Bulk TPG Submissions

[Thane]

Sink or swim, my ultramodern collection is moving from rolls and bags of raw to boxes and boxes of slabs.

 

A while back, I posted a comparison of NGC and PCGS grading, and I noted that PCGS offers bulk grading (then $10/coin, now $12, but with no charge for below minimum grade).

 

Well, I submitted to somebody other than NGC four date/mint mark combinations of Westward Journey business strike nickels, and the results are in.

 

The best quality came from original bank wrapped rolls (2005-P Bison) acquired in a trade with another Collector Society member. (Thanks!!)

 

There's not too much thrill in owning dozens of lower registry-quality coins and saddling oneself with over $1000 in costs for essentially slabbed pocket change ... But it IS rewarding to slab GOBS of these common coins with bag and roll toning not normally seen on the market.

 

I've added my keepers from this bulk invoice to my personal registry (1965-date 5c business strike), with photos.

 

Too bad I can't win a registry award for most ultramodern MS65's, .

 

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[cpm9ball]

What has been the highest grade you've achieved from submissions of the Westward Journey nickels? I'm curious because I have 20,000 of them in Mint rolls & bags and OBW rolls.

 

I've been working on a little project for way too long because I am such a procrastinator. I was able to purchase 9 dozen of the 13-coin Westward Journey display cases at a very good price. Each holder has a hole for the P&D of every issue, 2004-2006, plus one hole for each year to show the different obverse designs. I also acquired 9 rolls of proof nickels (3 of each year) which I will use to present the obverse designs. Now if I can just get off my butt and finish this project.

 

Chris

[Thane]

Wow, you've got $1000 face in nickels ... good luck with that!

 

MS66 was the best I've gotten so far. It really seems to depend on the mint bag. (For rolls, that means that mint bag they came out of.) Either an entire bag is mostly choice with a handful of gems, or the entire bag is chockful of gems and MS68's creep in. (Hasn't happened to me in nickels, but it has in other denominations.)

 

Enjoy all that searching.

[cpm9ball]

I opened 8 - $50 Mint bags, 2004 P&D Peace and Keelboat & 2005 P&D Bison and Ocean in View, and put them in tubes without searching them. The funniest thing occurred when I transferred some of the 2004 bags to the tubes. I came to the conclusion that the grades wouldn't be too good because the coins kept snagging and clinging to my cotton gloves. ! I still have the 2006 P&D RTM's in the $50 Mint bags. All of the rest are still unsearched in the Mint & OBW rolls.

 

By the way, the rolls do not come from Mint bags. The (contract) distributor receives all of the coins in bulk containers and they are subsequently transferred to either bags or rolls by the distributor.

 

I was curious to know what kind of grading results you got to help me decide whether I should search them or not, but I plan to keep the Mint rolls intact. I guess I should check the census, too! How many bags & rolls would you say you've searched?

 

You might think I'm crazy, but I placed all of the unopened Mint rolls in square tubes to protect the wrappers, and I've noticed that some of the end coins are toning anyway. I guess the wrapper has something to do with it.

 

Chris

[Thane]

GRADING RESULTS: no top pops, only a handful of sub-top-pop coins per type.

 

BAGS AND ROLLS SEARCHED: generally under $100 face per type ... meaning, I might've searched $500 of bank boxes in which uncirculated 2005-D Ocean View were interspersed (OBW's or mixed clean coins with other circulated) and found two thousand 2005-D Ocean View previously untouched. (My bank must've mixed lots when they made the rolls.)

 

But I don't think how many bags and rolls you search will necessarily mean more top pop coins. Either a SINGLE BAG has high grades in it, or it doesn't. With persistence, you might be able to assemble an army of MS 65 and maybe work hard at a few MS 66's, but higher than that is possible only through luck IMO.

 

Increase your odds at luck by getting your bags and rolls from multiple sources.

 

End toning doesn't bother me. Those end coins are useless anyway, most of the time, because of the circular scrapes they most often have (from the wrapping machines, presumably). Some strong toning at least makes them attractive to one buyer lurking out there.

 

Send me a private message if you want to chat further. You've got a lot of posts, you probably know way more about collecting than I do, I've only been seriously at this for a few years.