Value of 21 missing penny major varieties

[gnome]

Cheers Auto, Keep up the great work

[nealeffendi]

Nice work, only thing lacking is there are no table headers. I know the first one is estimated numbers known but the others are unspecified grades (maybe good, VF, EF etc) or are they numerical ratings (VF35, AU50, MS64 etc)?

[autocoupler]

When I copied the document for loading onto the forum, in error, I didn't include the header. Should read, VG - Fine - VF - EF - aUNC - UNC - CHU.

Thanks all for the encouraging words

[fred lever]

Good work auto!
The 1929 Indian caught my attention  with a low mintage compared to the English.
David Briggs and other collectors  give the ratio of Indian to English as about 50/50.
That opinion comes from actual observation over thousands of coins and decades of collecting.
However,
I went over my notes when cross referencing the Mint  information from Sharples/Mullett/Holland et al.
The best  indication comes from the hub types available at the time and to simplify it all:
There were successful obverse dies from the 1916 and 1921 (indian and english) master hubs in the press room during the first strikings of the 1929 job.
So a number ? of coins would have both types of obverse.
At some point during striking they exhausted the 1916 strain dies and to finish the job off they chewed through last dies from the English hub (1921) strain.
There were a fresh lot of 1916 source dies ready out of the oven but they were not required as the 29 job was completed.
These dies then featured in the 1930 and 1931 jobs.
So, clearly there were both obverse types were used, and maybe there were less Indians than English.
As no count was ever made of what type of obverse die produced what number of coins it is impossible to know exactly so it is BEST GUESS!
Closely counting the number of coins struck per die pairs used came later post 1930 , the 1929 strikings were chaotic as dies failed without warning.
The job then was just to bang away in the presses and replace broken dies as they  broke with whatever the toolroom could muster up.
Must have been real fun, dozens of dies never even got to the press room, some failed during hub pressing, some failed in heat treating or broke instantly when mounted up and run!
As making a die batch takes days of press, heat treat, and polish routines you can guess the press room was sweating on the tool room constantly.
Interesting times.
Fred.

[autocoupler]

Thanks Fred, also for your interesting info. To be honest, I don't know much about these matters, I just pick up information where I can. 

Ebay is usually a handy source for estimating comparisons between die types. A survey of 1929 Indian v English might indicate something?  

The reference to a 50,00 mintage for the 1929 Indians came from commentary on the Bench Mark collection. Reference link as follows.

Benchmark Coin Collection (ngccoin.com)

[Basil]

Thanks Fred, also for your interesting info. To be honest, I don't know much about these matters, I just pick up information where I can. 

Yes,good to see Fred back into it with his knowledge.

I don't have great knowledge when it comes to the Oz Mints procedures/shenanigans either,in fact,TBH, i try to stay clear of it where possible but still interesting to read.

[nealeffendi]

 A survey of 1929 Indian v English might indicate something?  

The reference to a 50,00 mintage for the 1929 Indians came from commentary on the Bench Mark collection. Reference link as follows.

Benchmark Coin Collection (ngccoin.com)

I have scores of 1929 Indians and they are from many different dies. Now how is that possible unless I'm a fortunate bugger and would also require that each die failed after a few thousand coins to make only 50,000.Now whether the ratio of Indians to English is 50:50 is something I can only speculate on, perhaps in different states they issued different batches and that will vary the ratio unless you get a large random sample from every city and state. Plus the Benchmark Collection is a lousy reference full of factual errors :blush: , a glaring example is the claim that the '26 Serif Sixpence are the product of the proof die, yet I have examples from at least 4 different dies.

[fred lever]

Just a casual test on the 1929 Indian/English ratio from my collection.
I have about 100  1929 of all grades and variety/error and the ratio of obverse type is about 50/50!
I never did try to buy 29's for the obverse type alone so what I have could be representative of the population.
Neal has a good point about release of coins by state area skewing the seeding of batch types.
I guess constant trading of coins across the country for 100 years  would tend to even "batch seeding" out.
Fred.

[fred lever]

I had another trawl through the summing up of the press and die balance books by Mullett to see if I could glean a different view on the Indian obverses and the useage through the late 20's.
The problem is obverse dies are not dated, so a successful obverse  die may not have been destroyed at a dated years end as reverses mostly were.
Thus in the general scrimmage a die could be re-used year after year without being driven to destruction.
Mullett mentions one obverse die marked "130" that he thinks was made from a hub before 1927 (actual hub source unknown).
This was a 178 bead and appeared in notation as being paired with various reverses during 1929/1930/1931 pressing trials.
Therefore limited numbers of coins with "130" 178 bead obverses and sundry (pick a year between 1929 and 1931) reverses may have been good enough to chuck into the outgoing bag to join the weighing out and into circulation.
Sound familiar?
Fred.

[nealeffendi]

Hi Fred, the leftover Indians were all done with by 1927 (a single die ex Sydney that was also used in 1924). So the 1929 Indians were all with fresh obverses. Now the number of English may include fresh dies and leftover dies and then the is working out how many Old English, Fresh English and Fresh Indians were used in 1929.

[autocoupler]

The recent IAG auction had some varieties listed and sold as follows. Prices are inclusive of commission.

1920 dot below English obverse - MS63BN $17,690

1920 dot below English obverse - VF25 (gf-aVF) $73

1921 English obverse - VF30 (aVF) $67

1922 Indian obverse - AU58 - (aUNC) $110

1924 Indian obverse - VF30 (gf-aVF) $24

1927 Indian obverse - VF25 (gf-aVF) $92

1929 Indian obverse UNC/CHU $854

1943I Long reverse denticles - AU55 (gEF-aUNC) $232 

Interestingly, lot 1288 was a 1921 Penny with what appeared to be an English obverse but not described as such - aUNC $500. 

Some minor alterations have been made to the list, but as always, these values are a guide only and should not be relied upon as fact.
 

[Mister T]

Oh nice - I had that catalogue set aside to look at.