Gollum

My problem is that I absolutely love the proof sets and the way they shine, the depth of the strikes and the clarity of the coins, I see them and they make me go weak at the knees, but, I know I will have to lock them away or some thieving little git will have them of off me. So, I thought I would also collect the run of the mill circulated sets that I can have at home to look at and drool over, and yet as much as I like the proof sets, i have to ask myself, are they "real" coins in the collecting sense, I mean proofs are ok but you buy them in sets, circulated ones whilst maybe grotty or knocked are life, they have a history, they have a story to them, they have mystery and in some cases the chase and allure of finding a rarer one is part of the fun, isnt it ?. I see the wisdom in collecting those older coins, the silver and gold ones, they are in some cases rare and alluring, yet, I will have to lock them away like marley or scrooge and I want to get them out at home and feel them, look them over and all that makes the chase worthwile. So, What do I do !. Chase one or the other, or both but the proofs in moderation. Ebay i hate you, it's like a kid in a candy shop, where to go, and where to stop.

Someone explain this to me. I saw this silver 1p that I took to be part of a 2001 maundy set, up for auction earlier, it then got removed as no longer available, then reappeared at the bargain price of £500 bin as very rare, have I missed something. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Coins-One-Penny-sliver-Very-Rare-/280798610442?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item4160e6c40a

I dont ever have much to spend anyway, you forget, I am married with kids, and as is usuall SHE gets first dibs on my wallet .

Hi Tom ,thanks for replying. So if I had a 1840 shilling that had say the nose missing and no other imperfections, and a 2001 shilling ( for the purposes of this explanation only !) with identical wear they would both be graded exactly the same then ?. If so the question has been answered for me. I just got the feeling that people allowed the grading criteria to be lowered from one century to the other merely for convenience of the coin they wanted or were selling was all.

That's not the first edition - which was 1969? 1970? But because the 1985 is more up to date than the 1st edition, and is also out of print, it fetches more than twice as much (usually). I never saw the point to that with regard to prices except to a book collector.

Thank you peter, it is the educational / reference content I need. So that is handy.

Are you really sure you want one.?A Spink and Collectors Coins GB would be a good start. A good read for the novice is Coincrafts 2000 catalogue.Ignore the pricing although it is about right now. Coincraft is a big lump of wood and can also be used to reach those high shelves or change a lightbulb. The old Freeman ones used to go for £100 and the new one £30/£35.Try a library copy. Peter, i already have a spink and CCGB 2011 ( of amazon ), I don't have the coincraft book though, but is it that good, I don't like borrowing from librarys because just when you desperately need to look something up the sods want it back.

Right, The Bronze Coinage of Great Britain by Freeman. Is there any major difference between the old 1985 print and the latest one APART from the prices. I ask because I can get the old one cheaper than the new one.

Ok I don't get it, whats wrong with a fir tree, it's huge and it sways like hell. My bike has lost it's front panels as they got brok when it fell over, not that I use it anymore but it's still mine. I don't uderstand the Biggish thing Pete, way over my head I am afraid . Big Issue. Ahh thank you Nick, the 1933 has dropped now.

Not sure what you're looking at? the 2 and 6? I'd say good honest wear in the 1st picture Worn die/worn coin. It isn't 6/2 if that is what you were hoping. How about this one? There is definitely something poking out from the bottom left corner of the six. 6 over 7 ?

Scratch that itch with postdecimal proof sets! Seriously, they go at auction for no more than half their Spink listed value, they are nice and shiny, and they don't cost a bomb. In fact, when I start looking out some coins for you, I intend to offload some of my proof sets - how does 1974 1975 and 1976 grab you? And maybe one of 1978 or 1979 into the bargain. I bought 6 sets for £15 and 10 predecimal sets for £4 from a postcard fair...they will sit there gathering dust...although one set is BU...can't resist a bargain...offers please in a plain envelope (John can supply cheap envelopes ) Do you mean the blue wallets? I'd say 40p each wasn't a bad price (just over twice face value) - if you can find any buyers! You can't usually find proof sets at £2.50 each -what dates were they? Yep the blue ones.& the proof sets were late 70's (some toned) over 30 years old now.They are a thing that I don't collect but have aquired.I found some old foreign unc sets from the 60's.They sold them in Smiths. As a side collection, I've started to collect pre-1965 US proof sets (working from 1964 backwards - have only reached 1961 so far, though...), the sets can be got relatively cheaply (recently bought a perfect condition 1962 set for only £10 on eBay! The silver content alone is worth more than that, though that really was a bargain) and the 1/2 Dollar, 1/4 dollar and 10 cents coins are 90% silver - I have problems with seeing base metal "silver" coins as real coins for some reason (though don't have this issue with copper...) Only silver coins I have are a 1964 and 1965 kennedy half dollar and a couple of sixpences. Probably not worth a great deal as silver goes. Only the 1964 Kennedy half dollar is 90% silver, the 1965-1970 issues had an outer layer of 80% silver and 20% copper but an inner layer of 20% silver and 80% copper, think it averages out at 40% silver or something like that - a bit like the 50% 1920-1945 50% British Silver I guess! I don't like em anyway, matter of honour, it aint british old chap. Still it's a coin.

