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Hmm...well it might be interesting to have a "rare in high grade" listing. I know you mentioned the 1879 narrow date earlier - that truly is rare in high grade. I've only ever seen 2 or 3 with lustre. Although not difficult even in mid grade.

I have a feeling there are way more than 25 extant, since I've just had a look, and I've got 8....:) ( Unless everybody is happy to believe there are only 25, so I'll get a few more, be then able to control the world price, and I can then charge what I like for them and then I'll be rich, I tell you, RICH!!!!........ ....at this point the nice nurse calms me down and gives me my Horlicks .....)

Had Ionofanes years ago-bonkers . Must come tp Darkest Herefordshire with a bottle of something good when the balloon finally goes up, and talk old gear.

Absolutely agree! Very few narrow date 79s in truly high grade, and likewise for open 3 1863s. I'd go further and even add 1864... All over the place in lower grade, but how many unc with lustre? In the old Cope and Rayner English Milled Coins, they had rarity estimates for different grades; maybe that should be the case amongst us penny-ists? But then of course we're talking about whether rarity is total extant or just nice ones! And that's always likely to be a moot point. I just try to get the best I can at the time and slowly improve grade if and when the chance comes along.

You sure that was not Roger daltrey?

We better hope that eBay doesn't read this. They might get the wrong idea....

I've got a bit of time on my hands at the moment so I might create a page - it's simple to remove it from the menu if I find that it's common.

Its easier IMO Blake to get as many lists as possible from Dealers and keep them .More coins of any reasonable grade will have been sold by dealers attributed correctly than anything else as the majority going in an auction have been submitted by a dealer or by a seller who bought it from a dealer originally.They also may not be of a value worth putting in Auction. Some maybe duplicated but even so its a guide as to how many of something there may be and in what grades from dealers who are handling a lot more every month than the few people who post on the forum ,apart from the last 12 months were it is harder for dealers to buy anything due to covid. Over a period of time you can soon find out what is hard to find or plentifull and why i keep them all going back seven years since i started to collect pennies. Out of interest i looked at lists for F79 and made a phone call yesterday and a couple more calls this morning as lots of sought after coins may be sold by dealers before they even go on a list. It also means that even some coins that may be considered common are much harder to find than we may think as most collectors when they buy a coin dont look for that particular type anymore. So over the seven years i have kept lists if there are hardly any on they are either scarce or sought after as sold straight away.

One day we may have to list (sell) them too.....if we are still around to do it!

A nostalgic diversion from loudspeakers:

Managed to get an 1854/3 penny for just £31. Bargain in my view, considering how scare they are. Many are touted as 4/3, but aren't. This one looks to be the real deal, however. link

Classic Ebay. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/International-Coin-collection/113857074156?hash=item1a826913ec:g:AqMAAOSwtspdWEYo

Or, of course, not list them, but send the list to a trusted member who can collate the lot....

A must-have for penny collectors. Michael's Victoria edition has superseded the early pennies but it covers Edward VII to Elizabeth II. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Rare-coin-book-The-British-bronze-penny-1860-1970-by-Michael-Gouby/363269173178?hash=item549487afba:g:XFYAAOSwRFtgDGIm

Fifty fifty chance? Really? That would suggest there's a 50% chance it's kosher. So it's a car now? You may remember, when first brought to our attention, she wanted a daft amount (a million, wasn't it?) for a pound coin featuring a minor production error, because she wanted to buy a fish and chip shop. Must've been one swanky chippy…...

Around 15 years ago I went to an auction somewhere near Oxford to buy a set of medals that went eventually for a stupid price. With me was a former Mrs. Bagerap and her sister at whose house we were staying that night. Upon retiring early from the auction SIL suggested a visit to a nearby "Outlet Park" where you could buy branded goods cheaply. New concept to me at the time but, what the hell, if the sisters go off shopping together I'd get a bit of a rest. When they eventually returned two and a half hours later, they were predictably miffed to find that the seating space had been reduced by a pair of B&W Matrix Studio Monitors. It would have been a sin to leave them behind at that price. I kept them for a long while but now they're doing sterling duty in a bar in Stavanger.

Perhaps the days of "good" speakers is over. The approach now is to use fairly ordinary speakers and enclosures and compensate for their defects using digital equalization where the venue is scanned by a microphone its response logged and the equalization calculated to compensate for the defects of the speakers and the venue. I first saw this demonstrated when I was at Uni where one of the student projects did just that using a basic PC, and an isotropic microphone plus an 8 bit ADC and DAC to digitize the test frequencies and the response of the system to them. I can remember thinking what a good idea it was. Of course the speakers would have to be able to handle the power and not saturate which would generate large amounts of harmonic distortion. The enclosure has always been an important part of improving speaker performance. For example the base reflex enclosure which was effectively a mechanical equalization system to improve the base response of loud speaker systems. Speakers have always been the weakest link in the chain because of the non linear nature of magnetic circuits due to the effects of hysteresis and saturation. Hence the Quad electrostatic speaker which employed an electrostatic transducer to convert the electrical signal into audible sound which is linear and does not saturate..

I was at a loose end...

Blakey's speakers reminded me of the Protectorate composite columns found on some of Ramage's patterns so I thought I'd design some to play the music I sort coins to