Album Review: United States Albums

The final hammer was $158 - a resonable price for a starter collection in a luxury album. I hope one of our members bought it!


http://www.ebay.com/itm/nystamps-w-...e&rmvSB=true

Brian

Apastuszak - yes, the stamps on the top and bottom of the more "curled" pages are themselves starting to show more and more curling.

Hi - a quick update to my earlier post about the US Palo Album I purchased in January.....

I still absolutely LOVE the album and would purchase additional albums if it were not for the high price. However, I finally gave in and purchased a second binder for the US Classic album collection. Although Palo says 100 pages will comfortably fit into their binders, I believe the realistic number is closer to 75 pages. I've split the US 1847-1940 into two albums - one with regular issues and the second with the back of the book issues. This will also allow me to add additional pages for custom content. Luckily I have a wide format printer so I'll be able to add my own custom printing to the blank pages I purchased.

On a related note, I did find two pages with faulty hinges in the original album I purchased. A quick email to Palo and new pages were received in less than 1 week. Great customer service!

Paul

Hi pk, I'm glad you are enjoying your Palo US albums. They are very handsome.
After my own exhaustive search comparing hingeless US albums, I recently ended up deciding against color stamp illustrations, and seeking top-loading mounts plus Scott numbering. Not too many choices out there with those specs.

I purchased 2 Mystic American Heirloom Collection Albums - Volume 1 through 1934 and the basic BOB album for Officials, Postage Due, Parcel Post, Ducks, and some others.
Both are very nice. BUT...the 3-ring mechanism used by Mystic does catch pages as you turn them which is annoying. You need to be careful or the pages will tear.

More recently I purchased 3 used Scott Platinum US hingeless albums on ebay from a dealer. I'm very happy with the Scott Platinum quality -- top-loading mounts, smooth 13-ring mechanism, Scott numbering & quality pages and binders. Too bad SCott stopped producing the Platinum series.

Now, I am looking to find a hingeless album for my US Revenues, Documentaries, Wine, Motor Vehicles BOB issues. It seems Scott publishes the most complete set of Specialized standard albums for these stamps. But I am sold on hingeless vs. hinged. If any one knows of a publisher that offers a hingeless album(s) for US revenues, please let me know!

dcaraz - have you noticed any curling of the pages and stamps in your Mystic albums that I noted above in my situation?

Dan - I moved all my Mystic pages (1940+) over to Lighthouse Vario-G binders. They are 3" binders with a "U" lock so they do take some getting used to. However, I haven't looked back. They can be found both on ebay and Amazon at discount prices. I also ordered Mystic Labels for the binders. I purchased the Mystic albums long before the hingeless were available so the collection is mounted with split-back mounts. As others have stated, the Mystic pages are curling. Here is a photo of my US Collection in the Palo and Mystic/Lighthouse albums.

Paul

Area66, I looked at the Steiner pages and he only has blocks for the modern stamps. He also said that you wouldn't be able to edit his PDF's. Is there any particular tips to editing the Steiner pages? Thanks.

See this thread:

https://goscf.com/t/37908&SearchTerms=Edit,Steiner

nywelton,

If you don't want to go to the trouble of learning programs like Libreoffice/Openoffice or Scribus or the cost of buying Adobe Professional, you can just convert the Steiner PDF to Microsoft PowerPoint using a free app, then make any modification you want and "save as" back to the original PDF format. Easy as that.

Hi Oracle,

Just saw your issues with Mystic pages -- I've been busy planning my retirement exit from Corporate America and haven't been on our Forum lately.

Now that you mention it, I am beginning to see some curling on my Mystic pages. These are new albums purchase a few months ago -- American Heirloom Collection US Hingeless. I have Volume 1 for my classics and the BOB album. I love the top-loading clear mounts. But the curling may be occurring because of the way the paper stock was run through the printing press. It's obvious that Mystic's market position for albums is "good value for the buck". That's why the 3-ring mechanism catches the pages when turned.

The number of pages the printer can position on each sheet of paper stack directly impacts the overall production cost for each lot of albums. When printing paper runs through the press you must choose in what direction the "grain" of the paper runs. Depending on the press and paper size ordered, there is less "waste" depending on page positioning. Less waste = less cost = cheaper binders at retail.

I am not sure if this curling issue can be overcome. However, I observed that the pages in my unused Mystic standard US Album (NOT hingeless) are not curling. That album is stored lying flat. The Mystic Hingeless albums that are showing page curl are standing upright in slipcases.

PK-short, do you mean to say that housing your Mystic pages in the Lighthouse Vario albums has eliminated concern for pages catching on the rings?

RE: Hingeless albums for US Revenues ---

Looks like Palo has the most complete selection of US Revenue albums -- 7 in all; 338 pages; all with the top-loading Howid-type mounts I love. And available in black & white for those of us who find color distracting. Palo is beautiful, but the set costs > US$1200 OUCH! I have looked on ebay for used US Palo albums and see nothing week after week. I see tons of Lighthouse, Safe, Davo and Mystic albums for sale, but folks must hold onto Palos!

I'm leaning toward Scott Revenues Volume 1 & 2 + buying the Howid mounts and getting proficient at mount cutting :-)

I check weekly for certain items (including Palo, Platinum, and other hingeless albums) and can't recall having seen a Palo US album for sale in the past 4 years. You are absolutely correct - people hang on to Palo albums!

Brian

Dcaraz - thanks for your feedback. Since I am getting concerned about my more valuable stamps, I am going to check out other hingeless albums such as Palo since I do like the top opening mounts. I've had the Mystic albums too long to think about getting a refund and I don't think it'll do much good to request Mystic to send out new pages. From the various comments, it sounds like it's a problem associated with their production process and new pages won't be any better than the of pages.

Hi Oracle, I'm afraid we may be in the same boat. Education is expensive. I compare my month's old Mystic pages which are showing signs of curling with the Scott Platinum albums I bought used that were produced in 1989 and the Platinum's have no visible curling.

But like Rileysan (Brian) indicates, collectors who bought Palo or Scott Platinum albums don't sell them. At least not until they may come up in an estate sale :-)

My US Platinum albums start at 1935 so if the Mystic pages continue to curl, I may eventually spring for my first Palo hingeless. Or I'll have to fight off Rileysan's bidding on ebay -- LOL!

As much as I was tempted, I couldn't rationalize spending over $1200 for the Palo Hingeless US Revenues albums. Instead, I ended up spending less than 50% of that for sets of the standard US revenue pages, and cut-to-order pre-sized Showguard mounts from StampParaphernalia.com .
Purchased 4 sets of Revenue pages from Richard Friedberg Stamps (Scott National Parts I & II, Telegraph pages and Aldrich Match & Medicine Parts I & II.

I prefer Hawid top-loading clear mounts, but could not find them in the many sizes needed fro Revenues, so next best solution was Showguard split-back mounts cut to all the sizes for the revenue pages.