Paulus

I have the same problem, just tried accessing the Forum using the IPB app on my iPhone 4 - Russian!

I do understand (honestly!) - it's just the 'obviousness' of it that could be improved I feel ... any truth in the rumours that you might be involved in some future publications??

It does make sense, I guess it just wasn't obvious (enough) to me ... if I examined hammered more than once in a blue moon it would be second nature I'm sure. I think it's more obvious when the run is numerically ascending (e.g. 25-32), rather than descending (e.g. 77-27)

Never knew that, thanks Stuart! You're not the first person to say that, so obviously there is a minor issue with interpreting the information laid out. As Stuart described it is as it is. How do you interpret the mms employed? In this case I thought it meant that the mm could be either 77 or 27, it was not intuitive to me that 77-27 was a range of mint marks! Better in my opinion if Spink listed the applicable ones in all cases, e.g. S. 2562A, but now I know! Still learning, and will be for ever!

Blinking white balance, it will be the death of me! Thanks again!

Never knew that, thanks Stuart!

Thanks Rob, I was staring at that page and couldn't see the reference to the acorn mm, but there it is, pictured!

I am disposing of a bunch of coins on the Bay, and hammered really isn't my area! I think this is a 6d, I think it is 1573, and I think it is mm 65b (Acorn), but I can't find such a combination in my Spink (2013). Any help much appreciated! Stuart?

Betty Botter bought a bit of butter. But the butter Betty bought was bitter! So Betty bought another bit of butter, better than the bit of butter Betty bought before. You're wasted! No, I mean you're wasted! Ok, I will come clean, I am actually a bot - a SpamMaster 3000TM. And one of my advanced functions is to generate random tongue-twisters on web sites, based on key words - this one was triggered by Coinery's use of the word 'botter'.

Betty Botter bought a bit of butter. But the butter Betty bought was bitter! So Betty bought another bit of butter, better than the bit of butter Betty bought before.

Wow. That's something that us lesser mortals can only dream about.Needless to say it's the pride of his entire HC collection! He bought the complete set from an elderly family friend who was bequeathed them (along with other significant HC's) by a family member/collector who'd pulled them at the year of their issue!Fabulous story, and quite an asset, to say the least! I must press him for some images???? Yes please do!

LOL!...Make that Feb 11th......not military time. I knew that! but I can never resist having a pop at the totally illogical US date format Amazes me that it doesn't cause constant confusion for the first 12 days of every month, since some use month/day and others (and internationally) use day/month!

I don't know where to get UNC decimals (other than from the RM itself!) but a while back I decided to grab nice examples of the £2 and 50p commems by going to the bank and exchanging notes for bags of them ... any unwanted examples can obviously just be changed back in to notes at no cost. Some of course are less UNC than others, and there are many duplicates and non-commems in the bags, but also quite a high percentage of high grade commems, and might be a fun exercise?

Those you mention are all image formats, so the Windows default picture viewer (or MS Paint) would cover most of those. If not, a free download such as Paint.NET will do the trick. thanks I can thoroughly recommend Paint.net

Be interesting to see if he sells any?Link

Absolutely NOT.

Beautiful coin Sword. It doesn't look dipped to me. Nice clear fields! I agree, looks like natural beauty to me!

Not for me, no. Imagine the exact same situation with brand new proof dies and a polished blank. It's still going to be slightly sharper than your currency piece and should get a higher score. I agree Nick, but what if there are no proofs for that denomination/year? The way CGS say they do things (which I agree with), is relative to benchmark coins for the same year and denomination, so it should be theoretically possible to achieve any score out of 100 in any year for any coin?You couldn't have a different scale for every year. It would be chaos. I would imagine that in a year with no proofs, the maximum grade achievable would be 90-ish. I don't think they should have a different scale at all. I think a proof coin is a different coin type, and grade-able on its own merits relative to others of the same type

Well that is what is I hoped someone would say, otherwise what is the point of a 1-100 scale if only the top grades can be achieved by proof coins, while proof is not a grade?Does anyone have an example of a non-proof CGS 'fdc' coin? Still feels like a bit of an oxymoron ... Edit: our posts crossed Nick, do you have a take as to how an fdc description can apply to a non-proof coin? If you look at CGS UIN 2043. It is an 1816 shilling and has been graded as a 91. However, if you're expecting to be dazzled by the quality of the photograph, you may be disappointed. CGS UIN 8978 is an interesting one. It's an 1884 shilling that is ex-Cheshire collection, previously NGS MS-64. CGS has graded it as 90. I do have a problem the the grading and pics of the first few thousand CGS slabbed coins, and am very wary when considering buying any! They seem to have become a lot better with grading, photography and consistency after the first couple of years, IMO

Not for me, no. Imagine the exact same situation with brand new proof dies and a polished blank. It's still going to be slightly sharper than your currency piece and should get a higher score. I agree Nick, but what if there are no proofs for that denomination/year? The way CGS say they do things (which I agree with), is relative to benchmark coins for the same year and denomination, so it should be theoretically possible to achieve any score out of 100 in any year for any coin?

I would love to see your toned UNC 1897, just so that this post can morph from TPG toning through cross-TPG grading to toning! Is it bright or toned?

I'm sure special dies were not created for the 20thC VIP proofs, more likely first strikes on prepared flans and PROOF is NOT A GRADE - grade by definition is a measure of wear This is part of my point, it's as if the top scores are being reserved for proofs, which, as you say, should be treated separately and are not an indication of grade

I quite like the idea of having a 'poor but passable in a dark tavern' contemporary counterfeit in my collection! Especially if there was a humorous error!

Well that is what is I hoped someone would say, otherwise what is the point of a 1-100 scale if only the top grades can be achieved by proof coins, while proof is not a grade?Does anyone have an example of a non-proof CGS 'fdc' coin? Still feels like a bit of an oxymoron ... Edit: our posts crossed Nick, do you have a take as to how an fdc description can apply to a non-proof coin? I hear what you say, but all things being equal an early strike proof should be better than an early strike non-proof. Therefore, if you measure them on the same scale, there must be a region at the top of the scale that a currency strike cannot reach. Agreed, the likelihood of proofs achieving the very top grades is much more than non-proofs. I wonder, for years where there are no proofs, whether the very top grades are even theoretically achievable? I am just playing devil's advocate here, the subject interests me!