Early 1980s Kelloggs Baseball Card Sets How Do You Separate the Crds?
 

Any Kellogg's baseball collectors and/or experts out there? Need some suggestions... I recently purchased a few Kellogg's baseball sets mainly from 1980-1983 and I noticed that most of the cards are attached with perforations. My task is to separate them, put them in penny sleeves, and then into card savers. I'd like to submit some of the best looking, best centered stars for grading and store away the rest.

My dilemma is that when I opened the envelope on a 1983 set I found that the perforated tabs were attached onto many of the cards. On some of the separated cards, the perforations would be more pronounced on one card versus the adjacent card causing a nick and/or slight delamination on the card without the perforation.

To separate the cards I would fold the seam inwards and the outwards until the cards come apart. With either a perforated tab or nick showing on each card, I'm not sure what is acceptable for grading.

My questions are:
What is the best technique to pull Kellogg's cards apart to minimize damage?
How should the edges look to get the best grade when centering and corners already close to perfect?
Are perforated tabs acceptable? If, not what is the best way to remove them?

Note: The Thornton pic show excess perforations on right side while the Ray card shows nicks and rough edges on left side. Sorry for the poor pics but thanks for your help and let me know what you think.

Again, thank you for your advice,
Bob


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Many of mine separated themselves....

I'm not really sure how you'd get them apart for grading. If it was me, I'd just consider the connecting bits as the normal edge and go from there. But I suppose the grading companies have to have "perfect" but not cut connecting bits.

I can't profess any expertise in how they grade, BUT . . . . here is a PSA 10 with connecting tabs apparent:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/CARLTON-FIS...0/313194332261

Thanks Tim and Steve, Really appreciate your thoughts. Looks like the hanging perforations don't affect the grade too much when looking at that 1983 Fisk PSA 10 example. So I acquired 4 sets; one each from 1980 to 1983. These are cool looking factory sets. I went backwards and started with separating 1983. The 1983 were the most difficult to separate. The 1982s and 1981s came apart much easier with less defects and/or chips. Still have 1980 to do. It is interesting regarding the variation in width and height on Kellogg's cards over the years. My favorite set so far is 1981 as these cards are the largest in size and mimic the typical trading card at 2.5" x 3.5". Again, thank you for your help.

Don't be to disappointed when you send in the Kellogg's and don't get the grade you think they should get. Also when I have got a 9 or 10, when I review them later in my collection, some have obtained cracks after they have been slabbed. I have stopped collecting Kellogg's for this reason. I hate to piece together a high grade set( pay big $$$) and then years later have to replace many of them. The 1975 Set is the worst, also a lot of my 1971's have cracked after being put into PSA slabs. Hope you have better luck.
Any others with similiar results ? How about other years ?

I haven't slabbed any.

A lot of the cracking is from the plastic losing some plasticizer over time and shrinking while the paper doesn't shrink. Humidity can also make the paper expand, and if things are restrained in a holder I think cracking is probably almost inevitable.

Some of my factory sets curled enough in the original package that the panels separated into individual cards. None cracked, at least not by the last time I checked. Most of my loose cards have curled some. Oddly the earlier proofs are mostly flat and the plastic is still more flexible. I believe it's a different type of plastic.

Plastics are a "new" enough material and there are so many specific formulations both in production and processing that even professional conservators in museums are often puzzled about how to go about preventing it from damaging itself.