Gary

Thanks Bob, Thanks B&CC, for the info. On further study it seems that just the last two digits are more widely spaced. As you say Dracott (have now dug the article out), mentions this occurence for other early 70`s halfpenny. Could it be assumed that a large quantity of 70`s Die was produced with just the 18 being punched and the other two digits being entered as and when needed? Cheers Gary

Have to agree with you there. funnily enough, all them years ago I did`nt find Monty Python that funny, these days!

I seem to remember reading or seeing somewhere of the mention, that for the 1870 halfpenny there are in fact narrow and wide date varieties. Can anyone confirm this? I am not talking of just the 0 being miss punched rather all date numerals being closer or wider apart. Cheers, Gary

It seems the french are not spared either, Ebay Forgeries In fact all three coins offered by this seller are forgeries. A new one now being the 1937 Crown.

Ok, most people were suspicious and rightly so. It is a fake. Maybe I should have worded the question different or just enquired under a guest entry as it seems the question alone made you suspicious. Point I was trying to make is that it is easy to be fooled by a picture. This fake was bought by a collector in good faith who after recieving it got in contact with me because the coin was not quite right..... I now have it here and the details are as follows- Dia 38,14mm Weight 18,8g and the thickness measured on the rim is 2,47mm. Should be Dia 38,9mm, Weight 28,2g and thickness 2,8mm. Alone the weight is a dead give away. Another is the colour, looks more like aluminium. Another oddity is who ever created this piece put a milled edge on it......... If you look at the scan of the obverse, you can actually see the milled edge, above the head. None of you spotted it. The legend is blurred and the surface is grainy and the design lacks the sharpness of the real thing. I have it from a reliable source that these things can be bought on the easten borders in bundles of 50 for a very little money. How long before they move on to other coins and whats more, get better at it? I do not think this is the last fake to fool the unsuspecting collector. My advice- Weight is a dead give away and very difficult to reproduce.

Hi german, thats a new term for me, what is a galvanocopy? and by the way I´ll let this run a little longer before explaining.....

If you saw this coin for sale on , say ebay, what would your opinion be of it?

Hi German, welcome to the forum. Rob, are you saying that all 1799 currency halfpennies have the three raised dots on the Obv? or have I misunderstood? I have a currency 1799 halfpenny on which I can find no dots at all, Obv or Rev. Cheers.

Hi Josie, thanks for that. I have now got my copy of the CCGB and have seen the entry however I`m not letting it go too my head

The spot of verdigris seen on the reverse looks to be dried out. It could be removed but will still leave a pitted surface, the damage is permanent. Light attacks of verdigris can be tackled with Contact Spray. This is a cleaning agent for electrical contacts. It is more effective on copper coins than bronze, probably due to the fact that electrical contacts are made from copper. It does not affect the patina of the coin. If you are going to try this then please try on worthless coins first and if you dont like the results then you know what not to do........ As for the O in Oarolvs, I am not convinced that it is an "O" . If you look at the O`s in CAROLO these are more oval in shape, where as the O in Oarolvs is almost perfectly round. How about a misaligned C being overpunched with a correctly aligned C with no attempt to correct the underlying misaligned C? If you closed the gap in the C in CAROLO then it would be as good as round!

would agree with Peter on this one, VG maybe slightly better but pitted and very dirty, looks like loads of gunk between the legend, not helping to preserve the coin at all. The light areas may just be the result of flash photograhy, the actual coin could be darker. I have never heard of this seller so cannot comment on his or her`s reputation.

I have over the last few months been watching with concern the increasing number of counterfeit crown sized coins being offered for sale on ebay. Here is one seller registered in germany who has no fewer than 7 items running at the moment. These range from hong kong dollars to 1935 crown. seller I have also seen real coins of good grades and years being bought by buyers from far easten countries and suspect that the counterfeit problem will get worse. At the moment they are easy to spot and poorly made, probably cast. Even though, these coins are being bought by unsuspecting collectors and I know of one who was dupped and refused a refund even though the seller worked in a well known bank here in germany. I have only been watching the german ebay, maybe similar coins are being offered on the british site! Watch out......

I´m sorry Hussulo but I totally disagree with you here. I have a 100% Feedback with over 600 unique sellers/buyers and I see absolutly no problem with with holding back my feedback after I have sold something. Firstly if the buyer has paid for the item then he has no reason to be afraid of recieving Neg feedback! Secondly, when feedback is left for me, I then have confirmation that the item has been recieved and then and only then is the transaction completed. Things can go wrong, lost in the post and all that, it happens. For this reason I only post feedback after a buyer has posted thiers, if something does go wrong then the Buyer is more likely to contact me before posting Neg feedback. The other way around, if I have bought something then I leave feedback after recieving it, regardless of wether the seller has already done so or not. In my opinion, like Chris said earlier, its a question of communications, if the comms are good then usualy there is no problem, whatever happens. I have had deals where problems have occured but due to good comms they have been sorted without resorting to Neg Feedback. The problem with comms as I see it is a problem that has only occured since the introduction of the ebay checkout system and the fact that most E-Mil providers, programms now use Spam filters. Firstly the Ebay checkout system reduces the communications (direct via E-Mail) and the spam filters filter out mails that should get through. The inexperienced user, more often than not, does not understand the workings off the spam filter and does not realise that they have to look in the spam folder to check that good e-mails are not being classed as spam and to tell the spam filter that this address is not spam. When I started on ebay you had to write directly to the email address given by the seller or buyer and in this way had direct comms as the person knew to expect an Email from you. Communcations is the Key. Cheers, Gary.

