Soaking

You have bought some kiloware or have an accumulation of stamps on paper. Now what? Rather than dump all of into a bucket to remove the backing paper, you need to do some sorting and preparation first.

Preparation
Are there stamps from before the 1940s? There may be stamps on purposely fugitive ink. Set those aside for floating.

There are likely self-adhesive stamps in modern kiloware. Stamp with slits intentionally cut in the middle are designed to fall apart when soaked. Otherwise, there are some self-adhesives that will not release from envelope paper. So, set these aside as a separate group. See: Self-adhesive stamp processing. Then, are there cancels that you might want to keep or might be tradeable? Set those aside separately, also.

Then, sort out anything on colored paper. Red is often fugitive, as is found on Christmas card envelopes and airmail envelopes. Orange and yellow orange paper for large-size mailing envelopes can also be fugitive. Set all these aside for floating.

If there is a lot of duplication, you may not want or need to soak everything. A large amount will take a long time to process. You may not want to keep stamps with significant faults, either. So, remove what you want to keep and set the rest aside, perhaps in a clear freezer bag. Good practice is to sort again after going through the first time – "measure twice, cut once".

Soaking
This can be a messy process. You will need:
 * a workspace with a flat spot to place your drying stamps. A large bathroom counter might work; a small one will probably not.
 * a good sized container, enough to hold at least three or four times the amount of water over stamps on paper.
 * lots of clean papers or paper towels for drying processed stamps, perhaps plus a drying book. The latter is extremely useful buying more than one is recommended. You will need a flat weight of some sort to keep the paper towels or drying book flat while drying. A wooden or masonite board or a thick plastic sheet would be good to place between the papers and drying book and the weight.
 * very cool or cold clean tap water.

Now:
 * Add water to the container and drop small bunches of stamps in bit by bit. If you put stamps in the bottom and add water, you will find the middle of the brick will often be dry.
 * Let sit about 10-15 minutes. Many if not all stamps will have loosened from the envelope paper. Dump out as much water as you safely can and add water back. It will have washed out out much of the dissolved glue but not all.
 * Let sit for 5-10 minutes more and replace the water at least once more to get out as much glue as possible. Stamps should be loose from envelope paper at this point.
 * Now comes the tedious part. Remove each piece of paper or stamp one by one, placing a stamp on your drying paper or drying book page, and discarding envelope paper. Check that envelope paper to make sure a stamp hasn't stuck to the other side.
 * There will be water on the surface of stamps that can be blotted to help speed up drying. Do not overlap stamps on your drying sheet or page.
 * Use the weight to press the papers or drying book. Check stamps after 3-4 hours; they need to be absolutely dry before removal. In humid weather, this will take longer. Separating the drying papers or lightly opening the drying book pages will help speed drying somewhat.
 * When truly dry, most stamps will release easily so be careful handling the stack of dried sheets or the drying book. Dry paper towels can be kept and kept flat for re-use for the next soaking session. A drying book should be set upright and ajar and allowed to fully dry.





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