1807 Dime revisited. UPDATE ON PAGE 2! CAC'S decision!

[AnkurJ]

So I bought this 1807 Bust dime last month off ebay. It is in a PCGS OGH VF30 holder, but looked much nicer. There was a question however as to what was going on behind liberty's head. Some said it looked like post mint damage, or grafitti.

 

So here are my pics of the coin which reflects how it looks in hand better than the sellers pics. The sellers pics were tiltled to show off color that does pop when the coin is tilted. What I feel that marks behind the head actually are, are marks from a rusted die. They extend into a star as well.

 

Take a look and let me know what you think.

 

 

 

Here is a close up of that area:

 

Ankur

[MarkFeld]

I didn't understand the (seemingly low) grade before, and I don't now, either. I don't see obvious damage.

 

What about the scratch in the right obverse field - how bad is it in hand?

[jom]

I'd be more worried about the scratches in the obverse. Not that I'm worried that much as I think it's really nice. I dunno XF40 or 45?

 

jom

[Conder101]

I think it has had a repair job done in the field behind the head and not a quality job. Looks like someone tried to smooth out some damage there but burnishing it.

[MarkFeld]

I think it has had a repair job done in the field behind the head and not a quality job. Looks like someone tried to smooth out some damage there but burnishing it.

 

If that is correct (and it might be - I don't claim to know, either way), the coin should absolutely not have received a grade, not even a lower net one.

[Walkerfan]

To me the scratch in the right obv. field is trivial and it shouldn't affect the grade that much. I'd still like to know what that disruption is in the left obv. field behind the head, though. I honestly don't know whether it is post mint or mint damage but it is still distracting. I would feel a little better knowing it is NOT post mint damage, though. If that was the case, then I am not sure that it is distracting enough for that much of a NET GRADE. I wouldn't rule out possible mint damage, as the minting methods and dies were MUCH cruder back then. I'm sorry that I don't have a better answer for you. I guess that, even if it WAS done at the mint, it would STILL be bothersome to me. That is the best opinion that I can give.

[Mr.Mcknowitall]

I don't know anything about this.

However, to my eyes, I detect, what I will call a blemish, on the reverse in approximately the same location.

I have a similar coin with the same appearance, and it is not post mint damage.

This is a very small and thin coin, and a blemish caused by pressure, etc. on one side can certainly have an effect on the other side during the strike.

Not that I am not seeing things.I am no good at determining anything about a coin from pictures.

I just felt like using the keyboard this morning.

 

Respectfully,

John Curlis

[braddick]

Lots of positive attributes going on with this one but it'll all be killed if it is post damaged, repaired or not, going on with the obverse as noted.

 

So original in all other respects.

[AnkurJ]

Looking at the coin with a 20x loupe, there is no movement of metal or a depression that would be caused by a repair. On the opposite side, there is just weakness in the strike. The more I look at it, the more I think it is a die issue.

 

By the way, the coin is CAC'd as well. I will be showing it to John tomorrow.

[AnkurJ]

Here is another 1807 from Heritage archives. It seems to have a good number of die clashing as well.

 

[BillJones]

As I remember this coin from the previous thread, this coin is in a PCGS green label holder. A lot of collectors think that the green label period was a golden age for PCGS, but it had its down side too, especially with early coins. PCGS tended to net grade them for problems, sometimes to the point where coins that should have gone into body bags got into holders. I saw PCGS graded early copper pieces with major problems net graded during this period. They were not isolated instances.

 

When I first started as a dealer I bought an 1807 quarter in a green label PCGS VF holder for a customer who wanted a raw coin. The holder was badly scratched, as I eventually learned on purpose, to hide the fact that the coin had been polished and given a coat of AT. A dealer friend who was adept at crack-outs broke the holder for me and as soon as he saw the piece outside the holder he said, "Oh no!" The piece cleanly should never have been graded.

 

As I stated before I think that this 1807 dime is damaged. I have never seen die rust that looks like that. The die rust I've seen was more subtle with a mild granularity to it. The entire 1807 dime mintage (165,000) was produced from one set of dies. The mint personnel seemed determined to push this die pair to the limit because they were not going to make another set of dime dies with the Draped Bust design. The dies were repeatedly clashed with many marks in the field as a result. I've heard expert dime collectors say that there are over 15 die states for the 1807 dime.

 

This coin appears to be a fairly early die state. If the marks at 11k were on the die one would expect to see at least traces of them on later dies states. I don't see them in the pictures I have available. There are also marks in the hair. Those look like post mint damage to me as well. My take is PCGS net graded this coin from AU-50 or EF-45 to VF-30. I don't think that they should have done it, and I have my doubts that they would grade this coin today.

