Rob

Does anyone else have problems accessing the Goldbergs site in order to participate in live bidding? For over a year now I always get the message cannot find the server at www.goldbergcoins.com, this despite them repeatedly sending me emails with links (allegedly) to their site and the auctions. Although there hasn't been a great deal of interest in their sales of late, it seems a bit off that their website doesn't work any more. This must be costing them a lot in lost bids. According to their catalogue the sale is also listed on the Saleroom (can't find it) and Sixbid (can see the catalogue there, but it won't do live bidding - only commission bids). I was going to email them, but if I can't find www.goldbergcoins.com, then I am unlikely to successfully send an email to info@ this unavailable site either. A phonecall would negate any potential profit on the single item I was going to bid on. :angry: :angry: :angry: Yours Miffed of Manchester

Ditto.

Pre the 1816 coinage, groats et infra were almost certainly struck on an as required basis with no consideration for the Maundy distribution. Although money was dispensed at the ceremony, it must have been taken from existing currency supplies. One would assume that the poor weren't particularly concerned what condition the coins were in, nor whether their date was current. In my opinion, the concept of Maundy Sets dated prior to the 19th century is something that has been retrospectively applied to those years where all denominations were struck, rather than as a result of a conscious decision to produce sets for the ceremony. With the introduction of Boulton and Watt's presses used for the recoinage of 1816, it enabled the mint to strike a consistent product, and it is this that I think led to the production of yearly sets, though obviously the priority was the production of regular silver currency pieces following 60 years of neglect throughout the reign of George III. Although there are a couple of gaps in the first years of the new coinage, since 1822 Maundy coins have been produced every year since. The number of individuals collecting has also increased progressively down the years, possibly as a result of wealth trickling down from the spoils of the industrial revolution and so we also see sets being made for collectors, in addition to those needed for the Maundy ceremony. This was the norm until 1908 when you could order them from the mint just as you can buy their 'collectable' items today, but from 1909 onwards the sets were essentially made for the Maundy distribution. 1762 is clearly a year where they only needed threepences, but it could just as easily have been any of the other denominations.

It can happen at any time on any denomination. They occur when the sheet of bronze used for making blanks is insufficiently displaced in whatever direction to clear a previously punched section of the sheet by the blank cutting tool.

As long as the missing arc is the same radius as the coin in question it is likely to be genuine.

Methylated.

It's a big no-no to get mucky fingerprints all over them. I appreciate you may wish to handle things, but you have to decide whether they are to play with or to collect, keeping them in the best possible state of preservation whilst you are the custodian. i.e. you don't want to do something that will damage the coin beyond its condition when acquired. If you just want something to play with, buy cheaper, low-grade pieces. Again, if you want to regularly handle them you could put them into plastic capsules or 2x2 flips. Sorry, don't know what a Schulz album is.

Most patterns (and as far as I'm aware, all the RM pieces) tend to be like proofs, with just the design varying from the norm, so I'm not sure that a non-prooflike version would be struck as a pattern. There are a few patterns I have such as the Taylor 1807 unfinished proof halfpenny where the design is only partly recut including the date 1807/6, or the Eginton 1787 pattern 6d in white metal which are clearly not prooflike. These aside, all the other private patterns are most definitely struck as proofs, as are the RM pieces, including all the decimal patterns from the 1850s. The nickel strikings of the 1923 & 1924 shillings are not prooflike, but here we probably have an experimental striking to test the suitability of nickel as a metal for currency.

You could try disabling the Firefox Silverlight plug-in. Using the icon with three horizontal bars (top right corner) click on "Add-ons" then "Plugins" on the left hand side menu. Scroll down to find Silverlight and change from "Ask to Activate" to "Never Activate". Big plus for this tip. It also has a box which allows pdf files to always activate, which is a much better idea than always being asked if I want to open a pdf. (I invariably do - that is why I have tried to open it in the first place)

How about this for BU http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1863-penny-BU-/331459258624?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item4d2c82e900 As in 'Bloody Uncollectable'? No, the field length isn't long enough. He has abbreviated it and left off the ggered - I think.

