THE MODERN FAKE SAINT VINCENT GRENADINES UNION ISLAND 1986 60TH BIRTHDAY OF QUEEN ELIZABETH II STAMP ISSUES

Saint Vincent Union Island 1986 60th Birthday of Queen Elizabeth II Forgery Set
Scott# 213-216

I discovered that this set along with other 1986 60th Birthday stamp sets and some of the souvenir sheets were forged and being put on the market in 2015. I am putting this page together now because I finally acquired the Union Island set as forgeries just recently from a Canadian stamp dealer who is selling this set and many other different forgery sets which he has stated he received from Morville Trading located in San Clemente, California. They are exactly like all the other forgeries I have created pages for and have been flooded onto the market for over two years now.
This page I have written in August of 2017. All of the stamps shown above are fake reproductions, in other words forgeries of the original set!

UPDATE OCTOBER 2017

I just purchased this lot of imperforate stamps.
I purchased them from eBay seller balticamber2011 at the winning bid of $3.85. balticamber2011 is raimissss. Also associated with armi777, asrm10 and hobbytrade. The users names are Raimonds Miskinis and Antanas Miskinis. Business names are Argi-stamps and/or SIA stamps all based in Latvia. The imperforate strips I received have the white gum as described. This shows the continued movement of the forgeries. Until recently the imperforate stamps were not being sold. Genuine imperforate stamps of this issue were and are a rarity.
Under ultra-violet light the strips glow just like the imaged stamps. All details described below are the same for the imperforate forgeries.

IF INVERTS OF THIS ISSUE APPEAR THEY ARE FORGERIES!
Inverts have appeared for several sets of this series. None are real because none were ever produced by the Format Printers.

END OCTOBER 2017 UPDATE

Everything about them is fake except for one dangerous fact, they have the correct perf size. The gum type is different in it being white in color and very shiny. This gum type was not used until much later years, long after Format went bankrupt thus proving they were not produced by the Format International Security Printers. Obvious differences will be shown below. So far I have discovered complete sets of perforated forgeries of the Union Island 1986 60th Birthday issue. I have not seen this set as forged inverts. It does not mean they do not exist though. With all the other sets that have been forged as those varieties, I would not be surprised to see them suddenly appear for this set as well. I also have not seen the souvenir sheet as a forgery yet. Usually the forger has been producing imperforate souvenir sheets for other sets. All are being offered online right now and have been for two years now as I write this on August 19, 2017.

I can also tell you that I have discovered that many more "modern" issues for Saint Vincent and other countries are being forged. Mainly varieties and "errors" of the issues which bring in higher profits although normal issues are also being faked in many cases. All are being produced by the same source which is unknown at present. All are dangerous forgeries because the perf sizes are correct. Images shown on auction sites cannot be trusted because they cannot be defined by counting perforations and unless you have a comparable image of the originals they cannot be recognized by the images given by sellers. This includes Audubon Birds issues including inverted frames, Dogs inverts, Flowers inverts, Michael Jackson inverts, and many more.

ANY INFORMATION TO TRACE THE SOURCE OF THESE FORGERIES WILL BE POSTED TO THE PROPER RESOURCES

At present sellers on eBay, Delcampe, Bonanza, and Amazon are offering them. I am sure other sources are now selling them also. A list of these sellers is being compiled and at some point the source may be revealed. At this time unless the sellers stop selling them (which is doubtful) it is up to you as a buyer to refuse to buy them without proper identification. In other words, make the seller send you 1200dpi images of the front and back of the stamps and then compare them with my images. I have posted more pages on the issues I have discovered to be forged and have included an index page listing them with links.

New information is welcome and you may contact me through this website anytime.

I recently purchased this set plus many other sets from this Canadian dealer. I can easily recognize the forgeries just by the images given by this seller on eBay. As soon as I received them, all are verified forgeries. So more pages will be added for them as I have time to create them.

Here are the differences for the Union Island 60th Birthday stamps.

ULTRA-VIOLET LIGHT DETECTION

I have discovered another way to detect many of the forgeries. Use an ultra-violet light on them!
In many cases with all the forgeries I have posted the now many pages for, I have found that many sets glow brightly like the fluorescent papers used on many, for example, Canadian stamps in the past. A word of caution on this though. Many forgeries I have found, which all have the yellowish gum, do not glow or have lower grades of brightness or have numerous fibers in the paper that glow. In quite a few cases I have found the sets to have mixed papers, as in , several values glow and several are either less bright or do not glow at all!
There are only two answers to this oddity that are possible. It is either the forger is so lazy that he just grabs whatever paper is handy or....there are numerous different printings of the forgeries and this has been going on much longer than my discovery of the early 2014 massive movement of the forgeries onto the market.

The basic rule to follow with all stamps produced by the Format Printers is,
THE IMAGE SIDE OF GENUINE STAMPS DO NOT GLOW AT ALL.
The Format Printers used basically all the same type of paper on all the stamps they produced in the 1980's as did they use the same gum type except for a couple sets they produced in 1989 when newer types of gum were becoming popular in the stamp printing business.

For both the imperforate and the normal perforated version of this issue that I have acquired the forgeries glow brightly as this image shows. I use genuine Specimen Overprinted stamps for the comparison.

Here are gum comparisons.

High Definition Gum Comparison of a Fake Stamp with Original
This gum appears to still be PVA but without the greenish tint. It has been noted that other British issues like some of the Machin issues have this type of gum. The problem is it was not used until the late 90's. The gum is very shiny though which conflicts with the description of the gum known as PVAI (Layflat) used on the Machins. Yet the stamps lay perfectly flat on a surface whereas originals have a light bending from aging.
This is evidence showing even a later creation and since these did not appear on the market until 2015 and no large movements have ever been on the market nor recorded, it proves these to be modern forgeries of the stamps.


