Accumulator

Happy birthday guys!

You certainly know how to treat a lady, Stuart!

You mean ... the £700 I just paid for one ISN'T a bargain after all? If it's the one with the toothed border penny, it's a steal! :)

I'm always amazed at how many olympic torches have appeared on eBay. Hundreds of them. Personally I'd hang on to something like that, but I suppose needs must! On that basis, I'm sure some of these 50p's will appear over time. Just a guess… £5k? Then again, get it slabbed MS70 and sell it as unique through Heritage to a US investor/collector, probably for £20k+!

Depends on your definition! Remember, I've never spent 4 figures yet on any single coin, though that (almost) tempts me to. Without the buyer's commission, that was only 3 figures

Thank you guys! Actually I got it for a good price Peck, so you wouldn't need to sell much of your collection. Bidding was probably subdued purely on the basis of the lowish 62 grade. It's pocket porn, Stuart!

Here's my sole Eric P Newman win, which I'm sure was undergraded (at PR62 by NGC). The slab photos show the coin to be darker than these pics. The surfaces and detail seem excellent. It's catalogued as a P1095 pattern.

Anyone picked up a Newman coin yet? I didn't follow last night's auction but left a bid and apparently won a 1797 pattern, much to my surprise!

Thanks! The 1869 was quite a sharp strike, but I didn't like the quality of image which showed something that I wouldn't have been surprised to find had been cleaned. It was probably just the image processing, but I found it off-putting. I think they were 3250 and 2500(?) hammer.Talking of images, what did people use. The saleroom only had the obverses and the on-line catalogue on Spink's site was crap. In the end they supplied a hi res pdf file an hour before the sale started, but it was touch and go. It also made eliminating potential lots pretty simple. Another gripe is that Spink didn't give out advance notice of the sale to those that receive normal notifications. During the past few day there have been adverts in emails from Spink for share and bond certificates, or a wine evening celebrating China on the 17th - but nothing about coin auctions which I may just have been interested in. I only found out from GC yesterday who stumbled across it by accident on the saleroom. How did everyone else find out? Somebody needs to be shot for an appalling exhibition of coprorate negligence. I used the images on Spink.com, not the eCatalogue or pdf ones, but the images on the main webpage. These could be clicked-on and enlarged. I agree that the notice provided by Spink was terrible. I had a feeling that many collectors could have missed the sale, though the bidding suggested otherwise. I discovered it by accident through the Saleroom too. Good chance. Looks like two spots to me. It certainly isn't the Adams coin which was ex-Stacks 1997. You're lucky. I was on the verge of bidding on this out of boredom as it was definitely the best of the G5 proofs.I'm also glad the hi-res images gave a chance to look at the KN, which had a diagonal mark across the knee and a small verd spot at 7pm. That was a simple decision. Still looking for a decent example. I'm lucky you didn't bid too then, though it went higher than I would have liked. It would be nice to confirm with an image of the Norweb coin, but I doubt I'll ever be able to find one. I feel fairly confident with the deduction though. I looked at the KN image and saw the dink. I also noted a couple of the other coins had nasty fingerprints. I still wish I'd gone for the F-8C, but isn't that always the way post auction!

Are you using a device which accesses the mobile version of the board, Rob. The 'normal' version has always been ok. Initially the problem with the mobile version was it's replacement with 'Russian' gobbledygook, then just that some graphics were missing. All ok now though.

Fine on my iPhone!

I bid too, but also dropped out as it was only EF

1968 penny???

As a footnote, I managed to find something on Wikipedia regarding "The Empire Coin Co.", under an article on Quentin David Bowers: In 1958, while still in college, Bowers teamed up with James F. Ruddy — the first of several partners to figure in his career — to form the Empire Coin Co. in Johnson City, New York.[4] The company rode the crest of the mail-order boom in the early 1960s to become one of the nation's leading coin dealerships.[4] In 1965, Paramount International Coin Corp. acquired Empire. Bowers left the coin business to indulge one of his other great passions: automatic musical instruments.[4]

You've done it again… your mention of Norweb got me thinking Rob! The 1986 Norweb sale, part 3, lot 1148 is described as: "Proof Penny, 1932, similar [i.e. as the previously described proofs in the catalogue] (BMC 2315; Freeman 419, dies 3+B [actually a mistake, as this is the reference for the halfpenny and this is in the penny section of the sale]. Two spots on reverse, otherwise brilliant mint state, toned, extremely rare. Bt. Empire Coin Co. 1964". Unfortunately there's no photo in the catalogue, but here is the coin I just bought. Two spots on the reverse perhaps??

