Canada Small Queen #37 3c Montreal And Ottawa Printings I.d.

Nitro, your images are not 1200 dpi, mine large ones above are 600dpi.

I did the AutoCad on your first stamp and it appears to be 12.2 x 12.4 which of course would be rounded to 12 x 12 1/2 or maybe 12 1/4 x 12 1/2.

If you can get them scanned at 600dpi and email them to me I can be more accurate. Send to bc (at) brcstamps (dot) com

BeeSee...When you use a CAD program and get a centimetre reading, do you multiply it by some thing to get your 12 or 12.25, etc. perforations...???

Wert, here is an example:



Instead of AutoCad, if you have a good eye, and you can measure with a metric scale.

We will use the top as an example.

I took a measurement along the top of 16.66 over 10 holes. Remember the first hole and last hole each count as half. There are 9 holes in between plus the two halves which make 10.

Standard perforation is measured in number of holes per 20mm (or 2.0cm).

We now want to pro-rate the 10 holes over 16.66mm to the number of holes per 20mm so we use this formula:

10 holes/16.66mm x 20mm = 12 holes. That is how we get perf 12 on the top.

For the side, it is 12 holes/20mm x 20mm which also equals 12, so the stamp is perf 12 all around.

I hope this helps.

BeeSee...Thank you very much for the info...I will try using it.

P.S. - For those who do not have AutoCad or can't afford it, may I suggest an open source (FREE) program for you WINDOWS users called GIMP...It has the same measuring capabilities as AutoCad....The link is below if anyone is interested.

http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html

Special Thank you to Bee See for taking time to auto cad/ perf a couple of the previous stamps for me. Result on the 1st of six is as follows. 12.5x 12.35 from the cad calculation. Below are pics with transparent gauge on all 4 sides. Now being that none other than 37D list a 12.5 perf and assuming the 12.35 rounded up I believe the conclusion must be that she is indeed a 37D. Now there is definatly oxidation but I dare not try and clean this one to reveal what should be true copper color/Indian red color.

Beautiful Auto CAD job there. Lovely pics.

I do not understand why you cannot use hydrogen peroxide (what is it 3% solution,? in the brown bottle from the drug store) to remove the sulphating (perhaps the wrong word really but it will do).

It would remove part of the stamp's ink, the part that has 'ozidized' and is now flaking away in the atmosphere. The stamp is damaged now anyway from that natural chemical reaction.

What's the harm from removing the 'rust', so to speak, and seeing what's left? Pretty soon (another hundred years) and you'll just have the blank paper left, perfed correctly, but blank.

I say go ahead and do it. No sunlight, ruins the HO, but just do it gently and see what happens.

I should be saying this to myself with my stamps. I do apologize for seeming to encourage you to 'harm' your stamps, but I do not think it would help to keep it in such a condition.

Does it lead to more sulpherization or no?

Yeh, the vertical side is definitely perf 12 1/2 on the long side. There is no dot, but of course the stamp could be from the first column.

Here is a screen capture from my AutoCAD:



Oops I posted before finishing

The number above the red dimension line is the distance over the number of complete perforations in the square brackets [ ]. The horizontal number is the actual mathematical perforation per 20mm (2cm) rounded to 2 decimal places.

The first stamp is 12.35 x 12.5, the second is 11.98 x 12.24

This matches close to Nitrolures electronic gauge.

In the other post where (I forget who) did the peroxide bath it really turned out well and honestly I see no issues personally --BUT does it fall into tampering or as in the coin world, cleaning the natural patina off of silver is a big NoNo . Really wish the stamp with the 12.5 had the color of the second which is more even and looks less oxidized. The big question would be ,is there any other circumstanes where perf 12.5 exist on any side and if so what is the other side. Either way I see no mention of 12.5 in conjunction with any other measurements so this is narrowed down substantially. Peroxide on the others will be forth coming with before and afters.

nitrolures...You make a really good point...I dabble in coins also, and I would never, never clean a coin...SO why isn't the stamp community following in the same frame of mine...To me (and I am no expert) if you peroxide a stamp or anything else and it changes the colour...Well, you know.

Its a damn damn situation- The peroxide wouldn't do anything but clean what is truly there same as cleaning a coin would only bring it back to shine. I guess its a personal preference either way but if reselling I think ethically I'd have to mention it or would I?

The early Small Queens DO BECOME OXIDIZED!

Here is a link to a Maresch Auction and check all the listings that have oxidided stamps BEFORE the Montreal printings.

http://www.mareschstamps.com/476/auction.php?Pag=7

In the same auction above, here is a picture of lot 946, described as 37d, the copper-red variety:



It has a Greene certihttps://www.stampcommunity.org/post...D=40#ficate.

I bought this lovely little cover on ebay for less than $10 and it arrived yesterday. The Mitchell, Ontario postmark is date March 8, 1873 which would lean towards a first Ottawa printing. I perfed it in AutCAD and it measures 11.89 x 11.89. According to Hillson, that guarantees a first Ottawa printing.





Now for the colour: copper-red or rose? I do not see any oxidation here.

Assuming the Maresch stamp is copper-red, I am leaning to rose.

Here is a rose in the Maresch auction:

Without looking at the maresch rose copy I would have leaned to Indian red copperish. I think of copper with a golden redish hue but if you look at plain ole copper pipe I guess there really isn't much red tint at all. I imposed the 37d from above in the middle of my 6 and it is lighter by far than all but it doesn't look oxidized at all. Does it seem like most oxidized copies especially on cover seem to come from the more havily populated areas possibly due to industry pollution from which there was no regulations. Or is it just plain ole oxygen and the oxidized ones would have been more open to air.