Die Clash on the Rim? Capped Bust Half

pursuitofliberty

I'm not exactly sure what I'm looking at.

What do you think?

Is this a Die Clash where the Stars from the Obverse impacted the Rim of the Reverse (albeit off center - which doesn't make sense)? Something else??

Here's the whole coin if you get all other tells

TomB

I don't know how to explain it, but I love it!

MedalCollector

I don’t know much about early US coinage, but I would guess that it is damage from another coin, since the incuse star is seen on the rim and the arrow. A die clash would be more prominent in the fields than the design.

jayPem

Good point above, die clash would be raised?

PerryHall

@GoldenEgg said:
I don’t know much about early US coinage, but I would guess that it is damage from another coin, since the incuse star is seen on the rim and the arrow. A die clash would be more prominent in the fields than the design.

Agree. It looks like a contact mark from another coin with a star as part of its design.

jacrispies

Perhaps a die clash meaning the struck coin flipped over and contacted the die while exiting the striking chamber. That would impress the design incuse.

On the extreme side, this could be a double strike, first strike brockage. I don't see any other unusual details that would prove that.

Todd, can you see if the incuse stars displaced any metal? Examining the coin with a loupe and a lamp at a low angle may do the trick.

ricko

My initial assessment would be post mint damage from another coin... Though it would take considerable pressure to do that... So thinking along that line, perhaps a striking issue, but they are incuse, so back to pressure from another coin... I would like inputs from @FredWeinberg and @CaptHenway on this one... Cheers, RickO

ebriker

Todd, here is my 1807 O.103a star clash for comparison

ebriker

CaptHenway

PMD from the raised stars on another coin. Possibly accidental if a bag of coins on the floor of a vault had another bag of coins tossed on top of it, but still PMD.

pursuitofliberty

@CaptHenway said:
PMD from the raised stars on another coin. Possibly accidental if a bag of coins on the floor of a vault had another bag of coins tossed on top of it, but still PMD.

.
This is an interesting theory, as I can not wrap my head around a way this could be a striking issue, at all. Yet there is no "damage", per se, to the rim of the opposite side of the coin.

Do you think the weight of a bag or other single, similar impact could cause such a mark?

BustDMs

@pursuitofliberty said:

@CaptHenway said:
PMD from the raised stars on another coin. Possibly accidental if a bag of coins on the floor of a vault had another bag of coins tossed on top of it, but still PMD.

I agree that that would not have enough energy to do this.

.
This is an interesting theory, as I can not wrap my head around a way this could be a striking issue, at all. Yet there is no "damage", per se, to the rim of the opposite side of the coin.

Do you think the weight of a bag or other single, similar impact could cause such a mark?

I believe it could be a partial flip over blockage double struck coin as another poster postulated. He also thought it could have contacted the die on ejection- again, not enough energy (pressure) to cause this.

CaptHenway

@pursuitofliberty said:

@CaptHenway said:
PMD from the raised stars on another coin. Possibly accidental if a bag of coins on the floor of a vault had another bag of coins tossed on top of it, but still PMD.

.
This is an interesting theory, as I can not wrap my head around a way this could be a striking issue, at all. Yet there is no "damage", per se, to the rim of the opposite side of the coin.

Do you think the weight of a bag or other single, similar impact could cause such a mark?

Assume for the sake of argument that the coin is laying face down inside a bag on the bottom of a vault. The coin is supported by the rim around 360 degrees of its circumference. Any force transmitted to the coin is distributed around that 360 degree circumference, and not concentrated at one one or two or three spots. No noticeable damage occurs to the rim on the underside of the coin.

However, on the upper side of the coin, which in this case happens to be the reverse, a second coin is resting with just the points of a few stars atop the reverse rim of the first coin. A force is transmitted to the second coin. Only a tiny bit of its area, i.e,, the points of the stars, transfers the energy to the rim of the first coin. Because only a small area is transmitting the energy the force per square inch is dramatically increased, and a recognizable impression of a design element appears on the first coin.