Agree! A coin to me has to be a means of trade. Doesn't need to be legal tender, the test is whether it could ever be used or ws intended to be used in a transaction - such as tokens or jetons used for accounting, even communion pieces or theatre tickets I'll also accept proofs and patterns, if they are examples or prototypes of real coins Art medals are not coins. I wish cataloguers would confine such NCLT crap to the back of the book. Spinks take note! Krause are beginning to see sense, moving quite a bit to their "Unusual Coins" volume David (in grumpy old man mode) Well I suppose if you want to be technical about it David, it fits your criteria in one respect, it was indeed intended to be used in a transaction and traded. Whoever wants one has to part with a lot of cash in trade to get it. It's the devil in me I am afraid...

I just looked at the new kilo coin, considering the pictures on all the foreign ones about, this coin is absolutely but ugly. It looks like my kid took a pick-axe to it. http://www.royalmint.com/olympicgames/London-2012-kilo-coins.aspx?src=hm_SmallBanner_2012Kilo

Toning occurs naturally over a long period of time, cleaning toned coins in my opinion would only devalue it because you cannot clean every bit of the coin IE the LEGENDS, so a cleaned coin would be easier to spot. A toned coin basically states that the coin has not been cleaned, some people love toning on coins (Americans are notorious lovers of these) they even artificiallly tone them to try and increase their price so such an extent that its actually ugly. There is a huge difference between naturally toned coins and artificial toning. My opinion and advice would be to leave them to grow old gracefully. I tried to clean my pennies with Acetone as I have some here and I spotted Vicky I think it was saying about it to someone, their worthless so no harm done but I would not do it otherwise, and it failed miserably. I do however have a halfpenny from about 1959 that has a lovely dark gold/brown tone to it and no hairlines so I don't think it has been cleaned. Even though it is a recent coin I think it is pretty even with the tone but I wouldn't like to artificially tone them if I knew how. I was tempted to clean my silver sixpences just to make them shine that little bit more but I resisted when Peter I think it was told me not to, wisdom comes with age and Peter seems old .

Scratch that itch with postdecimal proof sets! Seriously, they go at auction for no more than half their Spink listed value, they are nice and shiny, and they don't cost a bomb. In fact, when I start looking out some coins for you, I intend to offload some of my proof sets - how does 1974 1975 and 1976 grab you? And maybe one of 1978 or 1979 into the bargain. I bought 6 sets for £15 and 10 predecimal sets for £4 from a postcard fair...they will sit there gathering dust...although one set is BU...can't resist a bargain...offers please in a plain envelope (John can supply cheap envelopes ) Do you mean the blue wallets? I'd say 40p each wasn't a bad price (just over twice face value) - if you can find any buyers! You can't usually find proof sets at £2.50 each -what dates were they? Yep the blue ones.& the proof sets were late 70's (some toned) over 30 years old now.They are a thing that I don't collect but have aquired.I found some old foreign unc sets from the 60's.They sold them in Smiths. As a side collection, I've started to collect pre-1965 US proof sets (working from 1964 backwards - have only reached 1961 so far, though...), the sets can be got relatively cheaply (recently bought a perfect condition 1962 set for only £10 on eBay! The silver content alone is worth more than that, though that really was a bargain) and the 1/2 Dollar, 1/4 dollar and 10 cents coins are 90% silver - I have problems with seeing base metal "silver" coins as real coins for some reason (though don't have this issue with copper...) Only silver coins I have are a 1964 and 1965 kennedy half dollar and a couple of sixpences. Probably not worth a great deal as silver goes.

