Scott #139 Possibly?

Sure that would be great! These threads are pretty old your diggin up! lol

Classics collectors and archaeologists love diggin' through old stuff.

Here's a pic of the 6c Continental (159b obv) and the 2c Continental vermilion (178c rev) showing the two faces of a J-grill.



The scanner light angle does not show the depth of the impressions, but in both cases the grill has been strongly impressed, and has not been flattened. The 2c grill is so strongly impressed some of the points went all the way through the paper. This is not uncommon. A strong impression is one of the characteristic features of the J-grill, and the apparent lack of flattening is one of the reasons specialists tend to regard the J-grill as primarily experimental. The other reason is that overwhelmingly the stamps with this grill have not been used.

Only the 1c-30c stamps, including the 2c vermilion and 5c Taylor, are known with a J-grill, and of these, only the 2c (brown and vermilion), and the 3c (end roller variety only) are Scott listed in used condition. Years ago the 12c and 15c were listed only in used condition, but in recent years that has switched entirely to unused. The matter is still under study.


Here is a block of six points-down J-grill impressions on cardboard.



The grill area measures about 10x12 points, which were spaced 1/32 inch apart vertically. They did not use metric in that work back then, but Luff measures the grill separation on the sheet at 14mm horizontally and 18mm vertically (see the block).

This grill type was impressed points down, and this next picture gives a closer look at the grill points themselves, viewed from the stamp reverse. (I have enhanced the tone to better show the grills.) Like the later stage of the I-grills, the J-grill points were truncated pyramids, so they do not come to a point or form cross patterns in the paper. It is most probable that the J-grills were produced from an altered I-grill roller.





Okay, with that bit of an introduction, now it's time to have some fun. In the pic of the grill close-ups, two of these grills you have seen, but one is the reverse side of what I showed you earlier, and a third has been added. Can you tell which is which? Got it? Now, what do you make of the third grill? [Color is not a factor here, since it is manipulated]

Everyone can try at this, and in a couple of days I will show you what you've got.

the first one is the added one, the 2nd is the lower right of the block of 6 and of course the 3rd one is your first one (with the holes in the grille)

nice write up of them. I enjoyed reading it

Thanks for the hat tip. One of those is right. Stay with it.

And are their any other takers?

I would you say you have posted the 6c J grill, an I grill, and the 2c J grill in that order.

That is something to consider, but look at the point count. Also remember that the J-grill was used only by the Continental BNCo but the I-grill was under the purview of the National BNCo.

If everyone that intends to respond has done so by this afternoon, I will post the pics that will show you what I think.

OK, I was foolish enough to take your bait and make a guess when you are withholding some of the facts. No sense in stopping now.... Is the middle stamp a used J grill?

Not foolish at all. A very game player, I would say, and good at it! This was an exercise in learning to look at grills and really see them enough to recognize them. So enough of the cat and mouse, let me lay it out now.

In the pic of the three grills, the items you have seen before are the two at the ends, just as Sinclair2010 has said, and in that order.
The item on the extreme left is the reverse side of the grill on the 6c,




the item on the right is the same side of the grill you saw on the 2c but rotated 180 degrees from the way you first saw it.



The item in the middle is one you did not see before. In fact almost no one has ever seen this one,



for it appears on a sad looking used 7c Continental stamp I have been pondering for a long time (nearly 20 years). You are the first to begin to see it through but beyond my eyes. In view of what you know was said about the J-grill in general, especially about used stamps, and what Scott shows you, how does all that effect the way you look at it? Try to stay focused on the grill itself, and tell me what you think would happen if it went before the PF (which is a very conservative body on such things). Should it be submitted?

The fact that the grill is not parallel and perpendicular to the stamp is suspicious, OTOH, it should be pretty easy for a faker to do better than that! Not that that will ever be a reason for issuing a good cert. The scan isn't good enough to tell but is it clear to you that the grill came before the cancel? It isn't to me. Can you post a better scan?

I am not sure if I am on track here but I see that the middle grill on the 7c Continental appears to have 10x11 points and the other two are clearly 10x12 points. The 7c Continental grill might possibly have vertical 12 points but if so the top row is a very poor impression. I would say the there is a twelfth top row of points but it looks so out of place compared to the other 11 horizontal rows. I think that alone would cause PF to declare it to be a fake grill.

I would not necessarily agree with PF if they were to declare it fake. By the way, what are the mm measurements of the grill on the 7c Continental? The final word on grills is not in and probably never will be unless currently unknown documentation by Continental (or National Bank Note or US Post Office) were to come to light. To complicate things more, the Post Office supposedly discontinued grills in 1871 which is prior to when Continental began printing stamps in 1873 if I'm not mistaken. Plus, the grills on Peru's stamps at that same time period are not identical to any of the grills on US stamps. I would propose that there may be odd ball grills in existence that are genuine.

Will this help? The light angle makes what you want to see difficult to show in a scan, because the points on the obverse side go straight down and you can't see well how the walls of the depressions are covered (or not).