How to spot 'Evidence of Color Alteration" on 1971T BB and 1962T Football ?

bowlarama

I know that one technique is to look at the sides of the cards to see if color bleeding can be shown, but I was wondering what other ways to tell if the cards have been colored. Reason I ask is because I bought a high grade raw set, but a handful of cards have been rejected with this comment recently yet I see no signs of bleed

Stone193

Another way.

Take a black light in the dark - the ink used on a card will iridesce at a different rate than whatever was used to color the card.

Here's an example of just holding the card at an angle to an ordinary light:

miwlvrn

@drc said:

The ink can sometimes go past the edges of the face of the cards and be seen on the thickness/side.

This. The most common area for retouch is on the corners and the easiest way to spot it is, like he says, from the side due to minute bleed on the thickness of the card at the tip of the corners.

This is a wide-spread problem with nearly all black border sets, beyond the ones listed in the OP. That includes the many 1900/1901/1902 Ogden's sets, 1912 Cohen Weenen, 1915 Cope's, 1925 Teofani, etc.

Jimmy_Commonpants

There's almost always a color difference when touched-up. Its virtually impossible to match the aged color of a card with markers. Whether black like 71 Topps BB or red like 86 Fleer Basketball - touch-ups tend to stick out like a sore thumb under any type of "close" inspection imo. There are probably a few "good" jobs out there, but the difficulty in getting the same exact color gives away most, and, as others have said, angles/black lights/magnifiers will tell you anyway.

Cakes

I appreciate all the remarks so far, it's great info. Thank you, BC

bowlarama

Great info. Lets say that you have a card that has been rejected for altered coloring. Can you use something like Bestine or alcohol to remove the ink (even if it exposes the original color loss on the borders)? I have couple nicely centered 1971 Topps BB stars that I really want to get slabbed even if the grade drops from an 8 to a 6-7. But I also don't want to risk ruining the gloss or clarity of the original printing.

miwlvrn

BTW, watch out for black touch-up on the back side of 1973 baseball too. I've been the unlucky recipient of a couple of those, unfortunately.

Stone193

@bowlarama said:
Great info. Lets say that you have a card that has been rejected for altered coloring. Can you use something like Bestine or alcohol to remove the ink (even if it exposes the original color loss on the borders)? I have couple nicely centered 1971 Topps BB stars that I really want to get slabbed even if the grade drops from an 8 to a 6-7. But I also don't want to risk ruining the gloss or clarity of the original printing.

I remember someone 'soaking' a card and removing ball point pen ink but yours is probably a magic marker of some kind? Might be indelible ink?