Ok I don't get it, whats wrong with a fir tree, it's huge and it sways like hell. My bike has lost it's front panels as they got brok when it fell over, not that I use it anymore but it's still mine. I don't uderstand the Biggish thing Pete, way over my head I am afraid .

I didn't know the Fat Duck issued coins! I live not for from there - will have to see if I can get a tour of the facilities! I emailed her. Could we please have a larger picture of this coin showing the "unique" Heston mint mark please, we are amazed as the only H mint mark we know of is the Heaton mint mark. reply lol... err... umm... yes ..well. thank you for pointing out my error... i shall rectify immediately. kind regards, dawn.

Sure. I much prefer them to the countermarked pieces of 8. (By the way, George III had porphyria, he wasn't really mad.) Thanks, I didn't know that ... as a kind of coincidence, I have just started watching the film 'The Madness of King George' half an hour ago, I wonder if they will put the record straight? I hear it's rampant in the royal family still, they reckon Vikki had it too or such. Too much inbreeding with continental relatives and all that ya know. Bit like having our own UK rednecks.

If you're anything like the rest of them in here, you are never going to retire, its in the blood. You watch, you will think you are, then one day a coin is going to jump up and speak to you as you pass it in a sale or such and your back on the hook.

It's easy to get lost, I went round the london eye about 14 times in one night trying to get out of the darn place, car was complete with wife 2 kids and a friend coming from walthamstow and simply computers, more recently in the last 5 years I had a tom tom that got me lost as well. so much for technology.

Perhaps it's due to the mint being largely staffed by eastern european works like most industry here in the UK now. My wife works as a QA in a local factory where it's one thing after the next going wrong all the time. A while back they layed off most of the english workers in favour of busing in tempory staff. Once was the bigest employer in the town, now hard to find someone speaking english there now. Please do not get me started on foreign temps !, I once worked for de la rue as a courier in Basingstoke via another company, after picking up from DeLaRue I would then go round all the banks and on to london, park the Van up and then go to the one I had to do last ( I am trying not to be too particular as it is probably still sensitive) I often carried a half plate for some currency or other. One day I was asked to break in a new guy on the route, and he always had trouble after maidenhead getting his route to london. One day when he was sent out alone I heard he went missing, a full scale panic went on and everybody and I do mean everybody was alerted including ports etc, they eventualy found him sitting in Tadley at his parents home too scared to say what had happened, he had got lost at maidenhead and decided to go home, didn't have the brains to phone head office or alert DeLaRue security, it seemed he was carrying Bearer bonds for an insane amount as well as a half plate or two.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4035874/20-gold-bars-found-on-Paris-train.html

Scratch that itch with postdecimal proof sets! Seriously, they go at auction for no more than half their Spink listed value, they are nice and shiny, and they don't cost a bomb. In fact, when I start looking out some coins for you, I intend to offload some of my proof sets - how does 1974 1975 and 1976 grab you? And maybe one of 1978 or 1979 into the bargain. I bought 6 sets for £15 and 10 predecimal sets for £4 from a postcard fair...they will sit there gathering dust...although one set is BU...can't resist a bargain...offers please in a plain envelope (John can supply cheap envelopes ) Do you mean the blue wallets? I'd say 40p each wasn't a bad price (just over twice face value) - if you can find any buyers! You can't usually find proof sets at £2.50 each -what dates were they? Their mine I tell you, all mine, i lost them earlier. Well I am up for one of each set please, 40p each Peck ! bit expensive isn't it... Peter, give me a price in total please.

Danz, I hate to tell you this, but the one you say theywithdrew, erm it looks like plastic and even looks like it has the sprew from the mould on it from trimming... No wonder they withdrew that one.

Scratch that itch with postdecimal proof sets! Seriously, they go at auction for no more than half their Spink listed value, they are nice and shiny, and they don't cost a bomb. In fact, when I start looking out some coins for you, I intend to offload some of my proof sets - how does 1974 1975 and 1976 grab you? And maybe one of 1978 or 1979 into the bargain. :D I am smiling, in fact i look like one of the black and white minstrels !, oh god that shows my age doesn't it.