U. S. Coin Die Lifespan
JeffMTampa
Posts: 3,281 ✭✭✭✭✭
I'm writing an article for a Coin Club journal. In the article I want to make reference to the average lifespan of coin dies in the late 19th to early 20th Centuries. As I recall, I read not long ago that the dies averaged about 200,000 strikes before being retired. Rather than just winging a number in this article I would like to find a credible resource for this information. Can anyone assist? There must be a good book somewhere.
I love them Barber Halves.....
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There are quite a few variables that impacted this. What denomination is this in regard to? Obverse or reverse?
Shouldn't the mint be destroying coin dies every year to stop counterfeiting?
i do recall seeing that kind of info here on the forum previously. varies quite a bit by time period and method of striking. i think my favorite is the horses/mules walking in a circle!
Specifically I'm looking at 1893 Quarters, Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!
The person that may be able to help you the most would be RogerB, unfortunately he is no longer here.
I Think there is a chance you could get in touch with him on Vamworld.
I believe Roger is available on the NGC forums. But...he discusses a lot of this in one of his books I believe. Maybe From Mine to Mint?
Looking for Top Pop Mercury Dime Varieties & High Grade Mercury Dime Toners.
I have Roger's book and found a reference- just not very conclusive.
Awesome, send him a message via the NGC Forums and he will likely reply.
Looking for Top Pop Mercury Dime Varieties & High Grade Mercury Dime Toners.
Roger would be the "go to" guy for this type of info. He's helped me on the die life of Buffalo nickels.
It can be done on earlier series, like the Liberty Seated Dime.
Here most of the dies used have been identified, and you can divide the mintage by the number of dies.
There are also mint records about the number of dies shipped.
Some dies are not used, though.
For Philadelphia dies, often the reverse dies are not separately identified, so for those I'd suggest starting with the obverse dies.
https://www.seateddimevarieties.com/Date_mintmark_variety.htm
Of course, sometimes the last die is not used until failure in a low mintage year.
A few sample dimes:
@yosclimber thanks for the stats. Very interesting for sure. Have a good day. Peace Roy
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I assisted Roger B. with transcribing hand written documents to typed a few years back. I have an email address; I just reached out to him. I'll report back what he says.
@yosclimber where did your information come from? I would LOVE to see something like that on the Barber coin series!
@JeffMTampa
Not regarding life of the dies, but this is interesting regarding 1893 Quarters [ I think]
The New Orleans Mint struck nearly a million more quarter dollars in 1893 than the previous year. Lacking the novelty of 1892's first-year status, this edition is more scarce across all grades. Gems are very elusive, while prooflike coins are quite rare. Typical of many O-Mint coins, the strike is rarely complete, with the arrow feathers quite often being incomplete.
Entirely new shipments of reverse dies were sent to the branch mints for 1893 to replace those of 1892 having their mintmarks awkwardly wedged between the tail feathers and letter R of QUARTER. The first new batch placed the mintmark far to the right, directly over the D in DOLLAR. Though this solved the technical difficulties experienced in 1892, the far right position looked odd to the eye, and a second batch of dies carried mintmarks centered above the space between the R of QUARTER and the D of DOLLAR. This proved to be the final resting place of the mintmark for the remainder of this series, but dies having the far right placement remained in use at New Orleans as late as 1895
Successful transactions with : MICHAELDIXON, Manorcourtman, Bochiman, bolivarshagnasty, AUandAG, onlyroosies, chumley, Weiss, jdimmick, BAJJERFAN, gene1978, TJM965, Smittys, GRANDAM, JTHawaii, mainejoe, softparade, derryb
Bad transactions with : nobody to date
@JeffMTampa
Although a few years after 1893, some info on 'Barber' dies
Successful transactions with : MICHAELDIXON, Manorcourtman, Bochiman, bolivarshagnasty, AUandAG, onlyroosies, chumley, Weiss, jdimmick, BAJJERFAN, gene1978, TJM965, Smittys, GRANDAM, JTHawaii, mainejoe, softparade, derryb
Bad transactions with : nobody to date
Here's a link to the Journal of the Barber Coin Collectors' Society [1998]
https://archive.org/details/journalofbarberc9n01barb/page/10/mode/2up
Successful transactions with : MICHAELDIXON, Manorcourtman, Bochiman, bolivarshagnasty, AUandAG, onlyroosies, chumley, Weiss, jdimmick, BAJJERFAN, gene1978, TJM965, Smittys, GRANDAM, JTHawaii, mainejoe, softparade, derryb
Bad transactions with : nobody to date
@1630Boston Thanks for sharing the great information!
The article I'm preparing is for the BCCS Journal. It's to report findings that there are more than 2 MM positions on the 1893 O Quarter.
It came from individual date-mm pages on Gerry Fortin's website (the link that I supplied).
For example, the 1841 page has its mintage and 8 obverse dies listed:
https://www.seateddimevarieties.com/date_mintmark/1841varpage.htm
It becomes harder to identify the different obverse dies in later series,
because there are so many dies, and usually they only differ by date position.
Roger B is on VAMWorld. If you need to contact him let me know. He has provided excellent information to me on Morgan Dollar dies. There can be and is a lot things that come into play for each die. His records come straight from from the time period you need (the mint).
I sent an email to Roger B. and he replied within hours. He assembled a TREMENDOUS amount of very pertinent information to me in a Dropbox link. WOW- the man is not only a genius but also extremely helpful.
I really don't understand how he was able to assemble such pertinent information for me in such a short period of time. Pure genius.
Roger B has a collection of correspondence from the Mint old days. Much of it comes from the National Archives. Anything from the Mint director to the branch mints. He is a very valuable source of information. He has help me on my 1900-S die study.
Listed below is the die life chart for all coinage produced at the SF mint in 1900. The chart has a lot to say about the life of a die. Click on the file to view.