Align the coin differently and you get a common "bag mark" impressed into the bottom coin. That happens all the time.

There are various threads on here where various St. Gaudens $20's have perfect star outlines "bag marked" into a field from the edge of a second coin. Stuff like this happens.

The only think for sure is that these are NOT clash marks. The raised rim on the coin was formed by sunken areas on the die. When dies clash the sunken areas do not touch each other. The fields are in the way.

TD

gumby1234

Look closely and determine if the star at rim is raised or incuse then you will have the aswer. Incuse would be damage from another coin. Raised would be some kind of die clash

ifthevamzarockin

I have seen the exact same thing on Morgan dollars.
It's from contact with another coin.

PerryHall

@ifthevamzarockin said:
I have seen the exact same thing on Morgan dollars.
It's from contact with another coin.

I've seen G$20 Saints with a star punched into the field where the edge of another Saint contacted the coin.

2windy2fish

Not really sure what is happening here but comparing this to a gold coin does not hold water in my opinion as gold is considerably softer

scubafuel

Agreed on the PMD. There was another thread here a couple years ago where a member proved you could do this with Morgan’s by giving them a bit of a squeeze together, without showing any other signs of damage. @savitale

CaptHenway

@2windy2fish said:
Not really sure what is happening here but comparing this to a gold coin does not hold water in my opinion as gold is considerably softer

And those gold coins were indented by other gold coins of equal hardness.
This silver coin was indented by another silver coin of equal hardness.

yosclimber

Here's a similar coin with incuse impressions on the obverse rim, an 1861 half dime.
I like the "vise job" explanation.

yosclimber

And here is a similar 1839-o with impressions in the rims on both sides.
The incuse letters look large enough to be from a different denomination.

pursuitofliberty

Thanks all!

The marks are incuse, and so the only two theoretical's I could come up with were some type of brockage (very unlikely) or some form of PMD, but the PMD didn't make sense at first. I can see the way it could have happened now, and although I have yet to see another CBH like it, I found some Morgan's, and so I think maybe the bag weight theory is gaining steam in my mind.

My thought of a Die Clash was foolish of course, as the imprint is incuse, but I'm glad I put that in the title as this thread got some traction.

I'll pass it around amongst some experts at Pittsburg this summer, and if anything comes up different, I'll report back.

yosclimber

@pursuitofliberty said:
My thought of a Die Clash was foolish of course, as the imprint is incuse, but I'm glad I put that in the title as this thread got some traction.

Actually a die clash will yield an incuse (negative) version of the feature on the struck coin.
You can think of it mathematically as each time there is contact, the direction (sign) of the effect changes.
So a positive coin against another coin yields a negative. -1 = +1*(-1) .
But a negative die into another die and then into a coin also yields a negative: -1 = -1*-1*-1 .
Negative original die, positive on clashed die, negative on struck coin.

Here is an example of the most severe half dime clash I know of, on an 1838 V-10 half dime.
It should be clear that the date, Ms. Liberty and stars from the obverse die show up as incuse on the reverse of the coin.

lilolme

Not sure I recall this all correctly but here goes. There was a thread on the below coin. The coin was in a straight graded holder and was questioned as an error. It was sent back to pcgs for error (or damage a risk) and declared damaged (current). The thread had a lot of opinions. Someone took a couple of dollars, offset them together and squeezed them (a small vice as I recall). The coins rotated some when squeezed. The result was similar to the below coin. I did not look very much for the thread and didn't bookmark it.

yosclimber

Here are 2 of the threads on the 1899-O Morgan, from 2019:
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1022145/great-morgan-with-rim-hit July 2019
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1029531/cac-results-and-request-to-call-ja-final-update December 2019, 22 pages

CaptHenway

@yosclimber said:
Here are 2 of the threads on the 1899-O Morgan, from 2019:
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1022145/great-morgan-with-rim-hit July 2019
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1029531/cac-results-and-request-to-call-ja-final-update December 2019, 22 pages

Yep. Same principle.