Rob

They should be weighed in, then he could buy some more and start again. There are quite literally tons of coins that need to go in the pot. cdesteve holds a measurable percentage of them.

cdesteve must have taken ages to find such good coins. Not as low as the usual quality which is normally best described as 'defective washer, with traces of detail disfiguring the otherwise 100% proof-like blank'

Yes. I guessed 250K hammer. I was only a small house short of the final figure.

Somebody complained because the coin had lustre? Too nice to list on eBay or what? That's nonsense.

Yes, but you are fighting a beast whose loyalties are far from balanced. If you have the slightest problem then you will be out of pocket because of their policy of buyer good, seller bad. Even when selling crap you get problem buyers. The wife had one this weekend who didn't want to pay postage at cost and then left her a neutral because he wasn't happy with the coins (which had nothing wrong with them). That after she gave him the option to cancel when he moaned about having to pay postage in the first place. It's twats like that which make eBay a very unpleasant place to do business at times. Couple that with eBay's random account blocking and general dictatorial attitude and it makes Putin look like a nice guy. The customers are the people who pay a business's wages. These are called sellers on eBay, not buyers who do not contribute a single penny to their coffers. Now when you screw your customers (sellers) and give free handouts to buyers by refunding them and allowing them to keep the goods, the system is broken. As Dave said, not only the above but the inability to leave negative feedback or even communicate by email to other users means that everyone has a bad ebay day. Maybe an option would be eBay 1 and eBay 2. The first you have to pay to list with minimal or no final value fees, the second gives free listing but with final value fees. That would eliminate the vast majority of the crap from no.1 and make viewing the quality section slightly more worthwhile.

It isn't the lack of competition that makes me stick with eBay, it is the occasional moments of having nothing to do. I can say without any doubt that I use it as a gap filler by now. I don't actively search for the coins I need because I have neither the time nor inclination to plough through the crap for what is a fairly esoteric list. Even a couple thousand in the hammered section takes hours to sift through. There is no point searching for names like Edward, Harold or Victoria because half the people listing call him Eddy, Harry, Vicky etc. Hammerd is a favourite too. Anything sold or still for sale was on a list I gave to the wife a while back and will be recycled by her on free listing days using their bulk relist facility. When it runs out I will reconsider the position, but for now we are a passive user and have no desire to be more than that. If it sells it's a bonus, but nothing more.

Why does it have to be any particular character? Given most of these are punched in error, it follows that the punch wasn't checked before use. i.e it could be anything, even just a short straight or curved line punch as opposed to a letter or number. There is no certainty that the digit underneath had to be genuine, or that it had to be valid elsewhere in the series. It does hint of a 6 to my mind.

How do you define desirability? I like hammered, Peck can't be ar*ed. There are too many penny collectors on this forum, many would disagree. Some like bright coins, others toned. Some quality, others washers. This is too subjective to give a definite number. Availability is an ok parameter because it is a simple census and so is demand as long as you don't try to qualify it.

Sellers will presumably resort to free listings only. What ebay don't seem to realise is the mismatch between their demand for income and the relatively extortionate cost of a regular listing. Couple that with a system that encourages you to list crap because you don't get a decent price for quality and it is clear the wheels have partly come off the bus. Sellers get fed up because the degree of competition for material is typically not very great with anything other than the exceptional either not selling, or going for opening bid. To avoid the masses and get more eyeballs you have to pay to list. That increases eBays take to about 25% which is a lot of dosh to spend on someone who won't back you up in the event of a dispute. Buyers also suffer from the poundshop mentality where everything has to be a quid, whether good or bad value. Buyers get fed up because of the amount of dross listed. Virtually everyone I know who buys on ebay does a very limited search within what is already a fairly small subsection. List on a free listing day and the number of things available leaps to gargantuan proportions. Nobody has time to view them let alone bid on more than the odd item so you have to list at the minimum price you are willing to accept. There is no point listing if you are only going to get 3 or 4 views, or a single digit purchase rate relative to listings. Ebay is rapidly becoming passe. 10 years ago you could find quality within a relatively small number of listings. Today you find numerically fewer quality coins than ten years ago coupled with quite literally 10x the number of listings which are almost exclusively sh*te. Until eBay realises that less is more, it is best avoided. Note to ebay: there is another parallel universe out there which doesn't have ebay at its centre.