Correct. My 1731 shilling spent the first 275 years of its life in the bottom of a Georgian glass. Lustre on one side is like the day it was struck.

OK, must have it as the German comedy thread videos work. Just ignore it, I guess. Thanks. One of the kids put 'Ad blocker' on, which is good for adverts apparently, i.e. you don't see them.

No idea if I have flash. how do I tell? I haven't seen anything that doesn't work over and above the usual problems like the internet cutting out for a few minutes every hour or so.

As the topic says. What is it and why does it do it? Is it some sort of spying program or what? I block it and it goes away, but haven't found what doesn't work yet. Ideas anyone. If superfluous, how do I stop it annoying me as it has been doing it for weeks now? i.e. how do I send it into the bin? Ta

PM sent

Not if you want to sell it! I disagree. I listed the thing below on the website, accurately described as dire, and it sold within a couple hours. It wasn't at 99p either.

82, 80 and 75.

Uh, that should be passed, not past. Fined one shilling.

Ok, £2.50 and you have a deal.

Difficult to say what you mean as the image is too grainy.

Excellent news. I will offer you £1.50 for your museum copy. I will even foot the postage so that you aren't out of pocket.

I'll answer seeing as nobody else has said anything. I don't what they are. They are too regular to be flaws at the edge of the groundline, which is obviously a point where stresses would be given the change in relief at this point. There is nothing at the corresponding point of the obverse to suggest a die clash, and they don't show any features that could relate to a previous die being recut. Not a clue, but I suspect not of any great importance.

Type the copied photobucket address into the field that comes up when you click the link icon in the line immediately above this reply box. It is the 9th from the left on my screen.

That's quite an interesting comparison - thanks. Is it possible to do a similar study for those coins submitted by named individuals as opposed to general submissions? I have a gut feeling that they tend to be more lenient with their grades if it is an 'important' collection, so for example, I have a couple of George III pattern halfpennies that were both previously in NGC slabs, one was in a 61 slab and the other a 65, but the 61 (un-named) is markedly better than the 65 (ex-Cheshire). There are other examples. Another useful study would be the consistency of grading for the same coin, if possible. I had an ex 64 coin which I sold to someone on the PCGS forum and it came back 62 the second time round, even though it was from the same service. I know there are a couple instances where the coin has been submitted, cracked out, resubmitted, cracked out, resubmitted etc and the grading has varied by at least two grades. This is actually quite important as we all know the way slabbing afficionados think, particularly those of the registry set mentality. Buy a coin you think is undergraded and resubmit in the hope of it coming back higher. Obviously overgraded coins do not get cracked out and this has led to grade inflation with 65s commonplace today relative to say 10 years or more ago. The Peck 924 in the recent Heritage sale (lot 29616) was in a 65 slab, despite having sat quite happily in a 63 for quite a long time. This of course led to 65 pricing rather than 63 despite not being a patch on the raw P924 sold by CNG a couple of years ago. It is now unlikely to be cracked out unless bought by a person who doesn't like slabbed coins, but can only find this example to buy (and there is only one other possible candidate as far as I am aware). Selective resubmission is an obvious reason for grade creep. I'm not looking to open the perennial can of worms that considers the merits of slabbing or not as this will doubtless be resurrected on a regular basis, but given the number of resubmissions and the fact that these coins are not normally identified in the population reports, it is an important consideration in the data available. I also collected halfpennies for a long time as a denomination and can vouch for the unreliability of populations having personally cracked out a considerable percentage of certain rarer pieces.

And another consideration is that money is not restricted in movement within most world economies. If this country is posing a relatively large risk to an individual's wealth, you can always sell pounds and buy Swiss francs which a lot of people did to the extent that the Swiss currency rose too high too quickly, thus endangering their otherwise sensible and stable economy. Switzerland's borders are also now quite intensely policed to ensure that individuals are not carrying more than 10000 (?) euros out of the EU to hide away. There are usually many reasons why an economy is either inflating or deflating, but those wishing to make a political point tend to oversimplify things and just use the crude average to say the economy is either doing well or in trouble. This isn't helpful.