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Metals

Metals are still just a commodity As much as I like the gold and silver standard that this country was founded on vs. the fiat system we have today, copper, mickle, silver, gold, platinum, rhodium, and paladium metals are still a commodity. Today feels like 1976-1979 all over again, with a government that just raised the debt ceiling to over $14 trillion dollars to cover the President's deficit laiden budget gift to Congress. (I'm not angry, I vote!) Proof...We've gone through the housing
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Not All Bad and A Lot of Work

Madison, WI area had good issues.. NGC will certify I left work at 5:15 pm (2/15/07) to go hunt for a few $1 G.W.'s. The first bank I went to indicated they didn't have the coin, however, a local bank with a vault for sure had them. It was about 5:47 p.m. and the other bank was going to close at 6 pm. Rushing out of the bank, I hastily, and legally, made my way over to the other bank. Realizing I had no cash or direct account access, ran into the ATM, got cash, got back into the car. The
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Now to write the story...

Dec. 10th deadline approaches... Now close to two weeks away from this year's submission deadline for my entries and all the coins for this year are scanned in. There are three journeys to talk about. 2 for 2 new No. 1 sets - 2006 and $1 Sacagawea 1 for the expansion/upgrades to Statehood quarters and Half Dollars. Short of a couple of upcoming coin purchases yet to come in the next week, I look back at my past journal entires and have stayed the course to fill out what will be anot
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Start... Stop... Start... Stop..

There is life after a baby... Coin collecting for me started about seven months after meeting my now wife. I can still remember that invitation of a close friend to go upstairs and look at a MS-65+ 1955 double die cent and a few Snow type Indian Heads under the stereoscope. That was 2000, and it was just in time to go back and buy an OGP 1999 set. Now my two main hobbies, biking and coin collecting, really pair off great for the seasons. Last year around February, budgets were tight and
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Coin Holders Like Model Airplanes (OC II)

Easy way to tell if its the plastic or glue... On the NGC coins that I have purchased and submitted, I have had several with 'nibs'. At most I have had 6 locations where the sealer has left the nib, one at the top and bottom, and two on each side. I find that an x-acto knife works good to remove the excess plastic. One thing I take a look at, esp. with purchased coins, is the interstitial space between the two halves. If the coin is NGC sealed, the plastic looks the same throughout (barri
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It's just business after all

PCGS knows how to corner their side of the market.... It's funny to me that a 70 in a PCGS holder costs $750 and NGC at $500 for a particular coin. Look at who's putting the prices together. PCGS puts their price guide together and NGC has the more independent NumisMedia group do that. PCGS can say all they want. Yep.. higher prices to grade, our coins get higher prices..Of course they are going to look attractive to collectors, and they can possibly take more of your money in grading f
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Silver vs. Clad

Ever wonder why silver UC proofs look better than nickel-clad UC proofs... I was entering a clad PFUC70 clad dime today and thought it didn't look as good as its silver companion. I noticed that clad was a 1 to 4 shot at 70 vs. 1 to 2 shot for silver. While, this is not the case for all certified coins, there is a difference that can be accounted for (with some help from the internet and engineering experience). Let's look at coins from a material property standpoint. For general discussi
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New Category(?)

Westward Journey All Coins Set Under the Nickel sets, there are a few specific years called out, like wartime nickels, to reflect changes in the design. Would a new category for the Westward Nickel Series (2003 - 2004-2005 Westward Nickels - 2006 Return to Monticello for All Coins) be a worthwhile competition in itself? (spelling errors corrected 1/10/06) Untitled-5
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Nice photogs!

The new Red Book edition gave me an idea... Hat's off to the TheCoinGuy and MWit as those photos and detail look great! In trying to find a unique way to describe a set, my wife's scrapbooking set and this year's Red Book got me thinking. Maybe I had too much time on my hands, but it is a bit of work to take a X-acto knife and cut around the NGC holder with various colored papers (7 different colored frames to date). For the PCGS coins, the cut out is a red border and with the NGC cu
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Don't do it! is a great answer

My second lesson with coins was to leave them alone..... Older collectors, you've probably been through this before and thought it would be good to journal this for younger collectors. It's easy to understand that having a great number of one type of coin could tempt a person to start cleaning to find those great pieces to show off from the collection. "Wow! It would be great if they didn't have the brown stains on them." Several coins dealers in the area and books recommended dish soap f
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2006: What's next?

Hmmm....Three roads to travel 2006 will be a year of choices, chances, and concern. The first road - continue to purchase moderns at PFUC 69/70 and build several sets (dimes/nickels), the second road - start certifying my OGP sets (99 and up) toward a full set of State Quarters, and/or the third road - go through NCS and get some of my 1800's/early-1900's cleaned up and graded (1921 full set Morgan P/D/S and Peace). Some would probably not go through the conservation excerise and figure i
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NGC Times increase again

The Holiday's and FUN interupts grading.. After sending in three sets of coins (5+ each) this month and thinking about 2006, the NGC grading turnaround just increased again to about 2-3 days (sometime between Sunday and today on the website). Even with the Holidays and FUN this next week, seems like times are still slipping and slipping and slipping. You would think they would be better prepared after such a high modern population this year. I may get my slabs back in January? pfuc-1998
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Hehe... Three heads is a crowd

If only the attic was a great place to store coins.... Considering that the attached coin was found in an attic 3 years ago, it's got great details and slight cameo on the obverse. This coin will turn 40 in a few days. Goes to show, along with the previous post, how much better a preserved coin looks. can-test.j
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Unusuall Error Find

It's not on the coin, its in the package... Ok, I like finding a good die crack here and there. So, I get out my 2005 Legacy set just to check the O! The Joy! nickel. I struck out there, so I start to look at the obverses. I see this shiny line across Jefferson's forehead. Maybe paper thin, but there is something there. I'm thinking, "what a crack!" I twist and turn the coin under different lights. Turns out I got a piece of hair from one of the US Mint workers going right down Thomas
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PCGS vs. NGC

From a relatively inexperienced collector's perspective I think NGC has it right. Considering NGC wants people to join the collector's society, they open themselves to a broader, more competitive, group of coin collectors. Yeah, I don't like the fact the PCGS holders are different size, the fact some PCGS coins are more marketable than NGC, or that PGCS owners don't scan and describe their coins. There are also a lot of people with PCGS coins that probably feel the same way about other NG
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Ahh... Another year of coins

Just starting to get the hang of this.... Good luck to those competing this year and Happy Holidays. This year ended my first month of collecting toward the Kennedy Half Proofs and didn't think I'd make it as far as where the set is currently at. It is a bit exciting to hear on the news stations about information from the US Mint proposing 37 different coin dollars in 2007 (Dead Presidents Series,) and in 2009, various places and items associated with Lincoln on the reverse (maybe a new Lin
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It's late and the descriptions and photos are updated

If you've read through the descriptions and photos for other sets, what type of formats have you liked? Kennedy's seem like a good choice to be personally creative about a set that lacks the variety and longer history of other types. I've probably have stayed up too late and had some fun catching up on descriptions just to say more than PFUC69 - 1998-S Clad.
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NumisMedia Pricing Info Missing

I know coins are more than just a price, however, I know coins are more than just a price, however, several moderns do not come up with a value from MunisMedia, including some PF70 and PF69's. Is this common?
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