How important is die state towards your collecting goals?
Shamika
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While I'm very conscious of the die state of coins I pursue, it almost never plays into my decision to pass or play. Of course, I collect Buffalo nickels where die state is not a serious distraction (that's my opinion). If anything, a little die erosion seems to add a bit of frost to the luster.
Is die state of any importance towards your collecting goals?
Has anybody here ever done a die state study?
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tend to become more important to you probably. It's not only that so many of these are poorly
struck but they'll also be struck from poorly prepared dies which have simply been excessively
worn. Even very early die state coins are usually struck by obliquely aligned dies. Frequently
these dies will lack detail from the hub because either they were not fully impressed or the hub
itself lacked the detail.
If most of the coins were about the same then it would probably be less important to me, but
there are some nearly perfect coins of almost all the dates even where the vast majority are
very poorly made. Also the first coins off a new die have a special "pop" that isn't seen anywhere
else. It's almost like the look of a brand new tire before the rubber whiskers are worn off. With
copper nickel this look is worn off the dies very quickly.
Marking, and planchet scratches are distracting but a coin that lacks a lot of detail almost may as
well be worn.
Silver flows much better in the strike and wears the dies much slower and more evenly. Silver
coins can be struck by dies in more advanced state of degradation before they start looking bad.
...At least to my eye.
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I don’t love money . I do love the Lord God.
<< <i>As I got deeper into the series in question varieties became a factor and yes die states are a factor with certain issues.... >>
It's interesting how die states and varieties interplay. Coins such as the 1922-plain Lincoln cent and the 3-legged Buffalo nickel are all a function of die state. Many inexperienced numismatists are not aware of these correlations.
Hell, I don't need to exercise.....I get enough just pushing my luck.
<< <i>Die state is of a big visual for me as I collect VAM's as well as error wheaties. It's just not enough to have an EDS or even an LDS of a particular VAM..... >>
Do you mean you want both?
David
<< <i>
<< <i>Die state is of a big visual for me as I collect VAM's as well as error wheaties. It's just not enough to have an EDS or even an LDS of a particular VAM..... >>
Do you mean you want both? >>
EDS,MDS,LDS any and all stages are beneficial to learn the progression of specific characters that show how long the actual die's were used and gives me a lot of data that has shown approximately how many coins were produced with the aforementioned die's
Hell, I don't need to exercise.....I get enough just pushing my luck.
depends on the coin and era
<< <i>Not to be confused with the term "First Strike." >>
There are a few CBH collectors that collect by die state much like the Bust Half Dime collectors, but there are not many. A rough guess as to the total CBH marriages including all the die states would be around 700. It would take a lot of money to complete such a set.
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Great thread.
I thought it deserved recycling.
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these are fascinating to study, I say "used to collect" because of these are now far more fascinating to enjoy
I haven't bought a quarter in many moons, and I miss it
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Seeing the information put forth in such an organized and efficient manner made it easy for even a newcomer like me to the series to recognize the effects of continued use and the breakdown and deterioration of the working dies. That is part of the genius of the book itself as compared to the Overton reference on Bust Half Dollars- where the concept was explained but not fully explored.
Studying the dies in this manner also really gives me a "feel" for the hectic working conditions of the mint at the time, where you can see the dies being pressed into service until they in many cases were literally falling apart, being constantly reworked and lapped to extend their working life and so forth.To me this is one of the things that makes the series so interesting and rewarding to pursue.
-Randy Newman
<< <i>When I first read the Logan/McCloskey reference it really opened my eyes by putting forth the idea of working die degradation in the simplest form possible. The studies of specific dies as they were used to strike several different marriages and then remarriages was put into a chart form in the book so that using the plate coins you can literally "see" the degradation of the dies as they were used by following the charts. >>
Sheldon's book on Large cents (Penny Whimsy) is written in a similar fashion. It also gave me a whole new appreciation for die states when I read it.
<< <i>Being a Buffalo collector I prefer early or mid state coins cause of the reason you say , but there are some coins that I would only want in late die state. Thinking..................... oh yeah the 37-D abraded die. >>
I like silver Busties with CUDs, and CUD's are the latest die-state of any coin, therefore Die State is a factor of coins I will pick-up or pass on.
The later die states add more character to the coin and, to me, are more appealing than their EDS counterparts.
While LDS's are one aspect of collecting coins, it doesn't mean I will just pass up on a EDS in really nice grade!!!
