DaveG38

I don't think I want to see the EF details of Azda's arse, but others.........

Especially as the authorities can't agree whether it's a pattern or a medallion. And the Nicholson example was sold by Colin Cooke for £550, and wasn't much different with respect to grade, although it did suffer less corrosion, but had less detail remaining. At best, I'd say it might be worth a punt at £900, but not £9,000. Even then it's not a pretty sight, but then many specimens of this era in well known collections are not in top condition either.

I know its a major rarity, but £9k in that condition looks optimistic to me - still there may be a halfpenny collector who must have it!! http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Very-very-rare-William-III-1-2-Half-Penny-please-see-description-/281050802344?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item416feee8a8

Sorry to hear that But if it's been in your family that long, it should be ok. Your best bet is to put it in an auction rather than accept (at most) 2/3 of its value from a dealer. Unless you need the money quick, of course. You'll lose up to 20% in an auction, don't forget! And don't forget tthe buyer's premium, which any buyer will factor into the price they have to pay. Overall, you could be effectively back to a dealer's price of 2/3rds. Except that you never know what will happen in an auction where two bidders will go at it in a war of attrition, or maybe not. It all depends.

I am one of those who just misses out, having been born in 1950, although I do accept that I won't be caught by the new age at which pensions start to be paid. In practice, I retired at 56 on a company pension and so I'm not too worried about the changes, since the difference of between say £106 or £144 per week isn't that much for me to bother about. However, I do accept that for some people it may well be a considerable disadvantage if they don't get the new rate. Having said this, rather like the benfits increase 'cut' recently announced, all of those pensioners who receive the £106 per week are not going to be worse off, they just won't be as well off as those who get £144, so in a sense nobody loses. It's just that some win a bit more than others. What I don't understand is why there is a cut off at all. One of the reasons for the simplification has to be the costs of administering the system and I'd have thought that the maximum savings would be made by simplifying it for everyone. By keeping two systems going, and with one of them slowly withering as pensioners die, I'd have thought it would make sense to simplfy the whole thing, cut the admin costs and keep everyone equal. But there you are, what do I know? It's a bit like child benefit. There was all the hoo-ha about who got it, who earned what and with some households earning far more than the threshold to get it, but because two workers were involved they kept it, but in others where there was only one breadwinner they lost out. All of this could have been avoided and simplified by completely removing the benefit for new children. In other words all existing families continue to get it, but from the date of the new rules all children born afterwards don't. All that was needed was to bring in the rules at say April 2013, having given notice in the autumn statement 2011 that this would happen. That's a 18 month notice period and is plenty long enough to ensure that choices are made about the affordability or otherwise of another child. In short nobody who was pregnant in the notice period would lose out. In this way, child benefit becomes a payment that reduces over time to zero. Sorry, but this is one of my hobby horses.

Ah well, we all make msitakes. It did amuse me a little though.

I love the description of this one. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110999976953&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:GB:1123 It's described as 'COINS VICTORIA JUBILEE HEAD PROOF THREEPENCE 1887 GOOD EF'. It's not Victoria. It's not the jubilee head. It's not proof. It's not 1887. It's not Good. It's not EF. That just leaves coins and even then it's just a single coin. Otherwise a great buy at £20.00+!!! To be fair, I'm assuming the seller has put up the wrong photos.

You are lucky to win a coin. I put in my bid for one I have been looking for for years, at a value well above the estimate, only to find that I haven't won it, even though the winning bid was £60 under my top one. To put it bluntly, I'm Mr Pissedoff.

This ones decribed as in F-V/F and as a 'hole filler'. Can't think of a better use for it than helping with filling a hole - indeed its a pity it was brought out of the hole in the first place. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1719-GEORGE-1-HALFPENNY-F-V-F-/261147232467?ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:GB:1123

this one £23.40 + PP - though there are lots of similar on Ebay (avoid Chinese sellers!!!) needed a bit of fiddling to work out how to work it, but quite happy for the price NB only useful for looking at detail, won't do a whole coin David, Thank you for this info. Looks really useful.

