What's your opinion on the latest Smooth rim /no lettering Washie error's selling for ~150usd on ebay right now. I searched "washington dollar error" and got 6 pages of them, with the smooth edge error accounting for around 30-40% of the results listed.

Is this just another error that ol' Tom Potter will denounce as capitalist vodoo marketing ?
Will thousands of folks get out there buffers and begin to buff down the rim of Washie's and then put them up for sale on ebay as genuine errors ?
Will this error replace with wildly sought after and ultra rare 'upside down' edge lettering ; ) ?
or
Will this guy stick to the wall, be listed in the new Redbook, and become the key error in the series?,,
Like the Wisconsin Extra Leaf's.

Intentional Mint error,, drive's circulation, etc. ?

I see another Wisconsin SQ situation.

Don't spend your money on it now, because it will be worth face value later.

If it runs the same path as the Wisconsin SQ's then I just may get in. Those have gone up since 2004. They initially ran about 150 per variety, with the high leaf about 20% more. There were also around 16 pages of them listed on ebay when the flash occured. There are presently only 3 pages listed when searching "wisconsin quarter" and the high/low are going for around 200-250 per in BU condition.

My fear is that this error could be easily imparted to a coin with abit of buffing or other technique by a skilled jeweler or hack..... or worse still, this turns out to be a systemic mechanical failure within the machinery that produces the edging and the supply of the error continues to grow everytime they hammer out another batch.

I'm in waiting mode, but watching and listening carefully.

Ah, didn't know those errors were going up in value.

As for tampering, I could see it with either coin. Just be careful.

No edge lettering?
Heavens to Murgatroid!! We have "godless" coin in circulation!!

You've seen one in circulation?

I don't see these bring big money down the road. They are popping up every where.

One guy found 100+ of them, can't be that rare.

I think its much neater then the extra leaf errors.... these look like they might have been struck with SAC collars... which would make them a mule....

Maybe the coins with edge lettering are the rarities...

As many as there are on Ebay, these "blank edge" coins cannot be truly rare. I wouldn't waste my money on 'em.

My understanding is that the lettering is not in the collar but added later in a seperate process.

So much for the guy who invented THAT process......................

That's my understanding also...
Outlying question is whether this edging process is 99.9999% effective at imparting edging, or if it's 99% effective.
Anyone have any specs on the process.?

From this weeks Coin World


Collectors reporting errors on edges of Washington $1s
Finds include doubled, missing edge inscriptions
By Eric von Klinger COIN WORLD Staff