Same here, lack of time but also lack of expertise to create an interactive site. You can use any pictures from my homepage and if you require originals just drop me a line. It would probably be better to list the pictures required when and as needed, I am sure between us (Forum members) we can put together a pretty impressive collection! Cheers, Gary A link to my Site would be nice when you are up and running, I know there are many german collectors who would also be interested in your intended site.

I have just recieved my copy of the 2007 edition and after a quick glance through it, I must say I am impressed. I think this book is definitley going in the right direction. Colour Photos, and good ones at that. I have not looked too close for mistakes yet and do not expect to find any (many :-)). Well done Chris. What`s planned for the next edition? Listings from from the beginning of the milled series?

This story even reached the german papers. While having a break at a wayside inn today a workmate gave me his daily paper in which was a report about a British Squaddie, had to be did`nt it, no one else would be stupid enough, who blew his bum up with a rocket on the 5th nov. Now the whole world knows how strange we Britts are..........

I have on my homepage, a small picture guide, not brilliant and it is in german but you dont need to be fluent in german to look at the pictures. The problem with pictures is that they are only 2 dimensional and lack depth. If you are new to the game than it is always advicable to buy coins from a good Dealer, study them and the grades given first hand. This way you get a feel for grading. I am sure that the members of this forum can recommend some good dealers. wybritt also has a nice homepage, in english. You may find something helpfull here.

I too have a two headed penny. This one however is beyond me, George V and Elizebeth II. Why anyone would go through the trouble to do this is beyond me. You cant even win the toss with it! Again the two coins have been sanded or ground down and then stuck together. Weight 8.9 gramms so not a bad attempt, about 0.5g short.

Thanks Rob, thanks Gary. I got my head around it in the end and yes I also agree with you both 11 + J, F321. Just needed pointing in the right direction.

is it just me or has anyone else noticed the frequency in which this coin pops up on Ebay, mostly in very high grades. Over the last year there have been quite a few and all reach very respectable prices. There is one in there now 1860 described as EXCEEDINGLY RARE. Is it the same coin just doing the rounds or is it not as rare as thought? All the features described by the seller are normal for this overstrike, the A over A and the O in one. The die flaw to the right of the 1 of the date is identical to the one that I own. Also quite a few of the letters on the Obv are recut or double struck.

Does seem strange, I agree. The first two example were found here in germany at Auctions. The last example originated from the Uk via Ebay. I nearly missed the first one, due to the small size of the lettering they are easy to miss. I am sure there are more out there but I would still reckon they are much scarcer than say the 1865/3 penny which as we know commands quite a high price. This is probably due to the 1865/3 being well known and documented. I did send an E-Mail to spinks but got no reply! Chris said he would consider listing it in the 2007 Edition of CCGB, has anyone got a copy yet? is it listed? I still have to get around to ordering mine, probably do it after I finish this post. Like now.

a third example has now turned up, see scan. Not super, struggles to reach nF. I will probably be selling this one on on Ebay in the near future. Eyes open!! close up

Hi Guys, I have been trying to determine which Obv/Rev this coin has but cannot seem to pin it down. So I`ll throw it open and see what you come up with. Using Freemans it is either an Obv 11 or 12. If the CD from Mal Lewendon uses Freeman number then it should be an Obv 12, the R´s of BRITT and REG align with a tooth. As for the Rev, according to Freeman the only Rev paired with Obv 12 is L. However Rev L is a wide date and as you can see on the scan this is a narrow date Rev. There are windows to the lighthouse so Rev K is ruled out. This only leaves Rev J. Does anyone have the new edition of Freeman`s? Is there a new Die pairing listed for the 1875 Halfpenny, Obv 12, Rev J ?? Thanks And the Rev

I agree, not E over N but a repunched or recut E. The top underside of the E can be seen protruding below the repunched E. The " I " also looks to be recut. See enlarged scan.

Ok, lets see if we can sum this up. Rev D I have 2 examples, both of which have the 6 recut however they are not from the same die. One being recut slightly lower and too the left the other being higher and too the left. Both are different to the 6 o 6 shown by "Bronze & Copper Collector" above. This one seems to be a smaller 6 over a lower larger 6. Recut 6 - x4, at least 3 Dies or the same die recut several times (unlikely?) Recut 6 - with 1st 1 over 1 x1 Last 1 over 1 x3 Normal x3 (all F268A, 1860) Total Rev D´s listed above, 11. Obv 7 (Coupled with Rev D) R of REG recut x1 BRITT REG F D and colons recut x1 RE of REG recut x1 Normal x1 (F268A, 1860) and 7 with no mention of alterations. Obv 7 (Coupled with other Rev Dies) B over R in BRITT R over B in BRITT 1st T over much higher T in BRITT Ok, I think I have got that about right. Anyone wish to add to the list? The reason I started this was I thought that maybe the recut 6 was a identification mark for Rev D on 1861 halfpennies, however 3 have been reported with a normal 6`s so thats my theory gone out of the window. However it seems that that both Rev D and Obv 7 were subject to a lot of repair work which could be understood in the case of Obv 7 as this was the main Obv Die for the 1861 Halfpenny. The Rev D die however, if the rarity ratings can be believed (questionable), is quite rare which suggests it was not in use for long, the extensive repair work carried out on this die suggests, to me, otherwise........ Have a good one, Gary