I'm sorry, NGC, but your grade on this coin is way, way off

[James_OldeTowne]

I'm sorry, but there is no way this 1796 Liberty Cap large-cent should be in an NGC AU-55 holder. At best, it looks VF-30 to me, especially having almost certainly been cleaned and recolored. Sure, I'd love to own it anyhow, but AU-55?

 

James

[HaydenTubbs]

yikes!

[TerrapinWill]

Is this an example of "market accecptable" vs. "techincal" grading? Coin looks pretty worn for a 55.

[gmarguli]

While not my area, it looks fine to me. Clearly weakly struck, but some red in the protected areas, clear hair definition neck and below, solid details on the leaves. I don't notice any significant wear on the lettering. The cheek, neck, and shoulder appear to only have light rub.

 

If that is a VF30, I'll buy them all day long. AU55 might be high (or might not), but the coin only looks lightly circulated.

[James_OldeTowne]

NGC AU-55:

 

 

Here's what the Robinson coin (same variety) looked like - graded F-12:

 

 

James

[James_OldeTowne]

Reverses:

 

NGC AU-55:

 

Robinson F-12:

 

Under the most forgiving of circumstances, perhaps the morning after a frivolous night of a little dancing, a lot of alcohol, too many bean burritos and a severe hangover to boot, I could maybe, possibly see a commercial grade stretched out (and still overgraded) to XF, but AU-55?

 

James

[James_OldeTowne]

Here's a former Fine-15 sold by Heritage about five years ago (different variety):

 

James

[Tradedollarnut]

I saw that in the catalog last night. The EAC grade of 25 certainly caught my eye.

[Hoot]

I saw that in the catalog last night. The EAC grade of 25 certainly caught my eye.

 

Yup. The EAC grade made me scratch my head as well. It's on target for a market graded AU piece, however. The photo must be horrible. Like James, I thought the color was peculiar, as if recolored.

 

Hoot

[michael]

looks xf to me

 

the recoloring is a decent job but i would love to see the coin as i bet the photo does not do the coin justice

[CarolinaCollector]

Assuming the color is OK, I agree with Greg that this is a weakly struck AU. We all need to remember that this coin was produced on a hand-turned press in the 18th century.

 

Whether this coin should be valued as a 25, 30, or 45 is up to the individual. But I would be thrillled to purchase this coin at a market VF-30 full retail price.

[MikeKing]

excuse my ignorance, please, but how can you tell this coin has been cleaned and retoned?

Thanks

Michael

[Jazzy]

The Heritage auction is for a Sheldon 87 - and the nicest one I've ever seen to boot!

 

I agree that the grading is an issue, but maybe not as big an issue as many of the posters have made it out to be.

 

One has to remember that the technology of the mint at the time was below par (compared to the minting technologies of Europe). Actual horses were still being used for horsepower.

 

The condition of that Heritage coin is about as well-struck as the mint could produce for that series, and one could actually argue that it is in some degree of MS, except for the color.

 

Therein lies the rub - Is the natural coppery color original, or has it been cleaned at some point? It's very likely that it's been cleaned - cleaning was de rigeur until the end of the 20th century.

 

Grading these old coppers is a very different thing from grading anything else.

[James_OldeTowne]

((( excuse my ignorance, please, but how can you tell this coin has been cleaned and retoned? )))

 

From my experience, any time you see copper whose toning is like a "negative image" of what the toning should look like, that's an almost infallible sign of recoloring. In this instance, especially on the reverse, you see that the background fields of the coin are much lighter in color than the high points. So, if wear is what causes rub, which therefore lightens the color of the metal, then how can it be possible that the high points are darker than the background of the coin? The highpoints of a worn copper should be LIGHTER than the background, on account of the wear removing and exposing metal that is newer than that of the relatively unworn and untouched protected areas in the fields.

 

Here's what I mean. The image below is a simple negative of the Heritage image. Notice how more realistic the toning pattern is? In this negative, the highpoints are lighter color than the fields, which is how natural toning appears:

 

 

So how does "negative" colored toning happen? Imagine this scenario - the coin is cleaned to a bright pink color. The coin doctor realizes that it needs to be darkened down to appear more appealing, so he decides to use Deller's darkener. This applied by putting some on the thumb, then rubbing it on the exposed pink metal. Where does the darkener have the strongest effect? On the highest points of the coin, of course, which is why this type of AT (recoloring) causes the weird negative coloration.

 

Hope this makes sense.

 

James

[James_OldeTowne]

((( The Heritage auction is for a Sheldon 87 - and the nicest one I've ever seen to boot! )))

 

Jazzy, I actually agree with your sentiments. S-87 is a very tough variety, and I think the condition census only goes to around VF. BUT, the fact that the condition census only goes to VF should tell you something about this coin that grades "AU/UNC".....

 

James

[IGWT]

Thanks, James. You taught me something.

[EZ_E]

James, you still get my vote for the most educational poster on the boards!

 

[coinman1794]

I think this is more of a photographic issue than a problem with the grade. Heritage blowup pictures are a disgrace. I kicked the image into the lighten III mode, and ignored the blowup pictures, which always suck. If you look at the "coin-in-holder" view on Lighten III, it looks like a crisp lustrous AU..and there's almost no wear. The only thing, then, that bugs me is the presense of several scratches across the face!