New Flag Issues.potter Vs. Banknote

Scott has provided 3-sets of catalog numbers for the coil issues. In the September assignment they only differentiated by perforation the numbers. Did both printers provide 100 coil, 3K coil, and 10K coils? Other than the perfs, is there a way to determine if it was a 100, 3K 10K coils issue? (micro printing??) I am assuming the plate # will determine the printer but is there any printer mark to identify without the Plate#?

I believe 3k & 10k only from one printer.

The 3K and 10K coils were printed by Ashton Potter only. Both AP and Banknote Corp printed coils of 100.

There is no microprinting to distinguish stamps from the two printers. The die cut gauges are different for all three versions, 9.5 for the AP coil of 100, 11.25 for the BCA coil of 100, and 10 for the 3K and 10K coils from AP.

In addition the the die cut gauge, the stamps can also be distinguished by the characteristics of the die cuts. Stamps from the AP coil of 100 have square corners and the wavy die cutting starts with a valley at upper left, ending in a peak at lower left. Stamps from the BCA coil of 100 have a slanted transition cut at top and bottom and the wavy die cutting starts with a peak at upper left, ending in a valley at lower left. Stamps from the 3K and 10 K rolls have rounded corners and the wavy die cutting has peaks in all four corners.

The scan shows strips of all three, AP coil of 100 at top, then BCA coil of 100, then 3K and 10K coil.

thank you philatomiic & eyeonwall. Appreciate the information (I really was having a hard time trying to make the distinctions based on the 'limited' provided by the #assignment issue.)

Just as an aside, one benefit of ordering more than 30 coil stamps from each roll is you have the back number that by the number of placeholders gives you an additional reminder of which coil it came from. So coils of 100 will have a numbering that will start with 010 (this is because the USPS counts in 10's the number of stamps on the backing), the 3000 should have for the 10th stamp 0010, for the 10,000 roll the 10th stamp should show 00010.

Paying attention to the backing number can have you get stamps with both plate and backing number on one stamp. This occurs usually for every 270th stamp so that the amount of these stamps in a total run of 1 billion will be about 3.7 million or less as sometimes the backing number prints occasionally into the backing of another stamp. Also consider that this is a bit of a niche area within another niche area (plate number coil collecting), you can imagine a fair amount of these stamps with both plate number and a backing number not creeping into another stamp may not survive as they will be ignored or considered too inconsequential a collecting area by some collectors. Of course non-philatelists will not care about the plate number at all allowing for even less to survive in MNH condition.

Coils of 100 do not have back numbers. And until this year, the back numbers on 3K and 10K coils printed by Ashton Potter had the leading zeros dropped. So for previous AP issues, the number of digits in the back number does not confirm the roll size. Of course, stamps with back numbers greater than 3000 have to come from a 10K roll.

Philatomic - Thanks for the corrections. I started collecting in late 2019 and dove into acquiring my first definitive US Flag issues in 2022 - so at 58 I am still a comparatively "young" collector.

Your comments led me to check my 2022 Waving Flags and the recent 2024 Flags.

A) Thanks for reminding me the coils of 100 do NOT have back numbers. Doubly confirmed when I checked these and other flag stamps in my collection and online resources.

B) BCA did add leading zeros to indicate whether the stamps came from a coil of 3,000 or 10,000 as shown from the rolls of 3,000 and 10,000 of 2022 Waving Flag stamps I purchased for my collection. As for rolls of 3,000 and 10,000 printed by APU prior to 2022, I defer to your experience and knowledge as in 2022 (and appears 2023) Ashton Potter printed only booklets of 20 and coils of 100.

C) In 2024 Ashton Potter did add leading zeros to the new Flag stamps to indicate if the stamps came from a coil of 3,000 or 10,000 as you pointed out Philatomic and when I checked my own collection.

D) I checked a PNC strip from 2008 Flag stamps printed by Avery Dennison. They used leading zeros to indicate at least stamps originating from a coil of 10,000.

Sorry for any errors in my prior post. From my limited experience I can state confidently from checking my own collection that -
- BCA printer does differentiate between coil rolls of 3,000 and 10,000 with leading zeros since at least 2022.
- Possibly other printers aside from APU did the same as BCA as shown by Avery Dennison's print of 2008 Flag stamps.
- As APU printers for 2022 and 2023 did not produce coil rolls of 3,000 and 10,000, per Philatomic, it seems only in 2024 did Aston use BCA's practice of differentiating the 3,000 and 10,000 roles with leading zeros..

So my comments about differentiating where the coils from using the back numbers is only viable for rolls of 3,000 and 10,000 from some printers and years. This can be done with the 2022 Waving Flag and 2024 Ashton Potter Flag coils of 3,000 and 10,000. It may be done with the 2023 Flag stamps as it appears the only coils Ashton Potter printed were for rolls of 100.

It goes to show how involved the area of collecting definitive US Flag issues can be quite rich!

To All: Thank you for the discussion and information. I think I finally figured it out & have successfully cataloged this series. after about 2 hours with the gauge & glass I think I figured it out. The AP 3K/10K, vert 10 have the same Scott #s. Once I determined the perforations I was able to sort the Banknote and Ashton-Potter 100 coils.

Glad to hear you figured the stamps out.