Vickers Tester

Unicorn · April 10, 2019, 11:40:48 PM

You've excelled yourself Auto ...... I actually have tears in my eyes.

Every single die marker that you've shown is present on mine, though mine is only a 6 pearl crappy coin.

What wonderful photos!!!!

I started to do some this morning with my little camera and the batteries went flat so they're on the charger.

Now I'm going to get my good one out to hopefully reply with some that come close to yours!!!!

On ya Auto!!! :good:

autocoupler · April 11, 2019, 12:35:28 AM

Thanks uni, it's great that your coin is showing all the markers, and proves there certainly are others out there. This particular coin displays the common left tilted 9 and has a English obverse, but the flat based lettering in the reverse legend makes it pretty scarce, about 3% of the total mintage. When you factor in the central reverse dot, I imagine they will be reasonably difficult to track down. :good:

Unicorn · April 11, 2019, 01:15:47 AM

Talk about up all hours eh!!

Well apart from the fact that my coin really really needs a good cleanse ........ and a miracle to save it from it's past life I got my good camera out and took some quick pics (yeah I rushed them ..... down to 30 pics rather than the normal 200 .... ahhhhh anxiety).

Summary

Auto: Depression at lower inner circle and diagonal trench/die crack through date, as well as die crack at foot of second 2.

Though the depression is not evident (perhaps a stikethrough) the inner beading has many common features (especially to the left), die markers indicated are a lovely match.

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Auto: Could be post mint damage but looks like another trench between IA of AUSTRALIA

Though mine is full of plenty of PMD, yay the trench is not PMD .... exactly the same!!!

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Auto: Another pic of gnomes anomaly at bottom of E but pic not as clear as other photo. Also, another trench/die crack at bottom of M in COMMONWEALTH.

Very interesting .... there's a similar tag below the centre of the base of the downstroke of the E, along with the bottom leftmost of the E being weak. Same trench on the M!!!

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Auto: Elongated cud above E in GEORGIVS.

.... and there she be!!!

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Monty: .... oh and the dot ..... don't forget the dot! (nobody expected the dot!)

Seek and you shall find!

Now that we have some markers I might look over my 1922s again (as some are pretty worse for wear for spotting the dot)

nealeffendi · April 11, 2019, 03:47:54 AM

Quote from: 'autocoupler' pid='119091' dateline='1554908728'Thanks uni, it's great that your coin is showing all the markers, and proves there certainly are others out there. This particular coin displays the common left tilted 9 and has a English obverse, but the flat based lettering in the reverse legend makes it pretty scarce, about 3% of the total mintage. When you factor in the central reverse dot, I imagine they will be reasonably difficult to track down. :good:

I've long wondered if the '22s with flat bases, as well as the wide 2s, were the bunch of dies sent to Perth from London.

fred lever · April 11, 2019, 06:33:58 AM

Terrific photos guys!
Ok there are more than one coin exhibiting the middle dot, that pretty much excludes a one off punch effort.
I'm stuck on couple other projects at the moment and will have some more thoughts on the dot and draft up an article using info from this thread with your permissions.
Fred.

Unicorn · April 11, 2019, 07:30:38 AM

No worries at all Fred. :good:

autocoupler · April 11, 2019, 10:51:23 AM

Quote from: 'Unicorn' pid='119092' dateline='1554911147'Talk about up all hours eh!!

Well apart from the fact that my coin really really needs a good cleanse ........ and a miracle to save it from it's past life I got my good camera out and took some quick pics (yeah I rushed them ..... down to 30 pics rather than the normal 200 .... ahhhhh anxiety).

Excellent pics uni, and good to confirm the trench/die crack between I and A of AUSTRALIA isn't PMD.

autocoupler · April 11, 2019, 10:58:01 AM

Quote from: 'nealeffendi' pid='119093' dateline='1554920274'
Quote from: 'autocoupler' pid='119091' dateline='1554908728'Thanks uni, it's great that your coin is showing all the markers, and proves there certainly are others out there. This particular coin displays the common left tilted 9 and has a English obverse, but the flat based lettering in the reverse legend makes it pretty scarce, about 3% of the total mintage. When you factor in the central reverse dot, I imagine they will be reasonably difficult to track down. :good:

I've long wondered if the '22s with flat bases, as well as the wide 2s, were the bunch of dies sent to Perth from London.

Yes, the quality of the wider date dies were much superior IMO. So too were the narrower date dies which displays the upright 9, all had much squarer rims and a central strike as well.

autocoupler · April 11, 2019, 11:01:50 AM

Quote from: 'fred lever' pid='119094' dateline='1554930238'Terrific photos guys!
Ok there are more than one coin exhibiting the middle dot, that pretty much excludes a one off punch effort.
I'm stuck on couple other projects at the moment and will have some more thoughts on the dot and draft up an article using info from this thread with your permissions.
Fred.

All good Fred :good:

Don't know what's going on with the system today? It wouldn't allow me to reply to all recipients in the one post :huh:

fred lever · May 01, 2019, 09:33:05 AM

Coming back to Unicorns 22 with the dot in the middle.
That dot is not at the geographical center (centre) of the coin, so I doubt it is a left over from a machining sequence on a hub or die.

The vertical centre line of the die can be found by drawing a line through the centres of the scrolls and Uni's dot is a bit to the right of centre (center).
To check that I popped a scrap 22 in the lathe in the 3 jaw chuck spun that and noted the inner dot circle did not wobble meaning I had the coin "centred". Then I drove the tool into the coin paring out a circle. That center of that circle lay on the centre line of the scroll middles.

So Uni's dot thingy is just a die chip that fell into a place that drew attention.
We all have coins that are covered in dots, only ones that are near something get noticed!

Cheers Fred.

Unicorn · May 01, 2019, 11:19:27 AM

Thanks Fred ..... so would that also be the same in Auto's coins instance?

fred lever · May 01, 2019, 01:29:29 PM

Hi Uni, yes all in the same place, so its a good "die marker".
If we had enough coins we may find a progression of shape and size.

I went through about 100 1922 pennies and found plenty of dots and lumps but only one with a faint "mark" at the same place. Trouble is mine are circulated and what I was looking at could just be another bump lump thing. If we could find more and demonstrate it as a progression we could call it the "Auto-Uni" die marker and sell them on ebay as a new unlisted variety...........only kidding.....

Fred.

Unicorn · May 01, 2019, 01:36:13 PM

:laugh2: ..... on ya Fred ....... (I've always considered myself to be a bit of an unlisted variety :winkextra: )

autocoupler · May 02, 2019, 09:11:45 AM

Yeah Fred, I always knew the dot wasn't in the center, I've drawn so many imaginary lines on the 22's for other reasons that to me it was too far to the right. What attracted me was the perfect circular like shape with a flat top or bottom whichever way you look at it. I'm still running with, "the deeds of a dodgy Mint employee who wished to leave evidence of his existence by whacking a die with a small flat bottomed punch". Well that's what I would have done, and I'm dodgy! :angel: :blush: :biggrin:

gnome61 · December 31, 2023, 02:29:25 PM

While doing some light reading came across this interesting bit of information from the Melbourne Mint. The report is dated 6th June 1935 from the Deputy Master of the Melbourne Mint to the Royal Mint in their yearly reports. The page goes on about some other purchases that previous year.