Free – Report on abrasion (wear) of silver coins, 1821-1902.

[RWB]

I have a US Mint report on the percentage of weight lost due to abrasion of silver coins from approximately 1821 to 1902 (varies with denomination).

 

Anyone who wants a copy, please PM me with your email address and I’ll send it to you. The report is 10 pages, 4 megabytes, PDF.

 

("Act immediately and you might receive a free kitten. Delay, and you could receive 2 kittens by express mail. Wait until tomorrow and you'll possibly get 3 kittens parcel post collect and no report!")

 

[physics-fan3.14]

I'd love a copy. Its actually something that I've been very curious about. I did some minor experiments with the issue, as reported in a past WYNTK article.

 

Please delay shipment of the kitten until next month when I move into my new house.

[RWB]

OK. PM your email.

 

Have to hold the kitten anyway - out of herb seasoning packets.

[RWB]

18 copies sent so far.

[James_OldeTowne]

OK. PM your email.

 

Have to hold the kitten anyway - out of herb seasoning packets.

My Mom wants a kitten! What does media mail cost these days?

[RWB]

Sorry - all out of kittens. One person delayed ordering the report and so he got 6 of them. But I did have enough BBQ seasoning for him....

[physics-fan3.14]

For any who have not gotten this - this is a fascinating report, and well worth a read. It includes number of counterfeit coins detected that year, in itself an interesting report.

[NPCoin]

For any who have not gotten this - this is a fascinating report, and well worth a read. It includes number of counterfeit coins detected that year, in itself an interesting report.

 

I find it even more fascinating the fact that the treasury detected 50% higher rate of counterfeits of the half dollar denomination than any other silver denomination by percentage (15% as opposed to 10% counterfeit for other denominations).

 

When looking at the production figures for the previous 11 year period prior to the report (1891-1901), the half dollar only had half the production as the rest of the subsidiary silver coinage denominations:

 

mintage

52,308,615 50 cent

108,927,136 25 cent

139,015,913 10 cent

 

abrasion per cent (1890-1899)

.0319 50 cent

.0543 25 cent

.0768 10 cent

 

Now, on the face, these numbers are simply numbers. Yet, there is an ongoing debate amongst some as to whether or not coin metal is actually lost due to wear. Reading the report, it is assumed that metal is lost (and not simply displaced). Looking at the percent abrasion, we can say that the smaller the coin is, the more loss due to wear occurs. We can speculate on as to why this would happen.

 

Now, the Mint report seems to assume that the Treasury (secret service) were able to identify every counterfeit that came its way. However, consider the possibility that metal is actually not lost, but simply displaced. What "could" these numbers indicate?

 

The differences in the percent of abrasion seems to match up fairly well with the mintage numbers for the given years by denomination. At this point in time, the Secret Service was still in its infancy, being less than 40 years old. And I would seriously doubt that the Treasury had the manpower to properly authenticate the 1,612,209 coins the report indicated were processed in 1901 between the Philadelphia and New Orleans Mint facilities.

 

I would challenge anyone to consider the possibility that this report, instead of revealing a metal loss due to abrasion (wear), in actuality reveals that there is a real possibility that counterfeiting was not only fairly rampant, especially amongst the more common denominations, but also nearly undetectable through casual observation.

[physics-fan3.14]

SMS - if you objectively measure worn versus UNC coins as I have, and reported the results on this forum, then you will see there is no debate. A measurable amount of metal is lost. The mint report confirms this.