Machins organized chaos??

Although the following scans are composed of flaws, I have posted here, (rather than in my flaws thread), mainly because the single (normal) stamps relevant to these flaws will have been entered into my specialist albums. I've just completed i.d. ing the 3p ultramarine Machins (with a few exceptions that need another check) Most of the flaws here are listed by Gibbons & have various cat values. It may be possible, then, to cross check the flaws on individual stamps against the Deegam numbers.

Hi angore, I'm using the GB SG Concise (new edition needed), along with the Q.E. Specialised Decimal Definitives II catalogue, which lists most of the flaws. I never bothered much with flaws until I started collecting the Machins in line with Deegam & found just how many flaws there are when using magnification regularly to check dops, perforations etc. I keep the flaws separate to my Deegams unless I have only 1 copy of a stamp.

Hello Dr Blade,
I've new here and have been following your thread with utmost interest, as I'm also in to collecting Machins. I see from your current post that you are using a Stanley Gibbons Thirkell Position Finder which I think fits their specialised catalogues extremely well. I have never been able to source one - even on the SG website shop they don't seem to have one. Any idea where I might be able to find/get one?

I heard the value is what they would sell it if they had it.

Not much time lately to work on my Machins but I did purchase the following recently from Royal Mail.

Cracking on with adding the new barcode stamps to album No 10 of my specialized collection. The scanned page is the 50p slate/grey issue. Only space on the page for 4 profiles & 4 stamps. I don't have mounts of the correct size to fit the stamps yet, so I am cutting out "glassine cards" to accommodate them, attaching the cards using a glue stick. My opinion so far, stamps too big to look good in a collection, more pages needed, bigger mounts needed & eventually more album space needed. All adding to the cost of collecting so I'm not impressed. The 50p is also probably on inverted backing paper, (not checked yet). R.M. have introduced yet another type of backing paper (type 5) just to add to the chaos.

Hi, the simplicity of the Machin stamps was the main reason I started to collect them a long time ago & I think also the many colour variations. The Concise catalogue is pretty good with listing & numbering Machins. I use the deegam disc & reports to check individual stamps + the Concise & Q.E. II specialized catalogues & I still miss details. In fact, yesterday I came across a 2nd class ordinary nvi from 2021 business sheets that I'd missed, too late now it's retailing @ £25 set to be one of the rarer Machins. By the way my collection has plenty of spaces to fill yet, not sure my wallet will take the strain.

Nothing much happening with my Machin collection this weekend, the weathers too hot even for bothering about it. I did find 2 stamps from Scotland, 15p light blue & the 18p light green which were out of the normal. Both stamps had FULL LENGTH offset center bands, (as opposed to being short). There does not seem to be Deegam profiles for either of them. So more chaos to sort out.

The nice thing about the Adminware album pages is that they have 4 different levels of complexity. The Basic version is free, then there is the Novice, Intermediate, and Specialized.

For those who do not know, Adminware is owned by Robin Harris, who is also the editor of the Unitrade Specialized Catalogue of Canadian Stamps.

adminware.ca/machin/Index.php?Album

Hi brightonpete, the following is a list of the 2022 bar-coded stamps issued so far. It does not include the ones on the pilot scheme issued last year. 1p sapphire blue, 2p dark green, 5p purple heather, 10p aqua green, 20p light green, all from counter sheets, 50p slate grey counter sheets decimal pane 610 & coils, £1 wood brown counter sheets decimal pane 610 & coils, £1.85p wood brown counter sheets & coils, £2 bright blue counter sheets, £2.55p sapphire blue counter sheets & coils, £3 purple counter sheets, £3.25p purple counter sheets & coils, £4.20 light green counter sheets & coils, £5 spruce green counter sheets, 1st purple counter sheets books of 4 & 8 business sheets, 2nd holly green counter sheets books of 8 & business sheets, 1st large counter sheets books of 4 & business sheets, 2nd large counter sheets books of 4 & business sheets. (all have M22L year codes) (booklets of 4 have MFIL codes) (booklets of 8 have MEIL codes) (business sheets MBIL as usual), Coil stamps are used only as far as I know. The 1p 2p 5p 10p 20p 50p £1 £2 £3 £5 have white backgrounds as these are the current "make up values"
Have a nice day.

I am with you on that one Pete.
i have the basic from Adminware and I will stop there. Just too many varieties for me. I need to spend equal time on other collections. I will get some of these new additions as they are the first but I will stop there. Still many missing from the “ basic” collection.

David

I've not done much with my Machins lately, just a tidy up of my albums & general paperwork. Put 1 item (14p blue) into my "flaws-album" today, it has a blue ink spot on the back of it. Ordered 3 PSB panes from eBay today (buy now). The panes came in at under face value even with postage costs so the spares will find their way to the swap out scheme unless they have any flaws or are of other interest to me.

Just received the scanned 4 Machins from a trusted eBay seller to be added to my specialist Machin collection. Just to inform other Machin collectors, the interesting stamp is the 2nd class shown here. This issue was not expected to be done as the 2nd class bar-coded stamps (pilot scheme) were issued at about the same time. This copy is on inverted backing paper & there is also others issued on upright backing papers. It is very difficult to source these types and they are destined to become some of the rarer Machins. I know of at least 1 dealer on the internet who is asking over £20 sterling for 1 stamp already.
(MTIL/M19L) 1st SG U3029 SBP2U DG N1.62.17 - (MSIL/M13L) 1st SG U3024 VERMILION DG N1.54.5 - (MBIL/M17L) 1st SG U3026 SBP2i DG N1.62.8 & the old (small) format 2nd class blue, 25/2/2021, SGU3010 (DG N2.31.31) SBP2i

In my uneducated opinion, things I've noticed
1. When a stamp is removed from the backing paper (some) it leaves a fine outline on the backing paper, particularly around the security slits areas therefor, if it is rotated the syncopated perforations would/may show at the top.                                 
 2. Many self-adhesive stamps are only issued on one type of backing paper.
 3. Lots of stamps with certain flaws/errors can only be from one known type of backing paper.
 4. If there are 2 types of backing paper for the same stamp it would be a waste of time for a "collector" to swap the papers over, provided both versions were available to collect, unless there was a vast difference in each one's purchase price.

There is some text reference about backing papers being swapped in the Deegam handbook somewhere, but it would take me quite some time to find it.