A NEWP for me this time

[Hussulo 6]

Nice one Gary congrats. If decide to sell send a pm my way.

[Gary D 76]

Nice one Gary congrats. If decide to sell send a pm my way.

I'm still hoping in my heart of hearts that it can be attributed to be a Peck 2171 and take its rightful place in my 3d collection.

I think I need to see the piece listed by Peck, I assume it's in the British Museum. If so how do I get to see it, just walk in or would something like that not be on display.

To anyone out there with a copy of Peck, if it's not to cheaky to ask, would it be possible to have a scan of the 3d pages, it can only be 2-3 pages.

Thanks

Gary

[Chris Perkins 228]

You'll have to arrange an appointment with the BM, convincing them first that you're a genuine numismatist before they'll show you round and let you see specific things. It's not too difficult though.

[Rob 3,152]

Nice one Gary congrats. If decide to sell send a pm my way.

I'm still hoping in my heart of hearts that it can be attributed to be a Peck 2171 and take its rightful place in my 3d collection.

I think I need to see the piece listed by Peck, I assume it's in the British Museum. If so how do I get to see it, just walk in or would something like that not be on display.

To anyone out there with a copy of Peck, if it's not to cheaky to ask, would it be possible to have a scan of the 3d pages, it can only be 2-3 pages.

Thanks

Gary

Send me your email address & they are on their way. The P2371 in the BM was a gift from the Royal Mint.

[Gary D 76]

Nice one Gary congrats. If decide to sell send a pm my way.

I'm still hoping in my heart of hearts that it can be attributed to be a Peck 2171 and take its rightful place in my 3d collection.

I think I need to see the piece listed by Peck, I assume it's in the British Museum. If so how do I get to see it, just walk in or would something like that not be on display.

To anyone out there with a copy of Peck, if it's not to cheaky to ask, would it be possible to have a scan of the 3d pages, it can only be 2-3 pages.

Thanks

Gary

Send me your email address & they are on their way. The P2371 in the BM was a gift from the Royal Mint.

Thanks Rob your a gent.

According to Peck the piece in the British Museum is 1.5mm thick and weighs 69.2 grains. I have not measured mine but I estimate 1.5 mm to be about right and the measured weight of 4.52 grams backed up by the Royal Mint's 4.51g works out to be 69.6 grains.

I still think I need to see the BM piece but it's looking increasingly more likely that I have a Peck 2371

[HistoricCoinage 147]

Contact Mary Hinton at the BM and she'll be happy to arrange an appointment with you, I've met with her many times and she is very helpful.

Mary Hinton.

Administrator

Department of Coins and Medals

British Museum.

by email:

coins@thebritishmuseum.ac.uk

by telephone:

+44 (0)20 7323 8607

Kindest Regards,

Clive.

[Rob 3,152]

Thanks Rob your a gent.

According to Peck the piece in the British Museum is 1.5mm thick and weighs 69.2 grains. I have not measured mine but I estimate 1.5 mm to be about right and the measured weight of 4.52 grams backed up by the Royal Mint's 4.51g works out to be 69.6 grains.

I still think I need to see the BM piece but it's looking increasingly more likely that I have a Peck 2371

Obviously you would need to compare with a known genuine piece, but I would expect the genuine article to be fully struck ie. with a full rim. Yours is missing part of the rim, so this suggests to me a strike on the wrong type of blank. It isn't struck off centre to the extent that you have a lot of coin outside the rim to compensate for the missing rim which you would expect if the thickness is correct. The deviation of weights around the mean is quite high, so the similarity in weight could be coincidental. There was a thread on here about a Cu-Ni farthing recently. At the time I weighed a couple of dozen bronze pieces and there was a distribution range of about 10% around the mean.

On the plus side, very few currency pieces were struck in nickel, so it could be a P2371.

Edited January 17, 2008 by Rob

[Gary D 76]

Obviously until I can see the real thing this is pure speculation but I'm not totally convinced that a thin nickel flan would strike up totally.

My reasoning:

The minting process will have been carried out on a press of a suitable pressure for the job, to lower pressure and you don't get a complete strike. Too higher pressure and you could sqeeze the metal out and possibly break the collar. The threepenny bit was notorious for cracking collars.