Cool. Nice spot. There's more than two known. I've got 4 on the list which I haven't updated for 5 or 6 years and I'm certain I've seen at least two more, one coming out of Baldwin's basement. Peck only noting 2 doesn't mean anything other than he knew of two that he came across when compiling his book. Peck's obverses 1 & 2 are the same. I've got Nicholson 116 which isn't wonderful, but you struggle to find much better. There are at least two obverse and two reverse dies used for this variety.

Hmm. Weird.

It's a mule of the first obverse and last reverse. http://www.colincooke.com/coinpages/nicholson_part2.html Item 116 refers

I think the greater problem is that of availability. You can have all the money in the world, but you can't force the reluctant owner to sell if they choose not to do so. There must be quite a few on this forum who have been asked how much they would accept or who have asked that question themselves.

Yep, but you might pick up a fine GEORIVS 1/2d for a fiver on eBay today if you're lucky. Not everything has increased uniformly. You can use comparison price multipliers to give yourself a ballpark bid for the better items.

1685 halfcrown in Fine Lima halfcrown in EF Proof halfpennies 1799 or 1806 1772 GEORIVS 1/2d in Fine

Seller is from Leeds, it explains it all. Nowt so queer as folk. Reminds me of time when a local group targetting minors had operated in the Blackburn/Burnley area and the local TV canvassed views of the event. One elevenpence halfpenny interviewed commented that there was too much paedofiddlia going on. so on that basis, maybe the pair need introducing to each other.

I also notice it has conveniently been described as the somewhat scarcer type 5 instead of the 3a3 which it is.

Could be nickel rather than steel using a blank for a completely different currency. What is the weight?

You are in good company. Most people are in a similar boat.

Visiting costs are a pain here as it costs £10 each time you go, but within the overall context of the collection is not much as that is only the equivalent of £4K insured value premium each time. We must be about the only place that charges them - probably another example of the cross-subsidy culture within the banking system. As always there is a general resentment at un-necessary charges. Given there is always someone on duty at the safe area and it can operate as a self contained cost centre, the £10 isn't to cover exceptional expenses.

At this stage, security is not a problem as any measures taken will far outweigh the replacement cost. Contents Insurance should cover small collections, though it would still be worth checking with the insurers. Presentation - really depends on how much you want to spend on it. Personally I like the traditional cabinet, so have a mahogany one myself. 50cm high x 50 wide x 30 deep is sufficient for around 500-1500 coins depending on the size of holes in the trays. A broad selection is good for 1000-1100. It isn't as expensive as you might think as you can buy a new one for £300-450(?) and second hand between 2 & 300. In the future, should you go down the route of putting things in the bank then 2x2 envelopes in a stock box is best. A bank box starts at about £150 and up per annum depending on the size. The bottom figure is good for around 4 stock boxes plus a few odds and sods. By the time you would be looking at a bank box, the contents insurance will no longer apply. At this point, a specialist insurer would be better than the bucket shops who can't relate to collections easily. Rates are typically 1/2% of the sum insured if kept in the home, reducing to 1/4% for that in a bank. They are quite flexible, so will permit you to mix and match with say e.g. 10% of the collection being out of the bank at any time and the premium will reflect what you have agreed. You still need the insurance as the T&Cs of the bank box don't give insurance for contents. As for TG's comment about storage inside the bank being in an open area, this will vary from bank to bank. My box at the bank requires two separate keys to gain access (mine and the bank's), so obviously it depends on the bank in question. Also, banks are trying to phase them out so it is difficult to find one these days.

True, forgot about that one. I think a lot of peope treat rare as a variable quantity along the lines of 'key date'. i.e. in the absence of any hard numbers, the rarity is relative to others of that type.

You might get a few disparaging comments about the first two, but the third would be contentious as we all drink different things.

I think the key is having a critical mass of diverse collecting habits coupled with a reasonable knowledge of the bits you don't collect. It makes discussion a lot easier rather than sounding like Speakers Corner.