Chris Perkins

I've got a nephew that was born in 2013. Instead of 2013 I'm going to go for 1913 for him (when one comes along in a collection). 100 years earlier, better value, actually circulated and some real handheld history instead of peddled RM modern junk, struck in appallingly low relief. The 1980s Machin coins are quite nicely made compared to the modern ones.

I've probably had hundreds of varieties and have just paid them into the bank without looking! I don't think anyone likes to look at them for longer than is absolutely necessary, so maybe varieties have been missed. Perhaps you can post a picture.

I've recently put some new coin on the website, including: An Anne 1714 Farthing (P743 'ANNA REGINA') Most of the 1990 to 2014 £5 crowns in UNC or better A couple of older crowns A few inexpensive random foreign coins A few farthings, sixpence, pennies and other denominations

No certificate will mean that the coin was originally in a set and has been broken up, so had no single cert originally (the cert would have mentioned all the coins in the set). There isn't really a difference in value between normal striking and proof as far as I'm concerned. Both were made in very large numbers - large enough numbers to always satisfy the small demand for them. A stonking faultless UNC-normal (and they usually are UNC as they didn't circulate) or Proof versions may be worth a small % over the current bullion value, so I would have thought you'd be able to currently find one for under £200. I buy them at just under bullion where possible and if I had one I'd price it just over. Not sure what EF uncirculated is though, as it can only be one or the other and in fact finding one worn down to EF is probably quite difficult! Perhaps it indicates that the packaging is EF and the coin UNC. I expect it's a birth year so only 1981 will do, but I've currently got a few earlier years on offer here: http://www.predecimal.com/coins-sale-british-gold-coins-c-51_187.html

I can't see any rare coins in the RM picture. The real rarities are of course the cock-ups - 1983 NEW PENCE 2p and the Olympic Swimmer 50p with lines on her face. My favourite scarce (or perhaps it also counts as rare) decimal is the 1999 standard reverse £2 coin. They simply cannot be found in UNC/BU condition simply because the 1999 year set didn't include one for some odd reason (it included the Rugby commem). It's not a low mintage at all, but it seems all 38 odd million of them got used and abused. That's one for the future, if you can find one! I can't.

I hate it when that happens! Nothing worse than going to buy coins and sensing that the seller is starting to take a real interest in them and wants to keep some/all.

Oh yes, it mentions the altered date even! RRR in a recognised and highly regarded work like D&H can't be a bad thing even if some of the R ratings are out of date.

There are so many varieties of this token, and also known forgeries. D&H nos. 77 - 102 plus umpteen forgeries. I would imagine the cocked up date may indicate that it's a counterfeit (which are rarer). You'd probably search long and hard to find someone that specialises in just these Mining and Copper Company tokens in the hopes that he/she would pay above the odds for it.

Would have sold for about £30 without the hype. Good luck to the buyer when he wants to sell it. And the article states it's the only silver 2p in the world, even though it's not the only one and it's not silver.

I think taking the nick out of the edge was a mistake. The XMF machine proves they are genuine to me, as I think they read the metal past the first fraction of a mm, under the surface, which generally rules out any form of plating.

Or someone has machined it, for fun? The weight would be a clue.

Jason, I'll upgrade your PDF versions of the eBooks to the epub versions free of charge.

List the numbers of each pre 1947 silver coin Carly and I'll see if that £50 is about right. Are the foreigners silver (coloured) at least? Some countries still had silver content up to the late 60s, but not all that many. Generally foreign coins found in accumulations like this are ordinary coins from foreign trips, as Clive mentioned above.

Carly (facepalm (in your pic)), If they are just normal used coins from circulation (lots of people saved them in the 60s) generally the coppers are fairly worthless. The bulk of any value will be in the pre 1947 silver coins (for the silver content). It usually isn't really worth presenting them in any way, as they are almost certainly just worth the metal value, which could still add up to something worthwhile as the silver coins are worth many times their face value.

I think Halfpenny Jon and William kind of grew out of coins a bit I think, i.e. got on with learning whatever they were learning - no doubt boozing and babes and babies may have got in the way for some of the early members. I bought some coins off both Jon and William many years ago. And for young people now there is social networking. Forum? What's a forum, we may as well all be using ZX81's, we're so old.

In that condition, even with less doubt about it being a 'C' coin, I would have thrown it straight in the bin! I hope you get your money back for it.

Must be late Victorian then, I'd forgotten they called Florins 'Two Shillings' then, as well as later.

It looks like a toy coin (for kids) and is probably made my Lauer of Germany. Often Lauer is mentioned in the obverse legend. Actually it's a bit late for Lauer I think, so could be another maker. I sometimes wonder how many times these have passed through the digestive systems of children!

There are quite a few mentioned within this forum, too, over the years. It is no longer 1973 and thankfully there are search engines to aid people in finding lists of known forgeries etc.

I just logged in to have a look. So far there are 5 English fakes (3 milled, 2 hammered), 1 Chinese and 2 Ancient Greek listed, so currently very much in its infancy, it would seem.

The poster obviously didn't know who I am and seems to have posted an identical post in at least one other forum, so it could be some kind of advertising agency doing the posting. But it was actually very revealing to me Rob, as it confirmed my belief that dan.t.he.man of Pickering, does have an involvement with the new Westgate Supplies, which is very interesting.

On the subject of fakes, the BNTA have just launched a website for members with user name and password protection, where known fakes are documented and shown (I assume, I haven't looked yet). Apparently users can also add fakes to the database. The information is not available to the public and this is the reason: After much thought, and consultation with many of the BNTA members, the Council decided that the best route to take with the forgeries database would be to protect the information in a “members only” section of the website. This means that the information is not shared with the public and genuine collectors are not put off from building their collections by knowledge of the quantity of that forgeries exist. The best way to battle this problem is to educate ourselves as members of the BNTA and feed this down to our clients when helping and advising them to buy coins. So, this concept boosts one of the core ideas of the BNTA : that collectors should look for the BNTA symbol when buying coins and are advised to seek out BNTA dealers when building a collection. The private nature of this information also adds value to your membership of the BNTA, with access to information that you would not be able to easily find elsewhere. I think that's a wrong decision and it seems to suggest that collectors are a bit silly and that they all really need a BNTA god to offer guidance. Many novices do need guidance, but surely the best way to battle any problem is to educate EVERYONE, not just a minority group of UK coin dealers. It would be nice if everyone was aware of the BNTA and that collectors actively looked for the BNTA symbol, but I suspect of all the coin sales on the internet in the world, less than 1% is made by a BNTA member and that nearly 100% of the coin buyers either don't know who the BNTA is, or don't really give a toss!

No response then? Expect a letter to your home address in the next couple of weeks, Dan. And I will of course remove the link above for the moment - we can certainly talk about that and I don't mind linking to you when things are sorted.

I like my music like my forgeries.... brassy. It also made me proud to be an American, although I've never been there and have no connection to the USA whatsoever!

So you are still both working together then? I suspected so, as the addresses were the same. Don't we have a bit of an outstanding issue, Dan? Contact me please. I'm in the UK next week, perhaps we can meet up.