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A few years ago, I was going through $25 bags of GA SQ's, and I found one with an interesting die crack. I set it aside and continued to look for high-grade specimens. Afterward, I went through them again looking for any other with similar die cracks. I ended up putting together a 7-coin set showing the growth progession of 9 separate cracks. The coolest one started as a small chip near the designer's initials on the base of the neck. In the next stage, it formed a crack along the base of Washington's neck in a westerly direction. Then, it turned southwest toward the "AR" of QUARTER and finally extended through the "AR" to the rim. Next, the crack lengthened in a southeasterly direction from the point of origin. On the last coin, the crack finallly split in two directions and extended to the rim at 4 & 5 o'clock. In all, there were two obverse cracks (another from Washington's eyebrow northeast toward the rim) and seven reverse cracks that grew in varying lengths. Are they worth much? I doubt it, but it was fun putting the puzzle together!
Chris
I dug out Romines work on die states to be able to estimate mintages. For example, 80% of the March-release 72 T2, the one Herb Hicks wrote about, has an evolving reverse die-crack. None of these are in die-state older than middle MDS, presumably the point at which the die either dracked up or was pulled from service.
According to Romines, middle MDS would correspond to about 20% of the dies life, 20,000 strikes if the first Ike die tool steel was used for the reverse die, roughly 35,000 if the "new" die steel was used, in either case considerably fewer than the 100,000 suggested by Herb based on his correct assesment that his April T2 was a one die-pair Ike.
The 71 and most 72 Ikes (not the T2 probably and not the 72-S SB) were struck with the initial die tool steel and these dies progressed extremely rapidly through the die stages, perhaps significantly faster than Del's research would suggest (he never studied Ikes).
The 73-on Ikes, however, were struck with a more resilient die steel AND these dies were not pushed as hard so the proportion of LDS Ikes falls off a cliff in 73 thru 78, from 80% to maybe 10%.
Del promoted his die states as an alternative approach to grading coins since the proportion of Very EDS coins, for example, across all denominations and metals, is roughly 1% (for Ikes it is possibly as low as 0.1% so even a few die-adjustment strikes would take the die into EDS). Del proposed that these rare VEDS coins should be valued just as highly as the best preserved 1% of coins. Never caught on and Del's work has never received the recognition it deserves.
You might wonder how Del ever arrived at his numbers? His first and most monumental work was to assemble over 1,000 Lincoln cents that had the same hub-doubled die so he knew he had the output of a single die. Having defined his die states in terms of reasonable visual markers, mostly progressive die flow lines and progressive smear of metal off minor devices, he divided these 1,000 pennies into piles that corresponded to each of his die states, VEDS, EDS, MDS, LDS, VLDS.
In very rough numbers VEDS = 1%, EDS = 1-5%, MDS = 6-15%, LDS = 16-25%, VLDS the remainder of a die's production.
Del pointed out that DD notching begins to wash out in early MDS and only strongly doubled dies show their patterns into VLDS.
An article I wrote published in the May-June 2008 ErrorScope indirectly makes a strong point that more subtle DD patterns such as those coming from a doubled Master Die, wash out rapidly and this has caused confusion and errors in Ike DD catalogs:
ErrorScope article
Questions about Ikes? Go to The IKE GROUP WEB SITE
<< <i>As one who studies and writes about the Ike Dollars, die state is at the heart of much of my work.
I dug out Romines work on die states to be able to estimate mintages. For example, 80% of the March-release 72 T2, the one Herb Hicks wrote about, has an evolving reverse die-crack. None of these are in die-state older than middle MDS, presumably the point at which the die either dracked up or was pulled from service.
According to Romines, middle MDS would correspond to about 20% of the dies life, 20,000 strikes if the first Ike die tool steel was used for the reverse die, roughly 35,000 if the "new" die steel was used, in either case considerably fewer than the 100,000 suggested by Herb based on his correct assesment that his April T2 was a one die-pair Ike.
The 71 and most 72 Ikes (not the T2 probably and not the 72-S SB) were struck with the initial die tool steel and these dies progressed extremely rapidly through the die stages, perhaps significantly faster than Del's research would suggest (he never studied Ikes).
The 73-on Ikes, however, were struck with a more resilient die steel AND these dies were not pushed as hard so the proportion of LDS Ikes falls off a cliff in 73 thru 78, from 80% to maybe 10%.
