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When I was acquiring coins (I'm done now… accomplished my objectives.) I never knew how to navigate this website. Its format was not like it is today… all of the branches were merged into one: coins, comics, paper money… one Water Cooler. At the very start for me, I didn't know what slabs were all about, and all I wanted to do was fit into a very small puzzle box as much value as possible, and gold seemed to afford that. Sort of like you solve the puzzle box and get surprised by its contents of gold. Then I imagined buying a gold bar, hammering it with a spoon after warming in on a stove burner, and getting it to perfectly fit the puzzle box's inner dimensions. But that was way too much work, and I'd really be in over my head. (However, that would be a cool solution because the heft of the puzzle box would be maximized for its size.) Then, it seemed, rare gold coins would have more interest, and if the coins were worn, it didn't matter to me. I've just uncovered some interesting aspects of my early efforts… from 2013. Two small little Post Its in my "Red Book" on a GOLD DOLLARS page reveals how my focus was not nearly what it would later become. My first coin was a Carson City $10 Coronet Eagle and I contacted the dealer after I received it and I asked how do you get the coin out of the holder. I think he was shocked by my question, and replied that whatever I do, don't try to take the coin out of the holder. So, I learned that much. I'll see if I can snap a photo of the page and post it here. It really shows how my interest evolved from day one to roughly one year later. Half of the reason I never did a coin auction was because the hammer comes down, and you own the coin. No returns. Sight unseen, other than the online auction photos, and I was a complete newbie. With dealers there was always a return grace period, for any reason, and I returned around 10 coins or so.

Without going any further "out on a limb," my answer to the original poster is that NGC does 4 reassessments of coin valuations per year. Gold has inched up in the past year, most likely as a result of inflation, with some relationship to oil becoming more expensive. It's too cumbersome for them to do it every month, even every other month, and so 4 times per year… every three months sounds about right. I'll keep monitoring my type set, and will know more as more data comes in. The easiest answer would come from someone just asking Ali E.

One thing I've noticed about the coins I had collected, back around 2014, is that if I were to start from scratch, today, I would never have accomplished my objectives. Other than David Lawrence, no one has gold inventory right now… they've all been "picked clean." And when I look at just my main type set, I had a NGC Registry ranking for my 1834 — 1933 Gold Type Set of 48 late last year at some point… when I joined the Registry. My rank is now 58. There are a lot of new collectors out there, and they're well heeled.

I keep daily notes on this sort of thing. I began keeping the notes on October 10, 2021. Noticed that my Puzzle Box Gold collection went up in value (NGC's assessment of the coins combined) on: October 20, 2021; $50 higher October 22, 2021; $100 more February 4, 2022; $75 more February 7, 2022; $75 more

Isn't it amazing that our country, the United States of America, put a "moon buggy" on the Moon? (a rhetorical question) In History, more and more as I get older, I think I was born at the perfect time. And to think that I'm still alive and well, and all five of my brothers and sisters are also alive… and hopefully well… So much to be thankful for. Count your blessings… life is fleeting, and more so with each passing day.

Won't be going… rain most of tomorrow, and I'm doing my taxes this weekend, too. However, both Sunday and Monday are supposed to get into the 70s, and this winter having been so oppressive, Spring can't come quick enough.

Interesting… with all this talk of From Mine to Mint, I started to think that the book was familiar to me. Went downstairs to the library and searched for it, and there it was, on an upper shelf. Pulled it down, paperback edition, and for some reason a slip of paper placeholder was on page 100… something about post civil war assessment of the New Orleans Mint, mention of maybe shipping the equipment to Carson City. Looked at the front cover and there at the bottom was Roger's full name. Made me feel good. Inspected the book and I can tell I never read it. No dog-eared pages, in fact all of the pages are in like-new condition. Flipped through the pages, and knowing so much more about coins than when I bought it, it is a pleasure to see those old photographs of early mints. Own two other coin books, a 2013 Red Book, spiral bound paperback, free of charge from ARCI when I purchased my first coin, and a hardcopy reproduction of the original 1947 Red Book. (but Whitman Publishing Company, copyright 1946; the only thing I don't like about it is there is an ISBN sticker on the back cover, which probably cannot be removed without a trace.) Made me go to my paperwork folder for all of my coin purchases, and there's a nice showing of coin orders — and the beautiful letters from some of the dealers — NGC and NCS submissions, and dealer business cards. So, advice I'll give to coin collecting, one and two year anniversary celebrants, is save all your paperwork. In folders, ideally hanging folders in a desk, and "manilla" folders within them… forever. You'll come back to them later and marvel at what you went through when you were just beginning. They'll bring back the memories like they were just yesterday, and they're part of the history of your coins, too.

That's a lot of coins!

I was referring to the guy to the right of the baseball cap guy… who's wearing the red shirt. Looks a little like you, but I don't know because I've never met you.

Used to be a member of RAC, and attended the NEAF show at Rockland Community College. This would have been around the year 2000. Made my way up to Savoy, MA (Loop Road, Shady Pines Campground) for two SSP, lugging my Obsession 14.5" dobsonian telescope and Equatorial Platforms equatorial platform (original wood version) equipment, all in a little "sports" car packed to the gills with camping equipment. You get your tent and scope set up and then you can visit The Berkshires area. Back then, since I was leasing an Integra GT-S — brand new every three years — and therefore cruising those beautiful backroads out of North Adams on new tires, one of the highlights was to drive up to the summit of Mount Greylock with a really nice pair of Minolta 7 x 50 binoculars, up to the lookout point at the top, and really get a feel for the area. Such a great way to spend a week off from work in the middle of the summer.

Just to be sure, but that is VKurtB, third from the rear, or rather front, or… well… the guy in the red shirt?

This is news to me, just noticing mention of it in another recent thread. I think Mohawk will lurk for a while. He's been active with coin collecting for a quarter of a century… you just can't turn that off like a spigot. I was able to do a little detective work and found who may have made him decide to leave. Then there is his general disappointment with money-maker-only posters compared to true collectors, and how that is a turnoff for him. Finally, in my opinion, where he is located in the world, the region there seems to be going through difficult times right now and Winter will not lose its grip for some time, either. So, I think we'll see more of him again, late Spring/early Summer, when days are longer and you look forward to what each new day has to bring, each day offering more warmth than the one before. As a side note, a separate hobby I have to my small coin-collection hobby, the website recently introduced up arrows and down arrows there for a Comment Section. The site is now very divisive, toxic you could say, and has really affected the interest of many there, and even I'm considering not renewing in May. What I've learned is that it takes just a few people to ruin it for many others. So, I'm hoping Spring will uplift my spirits, and give me new hope. It's been a grueling few years for everyone, everywhere, so I understand Mohawk's discontent prompting him to leave this site… but a little time away just might be what "the doctor ordered."

Just a little more follow up on foam for cases. I used to be really into telescopes and so I had Dave Kriege make me one of his Dobsonian 15" f/4.5 Obsession Telescopes. I just checked on the base of the telescope, where there is a nameplate, and it shows that the telescope date was January 1999. With this beautiful new telescope I then ordered a a bunch of Tele vue lenses, a collimation laser, and a "gun case" with the foam to hold this stuff. The name on the outside of the case shows Diskocil and I can find zero information on this manufacturer, so I have to assume the foam is polyether polyurethane. I almost never open this case anymore, or even view through the telescope. So, it remains closed virtually 100% of the time, probably for the last 8 years or so. The foam is still intact and not degrading, it seems. The last time I used it was 8 months ago, for just one night from my deck in the Spring of 2021. So, the foam is at least 20 years old, and still holding up, while kept in a closed environment, undisturbed.

My strongbox is a Pelican case. It's interesting how the case has a lifetime warranty for the case, handle, hasps… but not the foam. Interesting that I was just at the bank cashing a product warranty check for a PATTON space heater that failed on me after 4 years. The warranty was for 5 years. Had to ship it back on my own dime. I just typed in the description of the space heater and the warranty detail is now only 3 years. I got lucky.

Just read VKurtB's 7 - 10 years, all-good foam, and then thereafter, look out, warning. What is nice to know is that the foam inserts of my strongbox can be purchased separately — 4-pc Replacement Foam Set — for $29.50. This may very well be in my future. Good to learn all of this.

This post, combined with the post immediately preceding it, can be misleading. When it comes to foams, there are generally two types: Polyester Polyurethane and Polyether Polyurethane. In the presence of moisture polyester degrades into a nasty sludge, for lack of a better description. Polyether Polyurethane does not degrade from moisture. To get around possibly potential problems, I went with a strongbox — for my Puzzle Box Gold collection — that uses Polyether Polyurethane foam. But, not wanting to tempt fate in the slightest, within the strongbox foam is nested a silica gel desiccant, and the Puzzle Box — itself — just fits within a large Coin Armour, Corrosion Intercept, Zipper seal, comic book bag, and then, even more, within the Puzzle Box is yet another identical Coin Armour comic book size bag that holds my two stacks of seven coins each. The whole thing is a remarkable marriage of available technologies that give me incredible peace of mind. Seven years out, now, and no issues of degradation found, whatsoever.

Easier, than I thought, and I'll probably come back to tweak things a little more. But for now, my only Custom Set has been created, slot order defined, and then just loaded the coins and their pre-existing descriptions. Done. Was an effortless process and I learned a few things. Just have to log out and revisit the Custom Sets to see what others see when they come across it when browsing. Now it's up to NGC to "get with the program" and update the Custom Sets software to bring it to the same level of excellence as the Competitive Sets.

Leroy, and possibly Revenant as well, I have an interest in making a Custom Set. My "potential" reason for going with a Custom Set is that the set owner can assign the order in which the coins are listed and displayed. This is important to me because my US Gold Type Set is a minimalist approach to spanning the years involved, thereby having as few coins as possible to capture the essence of the collection, and the only way for my type set to display "coherently" is by having the final say in the display order of the coins. For Competitive Sets, especially Type Sets, the coins are displayed/listed in order of denomination, and my collection suffers terribly by this limitation: the creativity I applied to collecting the coins is lost entirely, and the "narrow" display approach (only one way, you don't like it… too bad) is a major turnoff. Unfortunately, the software for the Custom Sets is nothing short of "ancient history" and has been this way all along. Ali E., is NGC planning to upgrade the Custom Sets software… this year? It's horrible right now, and you don't need me to point this out… everyone here knows it. Also, in your thread NGC Registry - What new features would you like to see added? I responded with an idea or two, never heard a peep from NGC on the ideas, and a collector or two gave me high praise for injecting my thoughts. Maybe you could summarize the ideas NGC is presently working on to improve the Competitive and Custom Registry sets for 2022. Give us something to hope for. Bob

I hope you're not desiring a Scratch-Resistant EdgeView Holder. From NGC's "News" the following was announced: NGC Scratch-Resistant Holders Temporarily Unavailable Posted on 11/18/2021 NGC anticipates that Scratch-Resistant Holders will be back in stock in six to nine months.

Concerning Custom Sets... Note: Custom Sets are not yet available in the new NGC Registry The "old" Registry doesn't have nearly the presentation appeal as the new Registry, so very much looking forward to Custom Sets eventual availability in the new NGC Registry.

Check and see if the other Competitive Sets have Images and/or Comments. It may be that the two that are tied for #1 got their Images and Comments added at the same time, and so they are tied. There is some mention, maybe Registry FAQs, about Rank order and how ties are handled.

I hadn't looked at J.D. Foster's Set. Yeah, he's got some Top Pops on the restrikes, MS 67 on a couple, and even an MS 67+. If he felt challenged, he could submit them for CACs just to bump his scores on something. But he's missing a few on the lower eight. Still, if I were you, I'd cross the lower-eight coins, see how you fare, and stay actively in the hunt. Their cool looking coins, and I like the brevity of their span… 16 coins. My puzzle box holds two stacks of 7, and there is room to nest two other coins vertically, but laying on their side-edges, along the double-seven-stacks top edges. But until this thread a few weeks ago, I never even knew about French Roosters. Puzzle Box World has one puzzle box left that can hold 16 coins, and it's a dramatic box… very beautiful. I think it's called a 54 + 1. Paperwork goes in the lid, 16 NGC's go below, and a Bausch & Lomb 10x, Hastings Triplet Loupe magnifier with nickel plated swing away case can "nest" in the unoccupied corner. You learn something new here all the time if you stay involved.

Go for it. You already have all 16 coins, half of them are already in NGC MS 66 (higher grades than anyone else here, it seems, but you'll have to verify that by diligent browsing of who currently owns "what"), and none of your NGC competition have all 16 coins. You're 70 years old, probably retired and can afford all of this, it can't cost too much to cross the others, life is short, so take the gamble. Knowing that you lost a grade on five of your prior crosses, you could size up your final 8 to cross by comparing their appearances and current PCGS grades to the other crossed coins, their crossed outcomes, to guesstimate how you think things will fare on the remaining 8. Goldfinger is missing the rarest date, 1900, he's got three MS 62, two MS 63, and one MS 64 in the lower eight, and you've got him beat from 1907 — 1914. HiHo's best set has a 1902 MS 61, 1899 & 1901 at MS 62, 1904 & 1905 at MS 63, 1903 & 1906 at MS 64, but his 1900 has you definitely beat at MS 65. You win on everything 1907 — 1914. As HiHo states, NGC's EdgeView holders definitely are an advantage due to the inscriptions on the edges of all of these Roosters… another reason. Then, retake your photos to standardize their lighting and sharpness — so they all look similar — and tell a story about each coin for each Owner's Comment. You're done. So, you'll get to Rank #1, here. Lastly, keep looking for coins going forward that will improve your collection. (Get HiHo to sell you his 1900 MS 65?)

Actually, make that "an ice cold beer" is more like it. (a slight rearrangement of one space says it better)

Enjoy "a nice cold coin?" These summers days, after doing home maintenance outside, "a nice cold beer" is more like it.