If you put an incorrect flan into the press several things could happen. Too small softer or similar metal (insufficient metal) would result in a fully struck coin with a smaller and iregular diameter as the metal would not reach the collar or possibly a fully formed but thiner coin.

If the flan was of a harder material the set pressure would be reached before a full strike had occurred and again the rim would likely not be fully formed by the collar.

My coin and the Peck are both pure nickel. Nickel is much harder than the copper zinc alloy used for the threepenny peice. Obviously I have not seen the Peck peice but looking at mine the obverse is fully struck but the reverse is not. The reason for this is likely due to the greater depth of the reverse design so that the set pressure on the press was reached before the metal had finished flowing. This would also explain the lack of rim.

Anyway I think a day out to the British Museum is in order

Gary

[Rob 3,152]

It would be interesting to know under what circumstances the Mint donated the P2371 to the BM.

If it was intentionally struck, then you would expect it to be properly formed, after all the Mint had produced a series of Nickel pieces (1/-, 6d & 3d) in the 1920s which were all finely struck, so in the not very distant past they had experience of working with this metal at this thickness. My nickel 1/- is 1.90mm thick at the rim, though the small denominations will obviously be thinner and within the thickness of your piece. I don't have a book with the details of who was Master of the Mint in 1937, but Johnson arrived in 1922 and so it is quite possible that the first Nickel strikes were initiated by him. If he was still there in 1937, then were would be no excuse for getting it wrong.

If it was an unintentional strike that the mint removed from the currency 3d bin during quality control and subsequently gave to the BM, then it would not necessarily be a good strike. However, if the latter applies I would not expect Peck to have included it.

[Gary D 76]

It would be interesting to know under what circumstances the Mint donated the P2371 to the BM.

If it was intentionally struck, then you would expect it to be properly formed, after all the Mint had produced a series of Nickel pieces (1/-, 6d & 3d) in the 1920s which were all finely struck, so in the not very distant past they had experience of working with this metal at this thickness. My nickel 1/- is 1.90mm thick at the rim, though the small denominations will obviously be thinner and within the thickness of your piece. I don't have a book with the details of who was Master of the Mint in 1937, but Johnson arrived in 1922 and so it is quite possible that the first Nickel strikes were initiated by him. If he was still there in 1937, then were would be no excuse for getting it wrong.

If it was an unintentional strike that the mint removed from the currency 3d bin during quality control and subsequently gave to the BM, then it would not necessarily be a good strike. However, if the latter applies I would not expect Peck to have included it.

Yes I would tend to agree with you. But then on the other hand Peck was just cataloging what he saw i.e. the British Museum collection.

[Hussulo 6]

If it is a Peck 2171 that would be a great find. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you. Regardless it is still a great coin. I love coins out of the ordinary, hence why I collect errors.

Hus

[Gary D 76]

I have an appointment at the British Museum tomorrow to have a look at their Peck 2171. What else should I have a drawl over whilst I'm there, 1933 penny springs to mind

[Rob 3,152]

I have an appointment at the British Museum tomorrow to have a look at their Peck 2171. What else should I have a drawl over whilst I'm there, 1933 penny springs to mind

Enjoy your viewing of a P2171 1887 gold pattern penny. While you are there you might like to ask if you can see the P2371 3d struck in nickel

Joking aside, they will weigh yours when you arrive to ensure that you don't swap them over, so get this figure for comparison. Take a good glass with you to compare the dies. A large picture of yours would also be useful, and if you want, they will do a photograph of their coin too for a fee. As for what to see when you get there, you are spoilt for choice. Any examples listed by Peck in the BM will be available.

Edited January 24, 2008 by Rob

[Gary D 76]

I'm just back from my trip to British Museum and no further forward, I should have taken more notice of Peck. Although he did catalogue the British Museum collection what I didn't realise was that he also included in his book other collections.

The long and the tall of it is that the 2371 was from his own collection not the BM which was distributed widely many years ago.

The only way forward now would be to find Pecks piece in an old auction catalogue or such like.

I stopping in and had a chat with Mickael Goulby as he is only a few stops along the central line from the BM and I do not often get the chance to pass that way. He seemed to recall that Pecks collection appeared in a Spink publication, coin chronical or something like that but I had already been into Spink's who where unable to give any inkling into what happened to the collection.