 

[Mozin]

Bill Jones makes sense to me. This dime was net graded. John A must have felt the net grading was acceptable.

[mkman123]

honestly now that ankur mentioned it, that area does bug me

[AnkurJ]

It's funny because in hand it's barely noticeable. For what I paid, and the look of the coin, I can live with whatever is going on.

[DirtyGoldMan]

It's funny because in hand it's barely noticeable. For what I paid, and the look of the coin, I can live with whatever is going on.

I agree. The damage is probably barely noticeable with the coin in hand. Good value, IMO.

[James_OldeTowne]

I don't recall exactly what I thought in the old thread, but from these images, this looks like a damaged coin that has been repaired. It almost seems to have been bent through some sort of impact behind the head, and then straightened back out, with resulting corruption of detail.

 

It has other impact damage as well, particularly at "AM" on the reverse.

 

Regardless of the foolish blind faith that some people (and I'm not singling out anyone here) put into old holders, PCGS made a lot of mistakes twenty years ago with early coins, and a lot of those mistakes are permanently entombed because of high prices that were paid for high grades. This just looks like one of those mistakes, to me. If you own the coin knowing that it is damaged, yet you don't mind the damage, then what does anyone else's opinion matter? You like it, and that's what counts.

[grip]

I don't recall exactly what I thought in the old thread, but from these images, this looks like a damaged coin that has been repaired. It almost seems to have been bent through some sort of impact behind the head, and then straightened back out, with resulting corruption of detail.

 

It has other impact damage as well, particularly at "AM" on the reverse.

 

Regardless of the foolish blind faith that some people (and I'm not singling out anyone here) put into old holders, PCGS made a lot of mistakes twenty years ago with early coins, and a lot of those mistakes are permanently entombed because of high prices that were paid for high grades. This just looks like one of those mistakes, to me. If you own the coin knowing that it is damaged, yet you don't mind the damage, then what does anyone else's opinion matter? You like it, and that's what counts.

 

That's what my thought was, the coin was bent and straightened back out.

[Kurtdog]

Looking at the coin with a 20x loupe, there is no movement of metal or a depression that would be caused by a repair. On the opposite side, there is just weakness in the strike. The more I look at it, the more I think it is a die issue.

 

By the way, the coin is CAC'd as well. I will be showing it to John tomorrow.

I'll save you the bother. He's going to tell you the same thing I'm going to tell you. That grade was taken down to VF because that area can't be explained away as die-related. PCGS isn't CSI Miami. They know that area is PMD of some kind, but they believe the coin is marketable at that grade-reduction. And, so does CAC, and, so do I.

[AnkurJ]

UPDATE!

 

So I gave this coin to John this past weekend so he could take a closer look at it. After reviewing it, he told me there was indeed something done to the coin many many years ago, and the marks were NOT mint made. But it has toned over and the coin still has a nice look to it

.

That being said, he has offered to buy the coin back for what I paid, or refund me $200 and remove the sticker. Or the last option is keep the coin as is with the CAC sticker.

What would you guys do?

Ankur

[jom]

Was this coin part of your collection or something you are selling?

 

If it's part of your collection: If you like it, keep it sticker and all. If you don't like it sell it to JA. I mean, if you like the coin what does it matter what happened to it?

 

If it's something you intended to sell to a client I'd probably sell it to JA as a first choice. Or if you want to move it to a client disclose the issue to them before sale.

 

JMO

 

jom

[mkman123]

ahhhh so CAC made a mistake eh??? They should pay you what the coin cost and some more

[e1cnr]

I think you should keep it

 

 

maybe let CAC do a buyback on the sticker, to let them keep their ? intact

 

you should collect coins big enough to see (just kidding)

[crypto79-migration]

UPDATE!

 

So I gave this coin to John this past weekend so he could take a closer look at it. After reviewing it, he told me there was indeed something done to the coin many many years ago, and the marks were NOT mint made. But it has toned over and the coin still has a nice look to it

.

That being said, he has offered to buy the coin back for what I paid, or refund me $20 and remove the sticker. Or the last option is keep the coin as is with the CAC sticker.

What would you guys do?

Ankur

 

If I were you I would learn to grade better before throwing that kind of money around. As for the coin I would sell it to CAC and let them take it off the market. I bet JA thought he was doing you a favor by offering to let you keep the sticker on the coin even though it had been worked but all it does by you coming here and announcing it is devalue the CAC brand a little at least in my eyes. Why would the founder of the company would be ok with a doctored CAC coin in the hands of a blabber mouth I'll never know.

 

Wouldn't this question be better phrased on the official CAC forum?

