Show Your US 1851-57 Imperforate Stamps

Jeez.

I guess it could be 71-72L1E and that would make these 10As. But the color is not even close to O.B. and the frame lines seem way too light. I don't know how to account for that. Can a 10 fade that much or do the plates wear that much?

But on the plating images you can see recuts of the top DBs that looks like a match and the spacing of the BLB to the BFL seems to match.

You're very warm

Classic Coins --

Agree that the online filtering utilities do not capture this position as a 2 line recut -- I will contact the owner of stampplating.com to see if I can get that fixed.

So that makes 7 possibilities to study for elimination or confirmation!

Regards //ioagoa

McDaniel may have omitted this position from the list of 2-line recuts because it doesn't show well on worn-plate printings from the late state.

The online utilities attribute the variety to the early state of the plate, but not the late state.

Apologies, I was unable to get back to it last night. Grand Babies have a way of taking up all of your time.

First. Banknoteguy, thank you for jumping in and taking up the fight.

Second, how do I get a better scan? SCF only allows 200KB for an image. I scanned at 1600 dpi, but have to resize to upload to SCF.

You guys are all pretty awesome!

In a higher resolution scan it looks like all of the UDB are recut. And on both stamps the right upper triangle recut lines connect with the upper right diamond blocks. Looks to me like 71L2E & 72L2E.

It looked to me like that was where we were being led [] also but I just don't think it can be those two.

Scan only part of the stamp i.e., put a box around just the part you want to blow up. You may still have to resize it to be within the 250K limits but you should do the minimum to meet the 250K limit. Hope that makes sense with your setup.

I will post why I don't think it is 71-72L2E in a bit.

Image below is the original pair sharpened a bit overlaid with 71-72L2E from the plating database scaled to match the pair under discussion. The right stamp looks like it could be a match to 72L2E if you ignore that it does not seem to have a double line recut in the ULT. But the left stamp just can not be 71L2E note the spacing of the left frame line wrt to the rosette. Just does not match.

Interesting, BNG. I see what you are saying and it's the same for both.

I've owned well over 100 #10/10A, and I never saw one near as oxidized as the Sacramento pair. I ruled out the orange brown plates for this reason.

The primary colorant for the 1851 orange browns was iron oxide based. Iron oxide is essentially rust, so the ink was not susceptible to significant further oxidation.

The primary colorant for the 1852 brownish carmines was lead based, with no iron in any form. The 1852 brownish carmines are susceptible to significant oxidation.

Reference: The U.S. 1851 3¢ Stamp: Color, Chemistry, and Changes, James A. Allen and Thomas Lera

I think all of you are to be commended for the amount of attention you are providing here in this thread. I have just cleaned up some of my oxidized stamps in the peroxide and am quite amazed at the improvement obtained. I struggle with the images but will try to post some before and after scans which will further show how significant that oxidation can be. Thanks

Is anyone still trying to plate the Sacramento pair (I know ioagoa plated it)? Or should I reveal it?

Hi Classic Coins --

YES - I did plate the pair -- and have no doubt as to its position.

One more hint -- on the Chase photo margin notes for the right stamp in Moyock's pair, I believe he put a "x" next to this position to indicate that the 2 lines recut in the ULT are often indistinguishable on the late state of the plate (i.e., as a result of the re-entry process). That said, on the Chase photo of this position -- and on Moyock's stamp -- the recut lines actually show quite well.

And even one more hint -- the left stamp in Moyock's pair is specifically called out in the Chase book for the "short break of about 1.5 mm near the bottom of the LIL -- but he also notes that very early impressions may show the line complete but very faint at this point".

Regards // ioagoa

I've been trying all day to plate the Sacramento pair, to no avail. Following ioagoa's hints and looking onto the Chase book, Chase says 71L2L which would mean the right side would be 72L2L.

Unfortunately, the right stamp (72L2L) picture on stamp plating the ULT recut lines are cut off and the Chase picture is difficult to distinguish.

So the Sacramento pair are relief A, Scott #11A, plated at 71L2L and 72L2L.

classic coins said,


I gave up. I looked over the whole 1E plate but I don't believe it is on there. I also checked similar positions on the 1i plate. I don't know enough to intelligently/profitably poke around on other plates.

This one appears to be outside the set of possibles generated by the plating wizard, thus I am pretty much stuck.

I will be interested in how you figured it out though.

When I initially downloaded the Chase plating print photos years ago, the first thing I did was open all 26 images in an image editor and reduce the image size to 10 percent of the original size in the vertical dimension only, and save them separately in that format.

Everyone plates differently. I focus heavily on the side frame lines. To simulate examining the side frame lines from a low angle to see the curves, I compress an image of the stamp to 10 percent vertically, and save it.

For the Sacramento pair, I narrowed it down to plate 2L or 3 based on the recut diamond blocks, and the heavy oxidation (which eliminated the OB plates for me).

I naturally started with L2L, and displayed the compressed Chase L2L image on the top half of my computer screen, and the compressed Sacramento pair on the bottom half.

Once I had the images up, I started scrolling down the left column of the L2L print, starting at top left, looking for the distinctive left inner frame line of the left stamp, which is heavy most of the way, but has a distinctive break in it. Since I started in a very fortunate place, it literally took me about 10 seconds to find a strong candidate for the left stamp of the pair at the eighth position I checked (71L2L). I stopped scanning immediately, and compared the remaining frame lines of both stamps.

At this point I was 99 percent certain of the match, and spent another four or five minutes checking the other diagnostics, including comparing with the images on Stamp Smarter and stampplating.com.

Here is the compressed image of the 71-72L2L pair, with the image size increased by 200 percent. There are some useful bends in the outer frame lines at the bottom left and top right of the right stamp as well.