lol My wife offered to buy me a drying book but I talked her into buying me a whitmans buffalo nickle book instead! lol

would the stamps be resting on the watercolor paper with paper towel on top?

and Rod, I'm curious about the freezer bag method!

A bit long winded,
but is really quite easy......

Stamps to be sorted via type prior to soaking.
eg: non fugitive, self stick etc.
In this example, low value, used, non fugitive with hinge remnants.

Articles required:
Large and small glass mixing bowl.
2 new laundered tea towels
tweezers
Large format disposable book with non-glossy paper pages
New scrap book with soft white thick pages.
Packet of A4 sized freezer bags.

Method
Rip the scrap book pages into A4 sized sheets
Submerge the stamps (60 at a time) in the mixing bowl of water
with cold to bordering on, tepid water.
Leave for 15 minutes,
Remove the stamps one by one checking for
any gum remaining.
Place into a second smaller bowl of clean
cold water.
When all removed from larger bowl,
lift the stamps from the smaller bowl,
onto a laundered tea towel, face up.

Any stamps showing sign of curling, can be
flattened in seconds by caressing the rear of the stamp
gently via the curved end or the tweezers (whilst on the towel),
they flatten out as if by magic.

When all stamps are on the tea towel, flop the second tea towel
on top, and pat dry. Remove the top tea towel.

Place an A4 sheet of scrap book paper, with a freezer bag
on top, begin to use the tweezers to lift each stamp and place
on the freezer bag.
When stamps cover the freezer bag, place another A4 sheet on top,
and place the "sandwich" into the disposable book
Leave about 15 pages between each "sandwich"

Put another random book on top, and leave for 4-5 days

I allow around 30 minutes to complete 60 stamps.
The finished product is a clean flat stamp which,
under the scanner the fibres on the perfs are generally
aligned and neat.
They will <never> (apart from badly soaked self stick stamps)
adhere to the freezer bag, and will just slide off when dry.

soak em (cold water), press em and then enjoy them. Nice page of stamps!

Any suggestions on removing from colored paper (especially red and green). I have ruined many a stamp trying to remove from colored paper.

And one more question - which do you do with self-stick stamps (1) soak them (2) trim the backing close to the stamp and mount without soaking.

ncbuckeye, I have the same question. I have many self adhesive stamps on paper. I sometimes swap with other collectors and it is not unusual to find these self adhesive stamps of paper. I have tried soaking some but the resull was not the best and I am afraid of atempting to soak moare with fear of damaging the whole lot.

Does anyone have any sugestions?