 

 

[FishyOne]

UPDATE!

 

So I gave this coin to John this past weekend so he could take a closer look at it. After reviewing it, he told me there was indeed something done to the coin many many years ago, and the marks were NOT mint made. But it has toned over and the coin still has a nice look to it

.

That being said, he has offered to buy the coin back for what I paid, or refund me $20 and remove the sticker. Or the last option is keep the coin as is with the CAC sticker.

What would you guys do?

Ankur

 

Ankur, if it was me, I would take the buy back offer unless this coin had a special, personal value.

 

Everybody makes mistakes.

[Coindude]

I say if you are planning on selling it, either you sell it to CAC at your buy price or, remove the sticker and sell it disclosing what you know about it. If you're going to keep it, keep it for what it is, preferably removing the sticker so that if it were ever to get into another persons hands they won't assume it's a non problem coin.

[James_OldeTowne]

That being said, he has offered to buy the coin back for what I paid, or refund me $20 and remove the sticker. Or the last option is keep the coin as is with the CAC sticker.

What would you guys do?

If I had bought the coin, it would have been knowing of the problem. I would keep it, but remove the CAC sticker. Of course, I would be peeling off the sticker regardless to keep the slab consistent with all my others.

 

Ankur, I know that you are in the "when it comes time to sell" crowd, which is truly the underlining premise of CAC, therefore the correct thing to do ethically would be to remove the coin from the CAC population so that the next owner doesn't get misled into thinking he has a problem-free coin. It's fairly cut-and-dried, in my opinion.

 

I had no doubt whatsoever that John would come to the same conclusion that most everyone on the boards did... that it is a problem coin.

 

Edited to add:

I am a bit surprised that CAC would make it an option to keep the sticker. If I bought that coin sight-unseen as so-called "damage free", I would NOT be happy AT ALL. On the other hand, I believe you said you paid VF money sight-seen and like the coin even knowing it was damaged, and I have zero problem at all with that.

[DirtyGoldMan]

UPDATE!

 

So I gave this coin to John this past weekend so he could take a closer look at it. After reviewing it, he told me there was indeed something done to the coin many many years ago, and the marks were NOT mint made. But it has toned over and the coin still has a nice look to it

.

That being said, he has offered to buy the coin back for what I paid, or refund me $20 and remove the sticker. Or the last option is keep the coin as is with the CAC sticker.

What would you guys do?

Ankur

I would have to reevaluate how I view the CAC if the final determination of borderline coins is up to the submitter. It would be like sending a coin to NGC, they evaluate the coin, and give you the choice between a 65, a 65+, and a body bag, that you get to decide.

 

Somehow, I think that there has to be more to the story or something else that is lost in translation.

 

 

[AnkurJ]

While I like the coin, the damage will always bother me as this was for my collection, not for resale. In hand the mark appears very minor as it has toned over.

 

But the bottom line is that CAC is taking full responsibility for their error. JA is simply giving me the option of keeping it if I like it enough. My decision is to sell it back as late draped bust dimes are not difficult to find.

 

Crypto: this is already on the CAC forums. Thank you. And looking at the coin it looks more AU than VF. PCGS net graded it. Good luck trying to get anything back from them for their error of putting it in a slab.

 

Ryk: I'm sure you've already emailed John so he will answer you himself. But this is not a case of a borderline coin, it's a case of a coin with damage.

[DirtyGoldMan]

While I like the coin, the damage will always bother me as this was for my collection, not for resale. In hand the mark appears very minor as it has toned over.

 

But the bottom line is that CAC is taking full responsibility for their error. JA is simply giving me the option of keeping it if I like it enough. My decision is to sell it back as late draped bust dimes are not difficult to find.

 

Crypto: this is already on the CAC forums. Thank you. And looking at the coin it looks more AU than VF. PCGS net graded it. Good luck trying to get anything back from them for their error of putting it in a slab.

 

Ryk: I'm sure you've already emailed John so he will answer you himself. But this is not a case of a borderline coin, it's a case of a coin with damage.

Actually, wise guy, I have not emailed John. He seems okay with you damaging the CAC brand with your public threads, and it's no skin off my back.

 

The coin is, apparently, borderline with repsect to its stickerability--why else would there be an option? If it were a mistake, the sticker would have to come off.

[AnkurJ]

How does this damage the CAC brand?

 

No one said they are 100% and never make mistakes.

When they do make one, they don't give you a run around and admit it!

And they pay for their mistake.

 

Have you ever tried this with PCGS? I have and it took weeks even to get them to admit they made a mistake.

 

In this case because I'm a collector JA gave me the option to keep the coin. If I was a full time dealer I'm sure the option wouldn't have been given.