Time To Play - "You're The Expert"!

I am looking at filling a blank US #393 spot in my album. I understand these coils can be created from imperforate #384's so am trying to be careful when considering any purchase. To educate myself, I looked up "not genuine" in the PF data base for 393's. Here's one that came up "not genuine". Question is, what do you see that would hint at this pair not being genuine? Do you think this was created from a #384?

Not an expert at all, but are the perforations supposed to align perfectly from stamp to stamp? These don't.

Not an expert either, but the slit seems to be waving a lot, as if scissor cut?


Peter

Hi Partime - I originally had thought that also. Many pairs in the PF database do not show this alignment. I guess that in the perforation process, the rows do not necessarily align with each other . Below is "genuine" one showing this.

Not a expert, but I could guess…
It's been cut, It has broken fibres on the top margin.

This would apply to U.S. flat plate printed coils.


This would apply to U.S. rotary press printed coils.

The distance between the two stamps looks wider on the genuine.

I agree with jogil ... the gap between the stamps appears wider on the genuine pair. While this isn't exactly scientific, I measured the distance from the left edge of the left stamp to the right edge of the right stamp as well as the gap between them. On the fake pair, these distances were 228mm & 14mm. On the genuine pair, the measurements were 221mm & 16mm respectively.
Note that though they appear wider, one cannot conclude that they actually are wider ... two different scans are involved.
Can one assume that the gap between successive stamps is uniform for 384 and/or 393? Are the design sizes of 384 & 393 identical? Do the measurements prove anything?

I'm thinking along the lines of what just_fella said. The cut line is really sharp with the "not genuine" while the "genuine" is slightly coarse. The sharpness would be likely from an exacto knife or razor. Edges from a genuine coil wouldn't (shouldn't?) be that sharp as they were cut with "knifes".

I'm not 100% sure but I believe the imperforate printings and coil sheets were from the same plates. Variations may be present due to differences in shrinkage but layout should be same.

Genuine is the manufactured straight edge,
The cut is fibrous.

The bottom margin looks to be from the edge of the sheet? (looks manufactured, bottom row?)

The closeups of the edges are a dead giveaway... you'll also notice there's a clockwise shift of the image frame versus the straight edges, which somewhat corresponds top and bottom, however this shift should also correspond to the vertical perfs, which are about even left and right.

Maybe my argument is wrong here. I thought I read (or heard on "Stamp Show Here Today" podcast) that "clean" cut = faked and fibrous (but straight) = authentic.

Disi_123 I see the slight rotation you mention and agree with you. Perf line and upper/lower straight edges should be square.

Too bad reviewers notes are available.

Re: the cut. Don't put the blinders on too closely. One must look at ALL the features of a coil when determining whether it is genuine or not.

Moral of the story, become knowledgeable or buy coils with recent certificates. Otherwise the water is much too deep to swim in.

John, your moral of the story is spot on. I'll probably just leave this blank spot blank. $65 catalog value doesn't justify sending in for cert, but at the same time I hate spending $ on something I'm uncertain about.