Rob

Without a picture it is difficult to say, but if missing the dots due to die fill, this is a normal progression through use and would be worth £2. If the die was blocked with grease giving a significant amout of missing legend and general weakness, add a quid or two for the error collector interest. If you desperately want to go on a voyage of delusion, call it £200.

Hence the value of provenance

Looks like a pin was soldered on the back to wear it as a brooch/badge

What a surprise. Presumably Chinese? And given the ease of acquisition, is the story legitimate? You would be amazed at the number of 1933 pennies passed down by grandad, unbeknown to the Royal Mint.

Yep, that's a wrong'un. Yet again, the rhetorical question. Why do people insist on buying something they are unsure about? Answer - the desire to pay less than market price for a good one. eBay has a shedload of 1902 crowns at any one time with better pictures. Better still, buy from a reputable dealer. People need to stop being greedy. If in doubt, leave it out.

me me me me me. Have a 50:50 chance to get my Lavrillier. And I got my money back on the lottery last Friday What could possibly go wrong?

If you try to upload a larger than 500kb file, I think it retains this 'on account' so to speak, so a smaller image just gets added to the initial figure. If there is a problem loading and you know the file is less than 500kb, exit the thread, come back in and try again. This should work.

Unfortunately it isn't that simple. For whatever reason, die life shortened to the point where it was hampering output in the second half of the 1840s. The figure of 30000ish per die typically had stood for more than a century, but was severely reduced for a while - see Linton's article on the 1848 halfcrowns in the BNJ. Once you get past 1850 the mint accounts are available. If only they went back a bit further.

Ebay ties itself in knots from time to time. Somebody bought an item from Spain, but it then blocked another from Sweden saying it required a permit international sales to proceed. No consistency. It's probably their continual tinkering that produces unexpected consequences.

I like 61s and 62s quite often. I have a very nice formerly slabbed 61 that was better than a 65 from a 'premium' collection.

I rest my case. I had one in change last year.

Put up a date run and it would be a novel way of displaying a collection. OK, I'll let you off the 1933, 1937, 1952 and 1954, but those aside you can get a full run at scrap.

I questioned it simply on the basis of numbers. Whether 100K or 200K struck is immaterial. To have 700 of them is a ridiculously high number unless you have had access to a known pile of them. Based on Wiki, which can't be accepted as gospel but should be of the correct order of magnitude, a total of 136m 2008 20p pieces were struck and the cumulative total of 20ps to that date was 3.248bn. 100K or 200K is only 0.07% or 0.14% of the total struck in 2008 and 0.003% or 0.006% of the total number of 20ps struck up to 2008. Based on a random distribution, to acquire 700 would necessitate looking at 22,736,000 coins based on an average of 1 in 32480, or half these numbers if 200K were made. Nobody has that much time on their hands, nor would I say access to sufficient material in the normal course of events to find that many. I'm sure they were released into a specific area or two as part of a mint consignment, which could skew the distribution curve, but it is not realistic to find the numbers quoted just from a random search of your change. How many people would see even a couple thousand 20p pieces in their change over a 7 or 8 year period let alone more than 10 million. To buy 700 off eBay or similar would cost too much, so ................ the whole thing just doesn't add up unless you were able to buy a mint bag of 20ps and they just happened to have a large number of no date coins. Or you can get them from alibaba.

The numbers struck from a pair of dies varied over time. 1825 halfpennies had 4 die pairs for a mintage of 210,000 which implies about 50-60K per die. Mint output of halfcrowns in 1848 was 91K ish but a total of 24 dies were used and there was concern at the RM over the short lives of the dies. One would assume this is also related to the number of overcut dates seen at the end of the 1840s. Exactly when the die life shortened I am not sure, but seems to be in the second half of the decade. Although neither are pennies, it would seem likely that a typical figure of approx. 50K is a reasonable assumption, with the caveat that occasionally one will break earlier rather than later, though the large size might cause them to fail quicker than a small die.

The links don't work for me, so a guess using the initial images. In CGS-speak, 80, 75 & 70. All appear to have some wear on the roses, so it is likely to be a spread around EF. The first is decidedly better than the last two. Those numbers should equate to Good EF, EF and aEF in proper grading terms.

How many of these have been taken from circulation and how many bought from the likes of dealers or ebay? The latter would obviously represent quite an investment and with them not being particularly rare, I would question the rationale for such a strategy.

I had one in change the other day, but as you say, 700 is a huge number unless you manage to acquire a bag of them from the mint. Does anybody know the number in a bag as would come from the mint? Given a journey or two were believed to be the total number struck, this figure of approximately 100-200,000 would suggest it be almost impossible to assemble 700 without access to mint bags, or alibaba. They were struck over a very short period of time, so there would be no chance of picking them from change in the normal sense because they would be dispersed faster than you could pick them out. I smell a rat.

Not sure why. All that is being discussed is a selection of numbers. Whether the poster puts up an inconsistent number or the TPG gives an inconsistent grade - who cares? Of far greater use is the knowledge that the number may or may not be an accurate reflection of a supposedly consistent set of criteria, irrespective of what is written.

Yes, but they are available on alibaba at a quid or so. They may or may not be genuine. Either way the market will be awash.

It's fair to say that with so many potentially overhanging the market, the price has just dropped by at least 20%, maybe more. All those who bought for several hundreds of pounds will only have one or two examples at most, and in most instances will remain in denial about the wisdom of paying so much. Those who have collected from circulation can accept whatever price they are offered, as there will be zero chance of realising the current market retail price. I think the best bet is probably to sell them as a bulk lot in the same way as that huge number of farthings a couple yeaars ago, and hope that two dealers push the price up. You can always spend them if the hassle is too great.

Likely. I had someone attempt a fraud on two gold pieces out of three listed in the past and I don't win the lottery, so unless I'm very unlucky there is probably a lot of dodgy buyers out there for gold.

Sad, or just that Barcelona is a bit quiet at this time of year?.

Not a personal thing, but people are too willing to let others do the work. We are all guilty, because even if the will is there, often the time available is not. The early Standard catalogues started listing increasingly minor varieties because the mentality of collectors is to collect something if it appears on a list, so the expansion of a list is a heaven sent opportunity to expand the collection without having to do any homework, and the benefit to say Seaby's was the potential sale of half a dozen coins to the collector whereas before one would have sufficed, having already ticked 'The Box'. Look at the number of varieties that are documented and then suddenly everyone and their dog has one. Those collectors could have looked at their coins before, noted the differences and investigated - but relatively few people take this course.

That is one of the best written articles I've seen on any topic. Concise and to the point.

Nonsense. He must stay in a lot more and extend the study. In true parasitic convention, everybody applauds the work and then just uses the info for their own ends. what would be more useful would be for a few people to carry out the same studies working in parallel. Chances are that whilst the bulk of material will agree, there will also be a handful of unrecorded types which would not come to light on the basis of a single study. The confirmation of research results is a pre-requisite for acceptance, the unexpected discoveries are the icing on the cake.