5$ note with a small printing error

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I got in a bundle of 5$ notes taken from a brick many (32 out of 100) notes having this small curious-looking printing error:  the children sliding in the toboggan at the left on the back of the note seems to have some snow between legs... look at the scan below. There is a white patch just at this place, instead of the usual blue ink.

And this error was repeating every three notes, with some exceptions however.  The notes between were normal.  Here the serial numbers having the variations: HON7238916, 913, 910, 907, 902, 899, 896, 893 , 890, 887, 884, 881, 878, 875, 872, 868, 865, 862, 859, 856, 853, 850, 847, 844, 841, 838, 835, 832, 829, 828, 825, 824.  The back position number is 19 (fpn = 18).  I have some difficuties to explain thi pattern. If it's a defect in the plate # 19, why it's was not found in every note?  And if it's caused by an interposing substance, why it repeats quite regularly and always at the same place?  Any suggestion?

Here the scan of a normal-looking note

Kinda looks like a devils face?!!? Cool!!!
Quel horreur!! (not sure if that was spelt right but, who taughta me how to spoken..?)

The white splotch looks almost like a....JackStrap!!  Maybe we can call this  "The JackStrap variety".  

 :oWOW!! How did you ever spot that small of an ERROR? Did you go over each note with a 16x loupe or do you have really excellent eye sight. I doubt I would ever have picked that out....still a very neat looking error though!! If you ever decide you want to sell one of them I would be interested in buying one from you 8-). Just send me a PM if you decide to sell. Thanks, Rob.

Well, it is interesting that it's every third.

A printer would call this "a hicky". It caused by a bit of paper fiber that gets stuck onto the offset roller of the lithography press (not the gravue passes). It would, however, be expected on every single note until it either fell off or was cleaned up.

So... here's a theory:

The lithography should be the first printed pass (all the other "raised" processes would get flatten if the lithography where done afterwards). It would be much more effiecent to print the litho parts on a web press (from a long roll of paper, instead of from sheets). Since web-based litho presses can have huge cylinders (much greater diameter that the cylinder on the gravue press), it is conceiveable the the plate for the litho section is actually three "sheets" in diameter, to the web gravue's one "sheet". The continous stream of paper would flow through the litho section, directly into the gravue section, where it would be cut into sheets for subsequent processing. Because the litho cylinder is 3 sheets in diameter only , every third sheet would show the hicky.

Now, I know that new web presses are being used (not the change in configuration of the sheet a few years ago), but I always assumed it was a single sheet diameter plate.

Other ways to get every third sheet seem less likely:
1) three press printing sheets at the same time and having the stack in an "interleave" fashion. I've need seen or heard of this being done in a printing operation though and I don't see any benefits of doing it this way
2) You could feed interleaves sheets from third stacks of sheets into an inspection unit and colate them together at the end of the process or inspection into one stack. Again, I don't see the benefit of interleaving them either before of after the process. You'd be better off "one to one" for quality control purposes.
3) You could interleave them during the cutting process into individual notes, but again, why. You'd just take the whole lift and stack them one on the other.

Anyone have better ideas, I'm just taking a stab in the dark here. I've not seen the presses involved, so I don't know for sure.

Very interesting theory, Paul.  At first , I though about a such big printing cylinder, but I was a bit embarassed with the BPNs.  The three sets of plates ought to have the same FPN and BPN.  How can we distinguish each plate from the others, if there is three of each, according to their position numbers?  The break in the regularity can be explained by the fact that some defective sheets were removed before the printing of the serial numbers.

And about finding this white patch, I use a very simple and quick technique:  I take the entire bundle and flap rapidly the bundle from one edge, so it give a kind of "movie" effect. I don't look to each note individually, but look to any change from a note to each other.  If there is a difference, it will jump to the eye, as the different note will break the repetitive effect.  I don't know if you understand what I mean, but I hope that you will try this trick.  When I have a doubt, I look to each note to be sure that I miss nothing.

Well, the BPN's are really plate numbers anymore, they're just "position numbers" and I'm not even sure that there are rules about them anymore.

Why would there be 32 of these sheets, every third sheet? That's more than just pulling a few out for inspection. I was trying to come up with an mechanical reason for so many to be in one bundle like that.

Just like copperpete's find, I picked up a brick of HOE4091xxx, which has a small printing error appearing on every third note. Its a white streak across the boys sweatshirt running up and down.
Note shown HOE4091239 FP 44 BP 25.