HM 90th Birthday

LooseChange · August 22, 2016, 03:36:44 PM

Picked mine up from post office.. pleasantly surprised how nice these coins are considering the reasonable price-tag.

trout · August 23, 2016, 11:24:50 PM

According to the tracking my HM Birthday coins should arrive tomorrow 4 months after I had paid for them.
it has been quite a long wait and I hope that they can live up to my expectations :angel:

LooseChange · August 24, 2016, 01:06:34 AM

Im sure they will trout, keeping in mind these cost $25 for a set of 3 somewhat unique coins.. i don't think you can get a better buy this year.

trout · August 24, 2016, 01:15:05 AM

Quote from: 'LooseChange' pid='95435' dateline='1471966594'Im sure they will trout, keeping in mind these cost $25 for a set of 3 somewhat unique coins.. i don't think you can get a better buy this year.

The in come the dollars/cents sets will take a lot of beating for being the RAM best product of the year in my book.
I will know if these can top that tomorrow :ok:

Robster · August 24, 2016, 04:57:47 AM

Received today, lovely set!

trout · August 24, 2016, 02:25:52 PM

My coins arrived today as well.
What a beautiful set of coins, The finish on these is quite Stunning.
These look like a coin a collector would design :good:

JeffH · August 24, 2016, 02:31:08 PM

You would have to assume that Ian Rank-Broadley and Stuart Devlin collect at least some coins.

trout · August 24, 2016, 02:40:41 PM

Quote from: 'JeffH' pid='95466' dateline='1472014868'You would have to assume that Ian Rank-Broadley and Stuart Devlin collect at least some coins.

The designs are the same, It's the different finish that is rather nice

ausjack · August 24, 2016, 03:53:12 PM

Gee they look like a bit of a funny mix, proof but then not a proof :scratch_one-s_head:

trout · August 25, 2016, 09:47:48 AM

Quote from: 'ausjack' pid='95482' dateline='1472019792'Gee they look like a bit of a funny mix, proof but then not a proof :scratch_one-s_head:

Yes they are different But they do look rather good.
Anywhere else in the World and these coins would be described as a Reverse Proof.
However these have a strange description on the packaging, Ram calls these a "Frosted Uncirculated" finish and much like the Wedding Set coins which were described as "Gem Uncirculated" they are a stupid and ill informed description of a coins finish.
WTF these sound like Grades NOT a description of a coins "Finish" :dash1:
RAM employs some extremely talented people and they produce World Class coins But their people in the marketing department stuff that up when they come up with these basically stupid coin descriptions from time to time :dash1:

trout · August 25, 2016, 11:11:26 PM

I just got an email from RAM letting me know that another order of these coins is on it's way.
I went into my RAM account and sure enough I had put another order in at a later date than the first one by mistake as I must have forgotten that I had previously ordered some of these.
Bugger :dash1:

trout · October 01, 2016, 11:42:58 AM

I am thinking of sending a set of these each to NGC and PCGS to be graded and to see how they attribute these.
I imagine that they would be scratching their heads for a while making a decision as to what to call these

I see then as a mixture of a Specimen, Proof and a Reverse Proof finish.
The information from RAM is that normal Business strike planchet's were used But the nice clear/smooth fields found on these coins indicate that the dies used were highly polished, Maybe they were struck more than once as well.

They are an interesting and attractive coin and are a very different finish to what we are used to :good:
It would be interesting to see what they get attributed as.

I have just noticed that the 50c coin that is included in the HM Birthday set is also available from Aus Post in a PNC.
I can't see Aus post pulling apart the HM Birthday sets to use the 50c coin to produce these So it looks like the mintage of 9108 will be wrong for the 50c coin in the set :angel:

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Australia-2016-Queen-Elizabeth-II-90th-Birthday-50c-PNC-1998-Rank-Broadley-/122132469875?hash=item1c6fa99873:g:WvQAAOSwzaJX2KXK

trout · October 02, 2016, 07:41:46 AM

I just had a closer look at that PNC and the mintage stated is 9000.
as the 50c coin in this set is exactly the same as the one in the HM Birthday Pre Order set then the mintage for this 50c is over 18,000.

More than a little bit underhanded of RAM to let us think that the coins in the HM Birthday set were ONLY available in the Pre Order Set and NO others were to be available in this limited issue and yet they produced another 9000 for Aus post and doubled the mintage.:dodgy:

LooseChange · October 02, 2016, 11:22:12 AM

I guess the mintage number is just a packaging number now... pretty shitty.

trout · October 02, 2016, 11:37:16 AM

Quote from: 'LooseChange' pid='99353' dateline='1475369532'I guess the mintage number is just a packaging number now... pretty shitty.

I think it is wrong and dishonest myself.:dodgy:
To be told that you have to pre order the coins because that is the ONLY way they will be available and the number of the sets ordered will be the mintage figure then supply Aus Post with the exact same coins to put on the market is a blatant LIE.
Do RAM think we are completely stupid and wouldn't notice :dash1: