Coinbuf

First welcome to the forum and condolences on the passing of your father. From your photos the mark appears to be incuse (cut into) the coin not extra metal laying over the other spikes. However, when I attempt to blow up the image it gets heavily pixilated so I cannot be sure either way. The coin is clearly circulated with many marks and cuts from the limited view of the coin in your photos. If possible please post some higher quality photos which would make it much easier to see what is going on.

Part of the post you quoted is correct part is not. Collectors who have submission ability can have 20 review failures per year at CAC stickering that they will not be charged the new failure fee. That could be twenty failures in one submission or one failure each over twenty submissions. However, the price for the econ tier is now $22 not the $16 it was prior to being suspended. CAC stickering is still not accepting new members, so the term "grandfathered in" just means that this policy is only extended to collectors (not dealers) who have submission privileges.

I see a damaged vertical of the D mintmark and a ton of verdigris, but I do not see any evidence of an S mintmark.

Well the op is clearly about stickering prices, hence my post and my confusion about your confusion . No the stickering business is still active and will be for an undetermined time (up to ten years longer is possible) at this time going forward. Submissions were halted at the end of May for a couple of weeks but are now once again open to current members, new memberships are still closed.

Well I have both, in fact I have a couple examples of both dates. While the 31-S has been given the title of key date it is anything but, it is far more difficult and expensive to find a nice, attractive, well struck, UNC S mint coin from almost any of the middle 20s dates than an UNC 31-S. Also, most MS63 red coins have a tendency to be spotty or lacking in eye appeal, in my opinion it would be better to have a real key date in a nice problem free VF or XF. Or find a nice lustrous MS brown coin that will allow you to buy a higher grade with far superior eye appeal than many MS63RD's are likely to provide. Personally, I would find one of the middle teens branch mint coins, those can be found with some absolutely hammered strikes dripping with luster in 65BN, great looking coins. I actually bought this 15-D MS63 in the old ANACS soapbox holder last year from a PCGS forum member for under $100, way undergraded in my opinion.

That is fine and your prerogative, however, it would be foolish to send a coin in for grading without knowing and taking into account what is important to the TPG graders. And while you may not consider luster a big factor in grading the TPGs do consider it a very important part (perhaps the most important part after authenticity) of the grade for mint state coins. I am agreement with the group that MS63 is the best and would expect it to return as MS62 or equally likely as not gradable due to a few issues like the scratch on the obv cheek and the corrosion.

Better than you might think, back when NGC suspended the use of US coins graded by PCGS into the NGC registry I sent 10 or 12 coins PCGS graded to NGC for crossover to use in the registry. Several had CAC green beans and all failed, honestly I was rather surprised and infuriated at those results, adding insult to injury is that it was only a few months later that NGC reopened the US sets to PCGS graded coins. Meaning that all I did was waste money on those crossover attempts. What I have come to know is that both PCGS and NGC have very low crossover rates, yet if those same coins are cracked out and submitted raw they often grade the same at each TPG. While I will never know for sure this strikes me as more of a politics game than anything else. As a result I will never send a coin for crossover to either PCGS or NGC, I just don't think that either firm is fair in this service.

Trying to compare the sticker prices to the price charged for grading is rather useless it seems to me, these are two different services with different cost structures and goals. Additionally, I doubt that very many of the people that submit coins to CAC have ever cared how those prices compare, it has always been an add on service for those who wanted to use it. While the new prices for CAC stickering have taken quite a jump and are less collector friendly than before, especially so when you consider that now collectors will have to pay some of the fee for coins that fail. The one saving point for collector submitters is that JA has grandfathered in a small cost savings, each collector that has submissions abilities will be able to have the first 20 coins that fail to sticker not be charged the new failure rate. In my last submission to CAC that I got back last week, I sent in one coin that I expected to fail, the reason I did that was because I wanted JA's opinion of the coin's toning. So I included a short note and asked for his opinion if possible which I did indeed receive, that type of service and passing of knowledge is rare in the coin business and I for one have learned a great deal from my submissions to CAC. Now comparing the new CAC grading service prices to that of NGC and PCGS is a much more relevant comparison to me.

What is the diameter and thickness of the coin? These measurements need to be precise. The weight is correct for a normal Zinc cent and there is no reason to counterfeit a cent, it would not be financially viable. It looks like it has been flattened slightly, maybe buried in some soft soil/road and run over many times, whatever happened it doesn't appear to be any type of error just PMD (post mint damage).

An obvious large date.

No one said anything about the coin(s) being fake JKK said it looks like it was plated, which it does look like. This was a common practice with circulated steel wheats so that they would look shinny and more appealing to non collectors and for souvenir/tourist stuff like what you have. All of the coins are well circulated coins with very minimal collector value above face value save the silver in the nickel, it would be a monumental waste of money to have these coins graded/slabbed. As a side note, I'm not sure if English is your first language but "brake" is defined as: The word you should have used is "break".

Both NGC and PCGS have section of their websites that discuss and define what is or is not a full bell line for Franklin Half dollars. Having said that, it is not difficult to find examples in both holder brands that may not fully meet the definitions as they are written by each service. Grading is not a pure science, there is some level of subjectivity to it and designations like FBL, FH, FB and more are not immune to this subjectivity any more than grades are. If you are looking at TPG's other than these two, well all bets are off. NGC definition PCGS definition

No errors that I can see, the first has some worthless strike doubling, and the other two appear to have some stains or gunk on them.

Your additional photos show the same as your original, just a normal everyday 1982 (Philly mint) coin.

As already explained the "A" designates your coin as having minimal detrimental effects of the time it spent in the ocean, I would not consider this to be "top of the pile" as you say but rather in better condition with less saltwater corrosion than most of the coins recovered from the wreck. NGC grouped the coins into A thru E and a group simply called shipwreck effect. A coins being considered the best coins and the remailing coins in lesser (more impaired) condition with the coins designated as shipwreck effect only the very worst of the coins recovered. All of this is spelled out for you if you take the time to click the link Sandon provided for you. And the AU does stand for about uncirculated, if it were not an impaired coin it would have received a grade between AU50 and AU58. As you say you are an experienced collector you should already know what the AU stands for and I am rather puzzled at your confusion on this point.

Well you do indeed have a small date coin, however, I see no signs of a "D" mintmark. What I do see is some scrapes and soot that if you squint really hard might seem to look like a mintmark, but is not.

Does not look like the 8/7 variety to me form your photos.

For comparison here is the photograde F15 example, which is what I think your coin grades (except for the damage) with a shot at VF20. Not too much recent auction data for this date/condition, but $400 for a TPG graded F15 seems very much in the ballpark from what I see in what auction data is available, you would likely get offers of closer to $300 from a dealer, those numbers are assuming a straight grade and could be less for a details grade.

Welcome to the forum, I have to disagree with the idea of submitting this coin for grading. The reverse shows a significant scrape/damage across the wings and shield, in my opinion that should disqualify the coin from a straight grade. However, the TPG's and I do not always agree on grade, should you decide to submit for grading please come back and update with your results.

I always thought that men of the cloth practiced forgiveness, guess I was wrong.

Tough to tell from that photo, way too much light and reflection to see the surfaces well. Sometimes you cannot tell from a static photo, the coin may need to be rotated to find the problems.