Del promoted his die states as an alternative approach to grading coins since the proportion of Very EDS coins, for example, across all denominations and metals, is roughly 1% (for Ikes it is possibly as low as 0.1% so even a few die-adjustment strikes would take the die into EDS). Del proposed that these rare VEDS coins should be valued just as highly as the best preserved 1% of coins. Never caught on and Del's work has never received the recognition it deserves.
You might wonder how Del ever arrived at his numbers? His first and most monumental work was to assemble over 1,000 Lincoln cents that had the same hub-doubled die so he knew he had the output of a single die. Having defined his die states in terms of reasonable visual markers, mostly progressive die flow lines and progressive smear of metal off minor devices, he divided these 1,000 pennies into piles that corresponded to each of his die states, VEDS, EDS, MDS, LDS, VLDS.
In very rough numbers VEDS = 1%, EDS = 1-5%, MDS = 6-15%, LDS = 16-25%, VLDS the remainder of a die's production.
Del pointed out that DD notching begins to wash out in early MDS and only strongly doubled dies show their patterns into VLDS.
An article I wrote published in the May-June 2008 ErrorScope indirectly makes a strong point that more subtle DD patterns such as those coming from a doubled Master Die, wash out rapidly and this has caused confusion and errors in Ike DD catalogs:
ErrorScope article >>
This is very consistent with what I've found except that VEDS is exceedingly brief
for clad quarters. Mint sets present a very good means to estimate the lenght of
die life since the number of dies used can be determined and mintage is known.
There is some variability but this seems to be right around 10 to 12 strikes usually.
These will be PL if the dies or planchets were polished but most aren't. They will
not always be well struck since alignment and pressure is no more likely to be right
initially than on later strikes. Well struck specimens tend to be simply outstanding.
Dies wear much faster on the Ikes and much more slowly for silver, copper, and
zinc.
Bill, the latest member of the IKE GROUP, a tool and die shop expert tells us that most dies come out of the final hardening heat-treatment with microscopic cracks on their faces that have to be polished off for any fine work, that without the polishing early strikes can look sort of frosted.
I suspect the proof-like quality of VEDS (and EDS) 73-on Ikes is due to such polishing before Philly shipped or installed them, especially the Bicentennial Ike dies. Also, proof-like VEDS and especially EDS die states are a heck of a lot more prevelant in 73-on Ikes, consistent with the fall off of VLDS Ikes.
VEDS 71-72 Ikes are exceptionally rare. I have one 71-D Ike whose lunar area under 90X has a regular pattern of confluent teeny die cracks that resembles fine snake-skin. The fields on this coin could have been polished as there are no visible microscopic die-cracks but the fields are not "proof-like". Hard to judge from 71-72 Ikes, however, as the planchets were on the dull side to the point that even a polished die would tend not to create a proof-like surface.
The proof-planchet 71-D Ikes (5-10% of all 71-D Ikes) show us that the degree of planchet polish is more important to creating a "proof-like" coin than whether the die is polished.
I suspect that the rare proof-like 72-D was struck on a 71 proof planchet that lingered in the planchet bin.
When digging for EDS 72-D Ikes in my research to explore Wiles rebuttal to our assertion that all non-Bicentennial CuNi-clad
peg legs are due to die-clash die-abrasion repairs, the IKE GROUP sent me over 200 of their earliest die state 72-D's, so we're starting with a pop of X5 to X10 that number.
Out of the over 200 there were only 2 close VEDS but they both had early (but loupe-visible) die flow lines, hence they were well into EDS by Del's definitions.
If something like 10 quarters (I like round numbers) for each die are in VLDS, that is on the order of .005% in VEDS. That is stunning information for me and fits perfectly with my Ike observations.
Extrapolating from my crude Ike numbers suggests something well under under 2 out of 1,000 or well under 0.2% 71-72 Ikes in VEDS.
I have no way to duplicate Del's work with Ikes but years of looking at tens of thousands of them with a researcher's eye leads me to think that 71-72 VLDS Ikes are indeed very, very rare, that die-flow lines begin to appear within a handful of strikes. Our "spy" at the Mint said that experienced die-setters sometimes got their die sets right on the first try but the average was a couple of test strikes.
I suspect even a couple of test strikes took the Ike dies through VEDS. Rob
Questions about Ikes? Go to The IKE GROUP WEB SITE
I think their large size and CuNi-clad hardness turned them into an 8 year struggle and experiment during which the Mints were at their theoretical and practical minting limits: Ikes therefore reward study as one can find more chaos and stronger examples of poorly understood minting problems than in other clad series. Rob
Questions about Ikes? Go to The IKE GROUP WEB SITE