Where do you think high grade starts for BA?

[Mutie Fan]

I have been going through my raw BA X-Men books (my primary focus since I came back into collecting about 3 years ago) and I am finding that several of the books are for lack of a better term…wanting. I was much more focused on filling in the books I could not get when I quit collecting in the 90’s in high school than I was on the grade.

I want to start to re-build and I want to look at higher grades. Much of my run from #120 down would struggle to make it to 8.0 with a few exceptions. The later the books however, the better the grades. I stopped collecting X-Men at #306 and I don’t really want to pick up anything newer than that and the BA books are the ones that interest me most of all.

Where in the grading scale do you feel that high grade starts with BA? I know several of you relentlessly pursue the 9.8’s out there and to be honest I can’t afford those until you get close to CA. Even 9.6’s in #’s 101 and below are out of my league.

Would you look at only 9.4 and up? Does 9.0 qualify? Is a 9.2 respectable for HG? I realize there is no one correct answer I just want some feedback.

Thanks

Beau

 

 

 

[Mutie Fan]

Well I tried to add a poll but I guess it is beyond my meager skills.

[CAP Freak]

9.2/9.4 for me.

[Arcade]

9.2/9.4 for me.

 

I agree.

In my X-Men 94-143 run, only 4 books are 9.0, and three of those will be replaced soon with better graded copies.

Only my #94 will stay at 9.0 because of the high dollar amount to replace.

Some 9.2's look great but generally I like 9.4 and higher.

[Mutie Fan]

When I got into graded books I thought of 8.5 as my sweet spot where I could get a good looking book for not too much cash. Now that I have several 8.5s to compare I realize that some look great and some look a bit beat. I have always been into condition, and now that I know a bit more about grading I realize that what I thought of as NM is more like VF or so.

[oakman29]

I always thought 8.5 or better is where I draw the line,but it really is about buying the book and not the grade.I had found a sweet Amazing Spider-man #50 7.0 CGC white PQ,that looks like an 8.5 or better.I guess it just varies from book to book.

[joe_collector]

It depends on a lot of factors, not just the numerical "preservation grade", but also page quality and unstated things like centering, color depth, gloss, cut, no prod creases, etc.

 

In my opinion, the value in buying a nicely centered, high color depth 9.0 is far superior to a mis-cut, white border 9.8 with production creases. I'd definitely start at 9.0 for BA X-Men, but don't always go for the CGC grade, and instead let your own eyes be your guide.

 

A good example was my quest for a well-centered CGC 9.4-9.6 X-Men 132 - that book can be tough to find, and EBay is full of mis-cut white border freakshows. Whenever forum members would "get out" of BA X-Men and sell their CGC 9.6-9.8 runs, the X-Men 132 would always look like crepe - big white borders, usually off center and about as far away from "high grade" as you can get. Same with EBay sellers offering X-Men runs, the 132 CGC 9.4-9.8 would usually make my eyes bleed.

 

Then a well-centered CGC 9.4 miraculously came up for sale on here, and I bought it, completing a a nice run of CGC books for me, and I count that book as one of the few *true* high-grade CGC copies of that book I've ever seen.

[nepatkm]

For bronze age, I always thought of 8.5 and up as high grade, but personally I have never been able to pull the trigger on anything less than 9.2. (and no Cream or tan pages allowed.)

[Mutie Fan]

The technical grade is less important to me than the look and feel of the book itself. I like OW to W pages or better and centering is very important.

Some of the 8.5 and 9.0 CGC books I have look great and I am happy with them, some I am not. I understand how they got the grade that they did but I want a better looking copy.

 

[Mutie Fan]

My first CGC book was an X-Men # 106 in 8.5 with white pages. It is still the nicest 8.5 I have seen. In fact I need to get the graders notes to see why it only got an 8.5. But the more 8.5's I picked up the more I realized that not all 8.5s are equal and I still did not have NM books. (I know, if I want NM buy NM).

[bigfiver69]

Depends... to me, the 'what is high grade' scale slides depending on genre... because some genres are tougher than others when it comes to finding books in nice grade.

 

If you're talking DC romance, I'd argue that 'High Grade' starts at clean 8.5. And before any of you start laughing, imagine if a complete run of DC's Romance titles appeared in that grade on ebay... it'd be very large money.

 

War comics, sharp 9.0. After collecting DC bronze war very hard for nearly a decade, there are some books out there that I truly believe do not exist in 9.4

 

Horror books, 9.2

 

Hero books, it starts at 9.4 - and there appears to be a steady supply.

 

Shep

[Mutie Fan]

Those are very good points. My particular focus is on X-Men so in my case I am talking mainstream hero books. It is looking more and more like 9.4 for me. I have been doing some calculations based on GPA and I have to admit, a BA run in 9.4 is not as expensive as I had thought. Although much more expensive than in 8.5.

[joe_collector]

Depends... to me, the 'what is high grade' scale slides depending on genre...

 

Other than romance and maybe the odd humor title, no way - if you want to pay the piper, you can find the majority of any Marvel or DC BA series in 9.4 and up. Sure, there might be the odd HTF issue, but it's like that even with super-hero books.

 

I collect Marvel esoteric Bronze Age books, and I don't pay top dollar for 8.5's and no one else does either. I see warehouse VFs of Marvel (DC is easier) 70's Romance books and they are not huge sellers - but if someone put a CGC 9.4-9.6 up there, watch out!!

[kimik]

Depends... to me, the 'what is high grade' scale slides depending on genre...

 

Other than romance and maybe the odd humor title, no way - if you want to pay the piper, you can find the majority of any Marvel or DC BA series in 9.4 and up. Sure, there might be the odd HTF issue, but it's like that even with super-hero books.

 

I collect Marvel esoteric Bronze Age books, and I don't pay top dollar for 8.5's and no one else does either. I see warehouse VFs of Marvel (DC is easier) 70's Romance books and they are not huge sellers - but if someone put a CGC 9.4-9.6 up there, watch out!!

 

Good points. Romance, War and Western are definitely tougher in 9.4, but I think that the HG cut-off for any BA book is 9.4, including Horror, Western and Romance. My gut feeling is that there are still a ton of HG copies locked up in long time/OO collections that have not been graded or seen the light of day for a while.

[awe4one]

Good points. Romance, War and Western are definitely tougher in 9.4, but I think that the HG cut-off for any BA book is 9.4, including Horror, Western and Romance. My gut feeling is that there are still a ton of HG copies locked up in long time/OO collections that have not been graded or seen the light of day for a while.

 

I'd slide that down to 9.0/9.2 for Westerns and Romance...

 

I'll also add that PQ designations lower than Off-White-White significantly affect the desirability of these issues...even those in 9.4 and up...

 

Jim