Thanks Bob, I was totally unaware of that obverse variation - will try and get a better image of the A in my specimen played with my new toy - a cheap USB microscope, on my 1860JA details of the N over Z, the recut O of ONE (hard to spot on my coin), recut R of REG, and yes I agree an odd A in VICTORIA David David, What's the product and how much? The quality of the images looks really good and I think I must have one.

All I do when sending a coin is place it in a plastic wallet and cellotape the wallet to the invoice in such a way as the coin can't slip out. Simples and easy to remove.

Hi Chris, This question is a bit of a cheek, but I hope you won't mind sharing some information with me. I'm currently in the early stages of producing a book on 20th century coins and I need to refer to many of the 'standard references' such as Davies, Peck, Freeman etc. My concern is about what permissions I need in order to quote information from these sources. What I have in mind is say Freeman or Peck numbers, rather than actual quotes from the text of the books. In your Rotographic series, for instance in Collectors Coins GB 2007, you use Freeman and ESC numbers to identify the coins, and I wonder if you needed to approach the publishers for permission to use them. It may be that this isn't necessary and if so I would be pleased to know as I wouldn't have to worry about this aspect of the task. I hasten to add that my 'book' will cover an entirely different area of coins than yours so there would be no direct commercial overlap. In other words, you needn't worry that you would be helping a rival!! Thanks in hope DaveG38

I've not seen ANY 1927 or 1937 proofs in slabs. http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_trksid=p3984.m570.l1311&_nkw=1927+proof+set&_sacat=0&_from=R40 Not a slab in sight! I'd like to see them slab a 1927 proof set case!

For $48 I'd want a whole coin, not half a one.

How did this project work out DaveG38? Both published! To avoid bias, and I couldn't find them for sale on Chris's site, just type 'David Groom Coin' into google and you'll find them! Amazon is the expensive way to get them. I offer them to forum members at £6.99 for the bronze and £9.99 for the silver. And if you want them signed then that comes as free bonus!! The only additional cost is Royal Mail, where the cost to send one book is pretty much the same for both. If you want one or both let me know.

The prices being charged by dealers on vcoins.com look a bit on the optimistic side to me.

Very true, '49! I am constantly struggling to find decent stuff on there these days. I like to stock up on commonish (not dirt common) 20th century stuf in high grade and I'm now finding myself forced back into the 40s, 50s and even 60s. Either that or drop my standards on grade, which I can't do. I'd much rather have nice common coins than older duffers. I'm an older duffer and I resent being rejected!!

Even straight from a mint bag - Churchill crowns seem to be a magnet for contact marks. Well, he's sold 3 already, so he's got his money back!!!

If you've got a 1686 then I'm interested.

if in acid i would have imagined the whole coin to be affected not just a liitle bit as shown. as acid makes a mess of anything Acid will affect all areas equally so the thin areas will go first, but you will retain a surprising amount of definition Putting a penny into concentrated nitric acid is a fun school "experiment". The copper gets oxidised leaving the steel penny behind. If done properly, you will end up with a very nice steel penny with the details of the coin preserved. If you are in a bit of a hurry and put a load of pennies in (with some on top of others), you often end up with patches of copper on the pennies. (However, poisonous brown fumes are produced in the process and it is not something to try at home!) Dinitrogen Tetroxide - N2O4

I wonder if anybody has ever bought or found a cut half and then found the other half at a later date. What odds on that I wonder.

You need to keep cats and lilies apart - the flower's pollen is poisonous to cats.

Blimey that's worth over £3K! My father-in-law took to collecting Royal Mint products for a while and subsequently gave them to me. This was one of the purchases. He gave me a good start at a date run of 20thC sovereigns as well. The only trouble is that I now find I need to keep all of them at the bank.

The only Piedfort I have is the 2004 Entente Cordiale crown in platinum - given to me - nice present!!