Red Riley

1946s were mint toned (as were 1944s and 1945s), so only the odd one or two which somehow escaped the treatment will be found with lustre. 1949 from memory was not an especially common year when compared with 1947 or 48, so that may explain their comparative scarcity in higher grades. I do however agree that collector activity skews the apparent rarity of coins with short mint runs. Try looking up 1918 and 19KNs on ebay.

From what I have heard, most of the 1950 batch went to Northern Ireland. Although the mintage given is twice that of 1951, they seem to be less common in the higher grades. I guess being closer to the centre of the empire, they became dispersed more easily and were hence more difficult to track down. I would be surprised though, if many were melted down in 1971.

On it's way. I have just packed it up and it will see the Post Office sometime tomorrow.

That would make them more than twice as rare as 1951s, and put them in 1860/59 territory. Like 1950 and 1951, it is conceivable that they all went to a specific location, and if anybody knows where this was, would they please enlighten us!

Yes, it is scarce but not really enough to make it worth much in average condition. The official mintage of 4.5 million is probably correct as no pennies were minted for the previous 3 years. Standard 1926s would turn up occasionally in change, but I never saw an ME in circulation. I have seen estimates that approx. 1 in 10 or 1 in 15 were MEs, but by the time I started looking for them, most had been whipped out of circulation by collectors.

I would go a little better than that, the legend is readable and the main points of design visible, so on wear alone maybe Fair. The photos are however rather blurred and it is possible that there is some damage that I can't see - or perhaps it has been cleaned? Given that it appears to have a convex shield, it is most likely F33 and worth a pound or two at most; a clearer photo would confirm. As a penny collector, probably the most likely to turn up a rarity is the 1926.

There do seem to be variations, but they only make a minor difference. You would expect a standard package to have a standard price, but it doesn't seem to have worked out that way. Without realising, on different days and at different Post Offices, I was charged £8.12 and £8.35 and I have no idea what the reason was. The double order I sent to the U.S. was charged at £14.46 and that went as 'Printed Paper' whereas the oithers went with a customs declaration, so I would say that the difference is marginal, if annoying. There is a much cheaper rate - about £4 something if I remember - which seems to involve somebody rowing an old bath tub across the Atlantic, but that can take 'up to six weeks', so I gave it a miss.

The shipping for 2 signed copies was over £14.00! How much is it for just 1 Del? For me to send one from here (Germany) would cost just £5.50 but I don't have any signed ones here. A single one worked out at (gulp...) £8.12 + cost of envelope at £0.49.

Aw shucks... This may sound a horrible cliche, but I hope everybody that reads the book gets as much enjoyment out of it as I did in putting it together. Some coins proved real stinkers to find in the conditions that I wanted, but the whole project carried with it a kind of 'thrill of the chase' which became really intoxicating. At the expense of sounding like a Hollywood Starlet receiving her Oscar, I would like to sincerely thank all the members of the forum that helped me out with coins and images of coins - all your names are acknowledged in the book - and I couldn't have done it without you. On the other hand, one or two distinguished engravers may be turning in their graves...

Never mind, it looks military so may yet have an interesting tale to tell.

Welcome to the club. Right, now - where to start! OK, you've found some coins in the garden. Now, I don't want to put you off in any way, but you must understand that such coins, less than 100 years and afflicted with corosion are very unlikely to be worth anything more than their metal value, so in a sense it doesn't matter whether you clean them or not. As a general rule though, with coins in better condition and a genuine value, don't. The better the coin, the less they should be cleaned if you get my drift; if you have a low grade coin which appears rather claggy, a brush over with a toothbrush may improve its appearance and shouldn't do much harm, but with bronze/copper coins, make sure you don't expose the bare metal - at that level, a good even tone is most desirable. If you do find anything of value, best to keep it as it is. In effect what you are doing is passing the decision on whether to clean or not on to the next owner. Most genuine collectors however would rather buy a dirty coin than one that has received less than expert cleaning. In a wider context, if you are seriously considering becoming a collector, look at what is for sale at coin fairs or with dealers. Browse the internet and even check out eBay - but with that site, exercise caution - if it seems too good to be true, it probaly is. Lastly, read up on the subject - there are some books shown above and a lot more available on the open market which can provide valuable information and shouldn't be too daunting. I could probably go on for days and days, but hopefully I have given you some pointers of where to start. Good luck!

