Game Changing Find With A Precancel On It ???

AS a long time collector and buyer of accumulations and collections, this past summer I was lucky enough to be high bidder on a partial collection from Indiana. When I got the lot in the mail and began really looking at what I had bought, I found 3 Shelbyville 734's, a few pages later I saw what I thought was a fairly common South Whitley L-1 on a Scott 300 stamp, with a straight edge. The straight edge is what made me look a second time, that was when I noticed it was a coil perf 12 vertically. So I grabbed up my pages of an old Scott I tore out and use to ID stamps, etc and saw this potentially is a 318, and has no known USED Copies. I did my due diligence in checking if it was one that had perfs cut off, and it doesn't look like it to me. Anyway this will be on its way to APS for expertizing soon. Just thought I'd share.

Interesting. Keep us posted!

There are two very similar South Whitley precancels currently listed on ebay both with APS certs stating they are trimmed #300 sheet stamps. What features of your stamp differentiate it to make it a genuine 318 to you?

This was a large format plate, probably designed to cancel a sheet of stamps at a time.
The chances that it was used on the coil issue is slim to none, especially so well aligned...
If you haven't sent it off yet, I'd think twice (and thrice, and whatever comes after that) about it.
Chances are you'll end up with another APS cert saying it's a trimmed 300.
Hope that's helpful.

Thanks Matt, I sent this to Arnold to submit for expertise, See I have a calibrated straight edge I used to use in aviation work and put the edges of this stamp up against it. Result was no "scissor cut variations" that I could see. But then I also no longer have access to a 100x microscope like I did when I was adequately employed, which I might have also used for closer examination. Hopefully we will see something back in May.?? further updates of course.

Must be an epidemic of them.

Well results are back and experts agree, on top, CUT perfs. But dang, whoever cut em did a mighty fine job. Am going to mount it on its own page in my Indiana section of my T&T. TY all for being patient for this update. New threads in a bit will need some help.

Thanks for the update. Too bad it came back with negative opinion, but appreciate your being candid and updating us!

Fully agree. Thanks for the update.

I'm with khj and Partime, — getting resolution back on such an instance is great.
Thank you for the update precanceler.

This is one of the things I am also constantly on the look-out for. I never give a 300 a simple glance, always a careful one. Better luck next time.

Inasmuch as the 318 coils were sold in full rolls, it seems almost impossible for any to have been precanceled. And I strongly suspect that if any had been precanceled they would be known to exist by now.