Even the pre-auction prices for tonight's Heritage sale are top-end! Spink's live bidding just about held together, though it was often delayed. Heritage still beats them hands down on that front.

I looked at the 1c too Rob, but decided I'd rather add another penny to the collection instead. In the end I bought the 1918H, as I've been struggling to find a good one and the price was very reasonable. I also bought the 1932 proof, for which I probably paid too much, but wanted to add to my 1934, 1935 & 1936 'run' (minus 1933, of course!). I've seen 3 other 1932 proofs, two impaired and a nice one ex Gregory. None of these are mine so I need to do some research! In hindsight I wish I'd gone for the 1860 1* + C, F-8C but it was so early in the auction that I didn't have a feel for the bidding levels. I also spoke to another major collector in advance of the auction who was very keen on the coin so didn't want to outbid him. In the end he didn't win it either! There were lots of bidders in the room, so presumably many US collectors: Bob or Gary among them, perhaps?

F-numbers? AAAAGGGGHHHH! I love my pennies but just can't relate to raw reference, hence it took me about 20 minutes to decipher this post!Anyway, going back to the original coin under scrutiny, I was talking to an old oppo of Rob's the other day re Soho proofs and patterns and since he's something of an expert I tend to listen to what he says on the subject, which was that anything less than hen's teeth rare and nigh on perfect may prove hard to shift as there aren't that many type collectors out there. Those that there are have by and large got the common stuff in better grade than you are likely to come across on the market. Deciphering all that, I think he would say don't touch it with a bargepole. That's a fair point Derek, but if you're trying to build a new collection for yourself it doesn't help to know that all the other collectors already have wonderful examples! It might be better to deduce that, in building your collection, you should only buy the very best examples as these will be easier to shift in a very limited market.

Good for me now. Thanks Chris!

I do know Gary from this forum and from a few exchanges of emails. I also have one or two of his coins. You'll find several other keen bronze collectors here too. Well done for having put together a fairly complete collection. I have a long way to go, but do collect right back to 1797, which widens the scope. Like you, I tend only to collect the Freeman 'numbers' with the obvious Gouby varieties. I don't often bother with the date width variations or filled-die type errors. Both F-21 and F-41 are great finds, especially if in better than 'washer' condition. F-148 isn't so common in high grade, but UNC examples are out there. Baldwins sold one last year from their fixed price list. I tend to agree about the F-169. VR Court found 2 in 1700 coins searched, but I honestly think he was lucky. They seem rarer than that.

Lovely coin and excellent photos which really capture the tone and texture.

I had the problem on my iPhone earlier this evening, but it was fine on my Mac. Works generally ok on the iPhone now but a few graphics are missing.

I agree, it's a lovely example of Peck 1325. I only have the 1321, (which is without the faulty 1 & 0 in the date, though apparently slightly scarcer). Price seems too high though, around $1500 would be the max for this coin in my opinion. Anyway, that aside, welcome to the forum! There are many copper & bronze collectors here and we'd be interested to hear more about your coins.

No need to feel you've missed the boat, Peter…. I have 10,000 Accumulatorbenefit Bitcoins which I'd be happy to pass off sell you for just £1 each! Health warning: Remember that the value of any investment is far more likely to go down rather than up but don't let that put you off.

Betty Botter bought a bit of butter. But the butter Betty bought was bitter! So Betty bought another bit of butter, better than the bit of butter Betty bought before. You're wasted! No, I mean you're wasted! Ok, I will come clean, I am actually a bot - a SpamMaster 3000TM. And one of my advanced functions is to generate random tongue-twisters on web sites, based on key words - this one was triggered by Coinery's use of the word 'botter'.You can't beat a better bit of botter! The standard of post in this forum is very high. I've learned a lot here. Sure you mean 'waisted', after eating all that butter!