Austria Fine Or Coarse Print - Help Please

jimjamtwo look at the two EXTENDING lines one left side of eyebrow and the other below the eye. Unless I am mistaked that is a pretty telling set of lines. - Jeff

Capital idea.

After examining some of my Empire stamps, it seems that the coarse and fine differences are not so simple! The Michel illustrations from Butterfly confuse it more, as the eye extensions don't seem to match, nor the lines on the bottom of the neck.

Here is what I have, first what seems "coarse", second "fine":

boy doesnt that just confuse the issue.

Reminds me of the US postage due color varieties. I got a couple dozen of them and was able to arrange a near continuum of color shades, so just gave up trying separate into the Scott categories.

I was thinking my difficulties in typing were related to light prints of the coarse and heavy prints of the fine; but now I'm beginning to wonder if multiple plate varieties are out there.

On the arms issue Michel does illustrate the 9K types as shown below.
I also had some difficulty with that.

On the other hand, could your stamps have been in close proximity to one another for a long period of time?
They might have produced hybrids.

Out of five examples that I own, three don't have coloured areas in the ears, just lines.

I think plate wear can put these on some sort of continuum.

Andy's article explains all where the catalogues are WRONG!

Coarse vs fine whiskers

By Andy Taylor

The ‚coarse vs fine' whiskers are a consequence of the printing arrangements, and are not a design feature. The stamps were printed from ‚plates comprising 100 individual cliches held within a frame. The plate was placed face-up on the bed of the press; above it were two rollers, a smaller one for the ink and a larger one for the paper. As the plate was traversed forwards and backwards, both rollers rotated. The plate was inked by the smaller roller, the skill of the printer ensuring that neither too much nor too little ink was applied. Meanwhile the paper was gripped to the larger roller (in English called the Impression Cylinder), which as it rotated pressed it on to the just-inked plate, causing the image to be printed. This roller was steel covered by a ‚make-ready' to allow the raised parts of the plate to press into the paper without creating indentations in the roller. Apart from the recognised subtypes of the 5kr, the differences are reputedly due to the use of felt or soft card as a make-ready under the stamp paper for the ‚coarse' prints, and a strong paper make-ready under the ‚fine' or ‚hard' prints, with variations caused by changes in the stamp paper itself, the make-ready becoming hard with repeated use or absorption of ink, etc etc. It is not true that all stamps printed before 1874 are coarse-whiskered and all on or after that date fine-whiskered.

Gary Ryan has pointed out that illustrations of the ‚coarse' and ‚fine' prints (such as that given in Michel or Gibbons) are an oversimplification and considerable experience is sometimes required to differentiate between the two. Study of the paper or the perforations can assist. However, a more reliable guide for the 5kr value is available, by examination of detailed design variations: see below. The first type II appeared in 1872, hence no type II stamps were sold in Hungary.

http://www.austrianphilately.com/gurahon/index.htm

At a quick glance, an interesting read. This requires some digesting. Thanks for sharing it.

These stams are not in my area of interest (I inherited them).
The first 10 kr and 50 sld I think are coarse printing.
The shadows in the lines in the hair of the head I think differ a lot.
I hope it will help you.

"Gary Ryan has pointed out that illustrations of the ‚coarse' and ‚fine' prints (such as that given in Michel or Gibbons) are an oversimplification." I couldn't agree more.

I collect Austria but only to the extent that I have an album filled with Austrian stamps, not that I'm an expert on Austrian stamps. Nevertheless, for what it's worth, this "coarse vs. fine" print difference can be very misleading. Defined this way, you'd think there were two distinct varieties. But there aren't.

There would be two varieties if the stamps were printed at two distinctly different times (they weren't) from different plates (they weren't) with different inks (I don't think they were) or on different paper (they weren't). As the links in this thread explain, what actually happened is that over time, different rollers were used, some softer and some harder, and different underlayments were used beneath the stamps (some softer and some harder) and perhaps the amount of ink changed (completely unknowable) and the printing plates themselves may have gradually worn, and so on. So -- over time -- stamps printed from different rollers, etc. produced different degrees of "fineness" or "coarseness".

To simplify them, you could divide these stamps into two varieties, "fine" and "coarse," but really some are very fine, some moderately fine, some a little coarse, others more coarse, and so on. From "fine" vs. "coarse" there's a gradation from really fine to really coarse with many stamps in between, and it's as many as you decide there are depending on this whisker or this lock of hair, and so on. Feel free.

Today this wouldn't be allowed, but back then a stamp was a stamp and how sharply or not these stamps were printed may not have seemed like a big deal. A little surprising for Austria since they generally pay a lot of attention to the details. But maybe not on this issue.

So you don't have two varieties, coarse and fine, nor four varieties as it says somewhere. What you have is a gradation of stamps or a continuum that gets coarser over time, with the use of different rollers and maybe with other factors, too. Call them "fine" and "coarse" if you want, and that's a decent enough distinction to make, but remember that a lot of these stamps are neither. They may be exceptionally clear so "very fine" or fine on the way to becoming coarse or really coarse in a very obvious way -- or they're somewhere in between these.

If I were laying out an album page, I'd provide spaces for stamps that are crystal clear and well printed ("fine") -- and identical spaces for stamps that are much more coarse. And I'd leave it at that. And that's pretty much what Scott and many albums do. Collectors naturally ask is this stamp more "fine" or more "coarse"? The answer is you need to compare two identical stamps and decide. If your "coarse" stamp isn't coarse enough, maybe look for an even coarser stamp. If your "fine" stamp is just a little too coarse, look for one that's more fine.

But trying to put these stamps into two distinct piles of "fine" and "coarse" is just not going to work. There are no clear dividing lines between groups. So, depending on how many of these stamps you have, your "fine-to-coarse scale" may include just two or three or stamps. Or you may need six, seven, or eight stamps in your scale from really fine to really coarse. Both are correct. It just depends on how far you want to go.

As for my Austria album, I just mount the crispest and finest stamps in one place and the coarsest below them -- as s if they were two distinct printings. Which of course they weren't. I'm a busy man.

I am about to go through a recently purchased lot of early Austria - and this is very useful information to keep in mind. Thanks much.

Great thread!

Coarse and fine prints have confused and frustrated me for a long time!
I may start to tackle my Austria stamps again

Dan