You sure come up with some ineresting stuff. It might be worth 'minting' the odd coin in plasticine - could give you a better idea of whether the dies are genuine or for the production of forgeries.

Almost certainly been erased, possibly by putting on a lathe (in which case the reverse will have marks remeniscent of a record). Very, very unlikely to have been issued in that condition from the mint. Value? Probably nothing at all. Incidentally, a wee bit intemperate, Mr. H.

Frankly, I never bid on an item where the seller has less than 99.5! And I read all the negative comments.

Probably an unofficial medal of some sort. The inscription probably refers to William IV's controversial handling of the Great Reform Bill of 1832. Historians nowadays are inclined to treat him a little more kindly.

I stick with temple token. As I say, not my specialist area (it might just be someone's) but they do exist and it would seem logical to use demonetised coinage to form the basis of these tokens. If you have Sikh or Hindu neighbours, may be worth having a word with them as they may have been used in the neighbourhood at some time in the recent past. Would suggest you don't melt it as it does have historic interest.

It may not surprise you that this is probably a temple token, although hardly my area. If you can post a photo, someone may be able to give you more info.

If you haven't got the facilities to post a picture, I would mention that there really wasn't much going on in British coinange in 1789; the guinea, its fractions and a few maundy bits but that was about it. Possibly a trade token, although most of those were dated a few years later.

We are all (rightly) wary of coins being forgeries, but the majority of these could be told a mile off. You say that it looks right but is very marginally underweight. I still think the chances of it being genuine far outweigh those of it being a dud, and the odds increase dramatically if you got it from a reputable source. On the other hand if it came from China...

It is part of a maundy set issued around the time when the 1d-4d silver coins ceased to be used for anything other than ceremonial purposes; hence why they are often not listed separately. We are not talking rare here, and they were very fiddly to make, so I suspect the chances of this particular coin being a forgery are quite low. Incidentally, I would concur with PhilipC's valuation although the photos are such, that I would suggest a large margin for error!

You can't be that much of an amateur if you own one of these!

Certainly something better than that will be required. I have found that approx. 5mb JPEGs are about the base level needed to produce decent pictures. The vast bulk of the coins to be imaged will be silver, and it is much easier to produce good images of these than copper/bronze. In some instances, high resolution scans will be sufficient. There are a lot of ground rules which will need to be laid down about this project, and perhaps we should all spend a few days thinking about what we want out of it and how this can best be achieved. Nonetheless, the ball has begun rolling and it looks like a goer.

Look, I know it's my fault for bringing down the tone of this discussion, but there does seem to be the germ of a very good idea here. So, just to recap, the idea was to obtain a large number of images of hammered coins and to let the experts on the board decide their grade, and then publish the results. Wear on hammered coins is so random that anything too structured could end up by posing more questions than it solves but a large number of examples with, where necessary, considered opinions would be an extremely useful tool. I would be quite happy to contribute in terms of writing and photography, but the technical expertise will have to come from the specialists. Chris has already said (I hope not too tongue in cheek!) that he sees the project as viable, so how about it? I will also attempt to post this as a separate subject.

Look, I know it's my fault for bringing down the tone of this discussion, but there does seem to be the germ of a very good idea here. So, just to recap, the idea was to obtain a large number of images of hammered coins and to let the experts on the board decide their grade, and then publish the results. Wear on hammered coins is so random that anything too structured could end up by posing more questions than it solves but a large number of examples with, where necessary, considered opinions would be an extremely useful tool. I would be quite happy to contribute in terms of writing and photography, but the technical expertise will have to come from the specialists. Chris has already said (I hope not too tongue in cheek!) that he sees the project as viable, so how about it? I will also attempt to post this as a separate subject.

Many a true word... But doesn't it give you a warm feeling that our largesse has provided a wonderful servant of the community with a mere £700k a year pension.