I’m glad you liked the link I gave… It’s the frame around the complete coat of arms You are interested in. Left lower edge of frame is what Michel-catalog uses as “visual reference” for different types, but IMHO any location with clear frame will do fine.

best,
-keijo-

Thanks! That site is going to provide me with hours of entertainment. Do you know which frame border I’m supposed to be looking at? Is it the one around the shield, or the one around the entire upper portion of the stamp (the complete coat of arms)?

I looked over the stamp exchange thing and will go through my worldwide stuff to see if anything is suitable to send to you. Great site you have here. I hope it continues to thrive.

Tanner

I’m not an expert with these, but here’s what I know…

What the catalogs refer is the border around the design/arms. Looking at “thickness” is not going to help you at all as it can (and will )vary from stamp to stamp. You need to find out if the line is single thick line or two thin lines – and this can be very tricky as two close lines can easily appear/merge as one… The best resource / source of examples I can come up are specific dealer websites like this: http://www.briefmarkeneck.at/default.php?p=191&sec=5813&l=de&upline=4891 (zoom the images/browser screen to see the differences in frameborders).

Hope this helps.
-keijo-

I’ve looked through all your Austrian posts and found them quite informative. I will be visiting many of your other posts as well.

Thanks, Tanner

The blog is here:
http://chaotic-elf.blogspot.com/2010/01/stamp-stuff.html