Gum Comparison of the Original and Fake 1986 60th Birthday of Queen Elizabeth Stamps
Again there is an obvious difference in color and texture.
When you put something black as a background under the forgeries you can see the design through the gum side as shown. You cannot see it on authentic stamps.


Screen and Color Comparisons of the Fake Stamp with Original Stamp

For the following comparisons I will use the 10c with the Queen wearing a scarf and the 60c with the Queen wearing her riding clothes. This is to show the extreme differences in the color images as well as the black and white images. I use a genuine specimen overprint set for the comparisons.

Comparison of the 10c values color image
Note the inferior screen pattern. So bad that you cannot hardly see the aging wrinkles around the eye on the forgery. You cannot see that the queen's eyes are blue on the forgery.


Comparison of the 40c values black and white image
Again, note the inferior screen pattern. You can see the clarity of the image on the forgery is an atrocity!


Screen and Color Comparison of the Plaque on the 10c Fake Stamp with Original Stamp
Here you can see the plaque is a completely wrong color. Very coarse but the letters look very similar.


Font Comparison of the 10c Fake Stamp with Original Stamp
On the forgery the "a" in "Grenadines touches the adjacent letters. The period on "St." also touches. Neither does on the genuine stamps and the letters are very clear.


Now let us have the side by side images of the stamps!

Comparison of the Fake 10c Stamp with the Original Stamp
A stunning difference yes?
Please note the extreme difference in color of the background and the plaque on the fake stamp.
The fake stamps are kind of like a photocopy of the originals but use a lower quality screen and have a shiny surface over the face.


Other differences:
As it shows the plaque is magenta on genuine stamps. It is purple on the forgeries
There is a very light gray framing around the image on genuine stamps. No frame to be found on the forged stamps.
The stamp background is very light blue on the forgeries whereas there is a yellowish tint to it on the genuine stamps.
The shading in the image is much lighter on genuine stamps. almost black on the forgeries.
The designs around the plaque are dark gray-blue on genuine stamps. It is gray on the forgeries.

Comparison of the Fake 40c Stamp with the Original Stamp
Here you can see the obvious difference in the black and white image colors.


Notes:
The forgeries have a yellowish-green tinting throughout the image.
All the same plaque color, missing gray frame, font differences and color differences of the background of the stamps as explained above.

Comparison of the Fake $2 Stamp with the Original Stamp
Here you can see the obvious difference in the colors in the color image unlike the 10c value which is close.


Notes:
The Queens face on the forgeries has heavy yellow tinting.
The forgery has distinct greenish tinting throughout the color image.
All the same plaque color, font and color differences of the background of the stamps as explained above.

Comparison of the Fake $8 Stamp with the Original Stamp
Here you can see the obvious difference in the colors.


Notes:
Background color is greenish on the forgeries versus gray on the genuine stamps.
The "$" sign of the value almost touches the "8" on genuine stamps. It is well spaced on the forgeries. Also the font is lighter on the forgeries.
The forgeries have a much deeper tone on the queen's face.
The red fonts are dark red on genuine stamps versus a much lighter red on the forgeries.

Because of the fact that a major portion of leaders in the stamp community wish to turn a blind eye on these forgeries. Because of dealers and buyers who are afraid to "step up to the plate" because of fear of being ridiculed by self proclaimed "experts" or because they don't want to get involved, the forgers will continue to forge more and more sets. They have already effected other issues that have nothing to do with Leaders of the World issues such as Nauru 1982 Scouts, Barbuda 1983 Manned Flight and others showing us the wide range of stamps they are capable of forging and possibly have already forged. Soon you will be the victim when you buy that fake high valued Orchid stamp or that high priced definitive set you have dreamed of getting or what you thought to be a genuine error or variety which in the end only turns out to be fabricated by these forgers and nobody wants it when you go to sell it or your children go to sell it.

You have a choice.

Continue to ignore this problem that the majority of stamp leaders and editors seem to be trying to do just like they have with unauthorized reprints and "illegal" stamps in the past. Or spread the word and complain to your contacts and leaders that these problems need to be exposed and described in magazines, newspapers and catalogs before every stamp issue made in modern times from the 1970's onward falls victim to being a suspected forgery and in turn you or your friends or associates will fall victim to it when trying to buy or sell them. These forgers are professionals and have been here for decades unseen. They will continue to harm us unless people like you stand up and take notice!

This problem effects everyone because now instead of the value being based on a set quantity of the issued stamp, we now have double, triple or even more in quantity placed on the market. It will therefore depreciate the stated value of them in the catalogs simply because they will not research them and "assume" there are tons available when in reality for many sets the originals are and have become difficult to find.

I am simply the one who discovered them because of my research on the printer.
Indeed several issues that I have researched and obtained the original varieties of are effected. I am a professional tradesman and have never depended on stamps to live on. There are many that do depend on stamp sales though and it is for them also that I have created this section of the website.

You can now define the forgeries of the Saint Vincent Union Island 1986 60th Birthday of Queen Elizabeth II stamps easily and can now possibly avoid being ripped off! Sorry to say this, a lot of you already have been fooled and more of you will be until the right people get serious about it!

Here are links to images of each stamp with an original next to a fake. All are scanned at 1200dpi so the files are large. All were scanned at the same time with the same settings and nothing is enhanced. Please be patient with downloading them because each file is around 7 to 8 megs.

Your friend and fellow collector and researcher,
JLowe RETURN TO TOP

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