Transportation Issue Stamps From 1981-84

How does a guy identify the plate numbers from Scott #1897-1908?

ffejy, do you want the plate number suffix that is printed on the stamps? Or do you want to know the complete plate numbers as assigned by the BEP?

Peter

I'm not sure. I'm going through the Scott catalog and, for instance, below #1903, it will say "P# strip of 5, line, #5". I'm assuming that the "#5" refers to a plate number. Or it says "#6" or "#3-4" I'm wondering what the different numbers mean. Hope this clears up what I'm trying to find out. Is there a way to ID the plate numbers on the stamps themselves?

Yeah. Those are the plate numbers on the stamp itself. The number on the stamp is the plate number. It refers to which particular plate printed that stamp.

We only call those the platenumbers. In reality the numbers on the Transportation issues are the computer suffixes; the real platenumbers are much longer. For instance, the 1 cent Omnibus has six different "plate numbers" printed on the stamps: 1 thru 6. The real plate numbers are:
40534-1, 40535-2, 40536-3, 40537-4, 40538-5 and 40539-6.

Peter

Okay, I found a plate number. I was expecting to see one on every stamp. Thanks guys!

There were two different 1 cent Omnibus stamps. The original stamps, if you have a long strip, will show a plate number every 24 stamps. Since your 1 cent is a coil of 30, you must have Scott 2225. It is recognisable by the larger 1 and the lack of a c for cent.
These stamps were printed on thye B or the C/D press, and here the platenumbers are 52 or 48 stamps apart!
Scott lists three different stamps, depending on the type of tagging.
If you'd like more info on these coils, go to www.pnc3.us/pnc3.org for much more info.

Peter

It is the #1897 the first plate number on the roll is 9 stamps in leaving 21 stamps after and it does have the c by the 1. I also just found a roll of 200 of #1903 with plate numbers 3-4. Thanks once again.

Lots of good answers, but no picture?





KirkS
[images from PNC3 website]