What is the Difference between Line and Comb Perforations?

Further to cjd's post.
Quick ID
Look at Collin's German stamps, the top Right Hand Corner,
The stamp perforations have a distinct "notch" as I call it.

If your stamp has 4 corners like that, it is a comb or block perfed stamp,
if the corners are irregular, they are line perfed.

"Comb" comes from the design of the perforator die, looks like a hair comb.
It punctures perforations on all 4 sides of the stamp at once, before advancing 2 lines of stamps
and puncturing the next block of 2 lines of stamps in the sheet.

With some Mozambique Company stamps (If I recall)  the comb advanced on 1 perforating machine just a squidge longer
giving the "notch" an elongated look.
This is the only way to distinguish 2 identical stamps as having been printed by Waterlow or De La Rue

Thanks guys,Easy to understand and visuals helped a lot.Now to file that information into my sieve brain.My new arrivals are piling up again,while I'm occupied with mounting Newfoundland on quadrilles.

Hmmm. I had an image in my archives 

Here is Mr. Grover, single comb, with larger Horiz or vertical Format stamps.

Hi cara, that is a good question. I am not sure if there are any rules set in stone in the collecting world. I know that personally I would rather not have any stamps with the wavy lines or damaged corners. For me I would use these stamps as space fillers until I find a better copy. For US stamps, it does seem more difficult to find a nice cancel as opposed to the wavy lines. Just my opinion.

Hi pattib, hi madbaker,

Thank you very much for your assessment. Of course, there is no general rule, but as you have described, a basic attitude to it. And this can obviously vary from country to country (and is perhaps production-related?).

Michel Germany Special says the following about the stamps "Marienkirche Lübeck":

"Michel # 139 and 140 are mostly poorly perforated. The prices are valid with only small perforation flaws. Flawless stamps require at least 20% surcharge."

This suggests that poor perforation is acceptable only in exceptional cases, but generally makes the German stamp worthless. This is also my knowledge for German stamps from German forums. But if most stamps in the USA have such a perforation, it is probably generally accepted.

Perhaps there are other opinions on this?

Many thanks
cara

Thanks for your posts on this subject, Cara.

I can offer an additional comment not really covered in the previous responses by Mark (madbaker ) and Patti (pattib ).  Have a look at this thread:

thestampforum.boards.net/thread/3159/line-perf-comb

This thread explains the difference between comb and line perforations.  So, your original observation is indeed about the production methods.  These are two different methods of perforating used by various countries.  Perhaps you will notice from one of the images in that thread that Germany has used the comb perforation method, which makes it possible to have perfect corners on each stamp if they are separated with some care.

With line perforating, which is common on the US stamps shown in your earlier post, the vertical and horizontal perforations do not meet uniformly at the corners, which results in many short corners on the stamps.  These are actually not damaged, but I would agree that some collectors (like me) would certainly find them less desirable.

I hope this may help everyone's understanding a bit.

P.S. I think that later tomorrow I will move the Comb & Line Perforations thread to a better location than the Newfoundland board, and I will probably move your posts into it, too, if you don't mind.  That way, if you and others want to continue on the topic of perforations, which is quite a good subject, there will be a dedicated thread for it.

Thanks for your response, Mark (madbaker ).  As it happens, I completely agree with you!  And thanks again to cara , pattib , and Roberto (ameis33 ) for continuing this interesting and worthwhile discussion.

For better or worse, I am a bit of a perfectionist in all things, so I can tell you that I really like stamps that are made with comb perfs, because it is much easier to find a perfectly perforated example with all corners intact than it is with line-perfed stamps.  But I accept that line-perfed stamps will more commonly have short corners that are not actually damaged, but merely a common tendency due to the production method.

To me, that is the essential point and the distinction worth understanding:  Comb-perfed stamps with short corners are actually damaged, as part of the stamp is torn off, whereas line-perfed stamps with short corners may not be damaged at all, but just have a short corner as a consequence of the random occurrence of how the perf paths crossed at the corners, so should not be treated as damaged at all.

Just my two cents, for what it's worth....  other opinions welcome, of course!

Stay stampy, all!

First of all a "big big thank you" to Beryllium Guy for his explanations and moving the post to the correct board!

And thank you to all collectors for their contributions.


I'am a little bit surprised that my simple question started such a discussion. My intention was only to ask the USA-collectors, whether it is ok to pay money on ebay for stamps with short corners, because for stamps of West-Germany short corners are a "no go" and nobody would pay a penny for such stamps. But obviously it is a topic of interest.


salentin I did not misunderstand Michel. I only wanted to bring an example how important good perforation for German collectors is and not only short corners.


But as I suspected, it's the technology (comb and line perforations) which is a plausible explanation for me.

So I can state for me that short corners are ok for US stamps because of the manufacturing process. And as ameis33 has written, wavy cancels are also normal on US-stamps.

Thanks to all for the contributions, which helped me a lot.

cara

Small anecdote: When I registered years ago in a German stamp forum, there was just a discussion about the degree of preservation of mint stamps. And the opinion was that a fingerprint on the backside of the stamp means that the stamp is worthless. There I was also a little surprised.

I think this is an example of the same sort of idealism you often see in stamp collecting.  In the above case, it's equivalent to "any modern mint stamp that's hinged is worthless" (a fingerprint damages the gum, so although it's technically never been hinged, it would no longer be considered to be MNH, which should be a term reserved for stamp gum free from any damage, not only hinging damage).  There are other examples of this, such as "any modern used stamp with a wavy cancel is worthless", "any modern first day cover which has been addressed is worthless", "any East Block CTO stamp is worthless", "any Sand Dune stamp is worthless", etc., etc.

The Unitrade catalogue makes mention of the mechanics behind line & comb perforations but as far as I know, there isn't any mention anywhere of value differences between a "good" line perf stamp and one with an ugly corner.  There are occasional mentions in the catalogue of similar value differences - one in particular is (or used to be!) with the OHMS-perforated official stamps.  The perfin punch was built for the small-sized definitives which made up most of the perfin usage, and when the larger size of the high-value definitives was needed, well so what & who cares, we're just going to use the same tool built for the smaller stamps.  This means the OHMS doesn't fit correctly on a large stamp, and the perfin then often runs into the edge of a stamp.  If the perfin intersects with the stamp teeth (as on the right side of this example below, nabbed from a current eBay listing), the stamp has considerably less value.  An OHMS perfin which doesn't intersect with the stamp teeth will cause a VF stamp to be valued 50% higher, back in the days of earlier catalogues, anyway.  My most recent catalogue now simply says the perfin pins can't hit the stamp teeth - they no longer give a value difference.  Drat & blast!  I'd rather see a defined value difference instead of leaving it vague, because it's the vagueness that ends up with people deciding that stuff is "worthless".  Grrrr ...



Ryan