Greetings And Question

Hello everyone!

I've decided to take the plunge and get back into stamp collecting. In elementary school in the 70s I had the basic US and world albums I'm sure many of you my age (55) began with. In college I got the bug again and bought the three volume Citation album, but soon career, marriage and kids became a priority. Now that my kids are adults I'm going to give it another (hopefully permanent) go.

I just purchased part1 A1 of the Scott International Album. My question is whether owners of these albums are using mounts or hinges? The closeness of the images seem to make it more conducive to hinges. Do most people use hinges and maybe mounts for higher value stamps? Any advice would be much appreciated!

Welcome!

Peter

Welcome!

I don't use albums, but have seen mention of some who use hinges only, some using hinges primarily with mounts for higher valued items, and some who use only mounts in their Internationals. Probably not much help, but it shows that this is a decision each collector makes for themselves.

Dale

You might want to be more specific about what you want to collect: mint, used, mix.

Thanks for replies. I'm much more interested in used, but wouldn't be adverse to mint if some were in any collection I might purchase or if the mint version for any reason was easier to locate.

Welcome.

Daughter (fellow collector) and I agreed to a "catalogue value" threshold over which we will use mount instead of hinge. Works for us.

Social12,

Collecting for the enjoyment of collecting, whatever that might be, is the name of the game. Don't hesitate to ask questions especially if you need basic information and especially more advanced sources of information for any possible topic. You should be able to find folks on this board a little further along on their collecting journey glad to share experiences. Russ

Hinging is fine, if that is your preference.
Warning:
Correct Hinging is a real skill, and takes some practice.
Modern German hinges need VERY LITTLE moisture.

Just a dab of moisture on the small flap, before placing well below the top perforations.

TEST
Use damage or common stamps, adhere a hinge, and wait a few hours
or overnight.
IF you can peel the stamp from the page, or the hinge from the stamp
WITHOUT it grabbing, you have cracked it.
The gum only needs to be "tacky" not wet.

Wet stamp hinging damages stamps.

In my mind, any stamp worth collecting is worth mounting. I loathe hinges.

That said, I'm an MNH guy, for everything. I'll leave the space empty before I fill it with a hinged or canceled specimen; if MNH is known for a type, I'll generally wait and hunt for it.

I agree with the OP observation that many Scott albums seemed to be designed for hinged tamps given how they butt stamps together. If you use black mounts, this can be the result.



Given hinging can reduce the value by damaging mint stamps by disturbing the back side (if value is a consideration for you), then you have to decide the clip level to hinge vs mount. If you go the mixed hinge/mount route, I suggest using clear mounts as they will blend better together.

I stopped using hinges and just use clear mounts on all (unused and used). It is easy to upgrade stamps without risk of damaging page.

Thanks for the advice and input everyone!

If the album pages have the spaces very close together as in Angore's image above, you might consider laying out a single, long mount strip which can be cut a tad longer than the page images.





Classic, I am curious as to which countries and date ranges you collect? I mainly like MNH definitives plus some BOB so with few exceptions my collections begin no earlier than 1910.

Welcome Socal12

Hi shermae, my active countries/periods are Czechoslovakia (and CR) 1918-present, Austria (and foreign offices) 1850-1938, Germany (w/ occupations, colonies, etc) 1851-1945, and USA 1847-1935. Thinking hard about starting Commonwealth KGVI later this year, and maybe France and colonies 1849-1950ish some day.

My Czech collection is 98% done MNH, as are Austria and Germany back to 1900 (though not overseas), while US has a lot of strange, random gaps. I don't flyspeck or acquire blocks/sheets (well, usually I don't), I just collect the "prime" example of each issue and major variants. I start with what's easily/readily affordable and available, which generally means working backwards. I skip the hard ones and then circle back... it's important to always be making progress when collecting. Not interested in filling a spot just for the sake of filling it, I think that gives one an excuse to just not try to upgrade later. I'd rather have the one empty spot on a page and think about my white whale, than look at a completed page but ruefully glance at the used or hinged filler.

Eventually, I will reach a number of issues where MNH simply isn't possible not matter the time or price, and I'm still thinking about how to handle that.