    Reports of manufacturing errors involving edges of new George Washington Presidential dollar coins include double lettering, lack of lettering, "dropped letters" and odd stray marks.
    The George Washington coins, first officially released Feb. 15, are supposed to have these elements incused on the edge: date, Mint mark, IN GOD WE TRUST and E PLURIBUS UNUM. In the production of circulation-quality coins, the planchets are first struck, obverse and reverse, in a coin press with a plain retaining collar. Then they are taken in open buckets over a long conveyor system to a machine where they are fed horizontally and spun by a rotating, vertical wheel through a slotted chute. In that slot, they are rolled and pressed against raised figures on what amounts to a final die, called an "edge lettering segment." The vertical orientation and horizontal positioning of inscriptions in relation to the obverse and reverse are random.
    The new production process for the U.S. Mint has resulted in a new series of errors attracting collector attention.
    Shawn Bell has reported finding an example of double edge lettering in a bank-wrapped roll of 25 coins that his wife obtained in Leesburg, Pa.
    The coin has two complete sets of the edge inscriptions, he said.
    "The letters are readable, with the words facing upright toward the reverse of the coin on both sets of wording," he wrote in an e-mail. "If you start with the date as the starting point, the second set of wording starts almost exactly 180 degrees from the first ones. Somehow the letters all seem to intermingle between the open spacing between the second set of letters, with only about four letters actually struck on top of one another. …"
    Bell supplied several photographs. Coin World has not seen the actual coin, but Bell is known as a collector of varieties and errors. He first contacted a specialist in this field, to whom he has sent numerous other finds.
    In a visit to the Philadelphia Mint Feb. 7, Coin World representatives saw that the location where edge lettering was taking place was separated by a considerable distance of floor space from the initial striking of coins with plain edges. At the same time, it was evident that some plain-edge pieces occasionally fall onto the floor, and the same may be true of edge-lettered coins on their way to being bagged.
    Spillage is supposed to spell spoilage; that is, pieces from the floor are supposed to be condemned, not mixed again into any part of the minting process. The reported error, however, had already received the edge lettering and somehow was re-entered into the lettering process.
    Some pieces apparently are missing the edge inscription process.
    Mike Diamond, president of the Combined Organizations of Numismatic Error Collectors of America, said he has received reports of some unmarked edges.
    While the rarity of the plain edge Presidential dollars is uncertain currently, one dealer specialist in errors and varieties offered an opinion.
    Error dealer Fred Weinberg said: "I believe that the plain edge dollars, missing the lettering operation, will turn out not to be rare at all, just scarce. I know for a fact that one person found five plain edge coins in one box of $1,000."
    A quirk with these coins is that no one will be able to identify them self-evidently by Mint; the Mint mark would have been on the edge.
    Although the inscriptions are incuse and should therefore be more difficult to obliterate than if they were raised, the incusing appears to be fairly shallow and collectors need to be on guard against alterations.
    "One of the best ways to verify the error is to know the weight of the coin: 8.1 grams, 125 grains," Weinberg said. "This is the easiest way to know if the edge has been filed off, without having the actual coin in your hand. Knowing, or comparing, the diameter of the coin to a regular Presidential dollar [26.5 millimeters] would be another point to compare."
    The scrutiny being given to edges of the coins has turned up another phenomenon that has not been familiar to error collectors: "dropped letters" on the edge.
    "Dropped letter" is the name given to an extra, incuse, reversed letter on a coin’s surface, apparently originating with die "fill." Raised letters or numerals on a coin correspond to recesses in the die. These recesses can fill with grease, metal filings or other debris, which in turn hardens as the die continues to strike coins. This "fill" material then works loose, drops onto an incoming planchet in the coin press, and is struck into the coin that is produced. The dirt or other foreign matter may fall away again, leaving simply the reversed impression. More broadly, such errors are referred to as "strikethroughs" and could involve cloth, metal scrap or any of a number of other items.
    In the case of such letters on the edge of Presidential dollars, it is surmised that the die fill landed between a planchet and the plain collar during the initial strike, rather than on the surface of the planchet.
    John Riggs of Olympia, Wash., sent the first "dropped letter" example reported to Coin World, a 2007-D Washington Presidential dollar with a reverse E next to the Mint mark. The "dropped letter" was a match in size and font to the E’s in PRESIDENT on the obverse.
    Doug Huntley, who has reported other finds to Coin World in the past, provided a photograph of a 2007-P Washington dollar with incuse, reverse letters JF(M) between the 0 and 7 of the date on the edge, corresponding to obverse designer Joseph Menna’s initials on the base of the bust of Washington.
    Other dollar coins have been reported with stray raised letters or other raised marks on the edge.
    Mike Clements, who makes a specialty of small dollar coins, provided a photograph of a Washington dollar with a raised, backward R barely overlying the right side of the D in GOD.
    "My hunch," Mike Diamond said about this and other coins reported with raised, reverse letters, "is that finished coins are being rolled and squeezed against each other in Mint machinery. The normally oriented incuse letters on one coin leave raised, mirror-image letters on the edge of the other coin.
    "We see a similar phenomenon on broadstruck dimes and quarters. These sometimes bear reeding impressions on the edge from neighboring normal coins that have been rolled against them after the strike." ("Broadstruck" coins are struck outside the retaining collar in the press, which supplies normal reeding to the edge.)
    For the circulation-quality coinage, error specialist dealer Weinberg said, the system of separate lettering may mean "we’re in for some fun and vast confusion with these new coins." CW

[attachmentid=2176]
Image courtesy of Shawn Bell. DOUBLE LETTERING on the edge of this 2007-P Washington dollar shows separation of about half the circumference, such that the words TRUST and PLURIBUS appear here to overlap.

[attachmentid=2177]
Image courtesy of Mike Clements. MIRROR-IMAGE LETTER R overlapping the D of GOD is raised, not incuse, as a "dropped letter" from die fill would be expected to be.

[attachmentid=2178]
EDGE LETTERING SEGMENT contains edge inscriptions in reverse. Coins whose obverses and reverses have already been struck are forced along the groove.

[attachmentid=2179]
"DROPPED LETTER," an incuse and backward E,appears to be of the same font and size as the E’s in PRESIDENT on the obverse of this 2007-D Washington dollar from reader John Riggs.

[attachmentid=2176]
Image courtesy of Shawn Bell. DOUBLE LETTERING on the edge of this 2007-P Washington dollar shows separation of about half the circumference, such that the words TRUST and PLURIBUS appear here to overlap.

[attachmentid=2177]
Image courtesy of Mike Clements. MIRROR-IMAGE LETTER R overlapping the D of GOD is raised, not incuse, as a "dropped letter" from die fill would be expected to be.

[attachmentid=2178]
EDGE LETTERING SEGMENT contains edge inscriptions in reverse. Coins whose obverses and reverses have already been struck are forced along the groove.

[attachmentid=2179]
"DROPPED LETTER," an incuse and backward E,appears to be of the same font and size as the E’s in PRESIDENT on the obverse of this 2007-D Washington dollar from reader John Riggs.

The latest guess for the number of smooth edge coins is around 40,000. That would make it a rather significant variaty and the price would settle in the mid range of the prices we are seeing today.
I see two problems with them though. One, there is no way to tell if your coin is a Denver or Philly coin except taking the sellers word for the roll it came from. Two, The error is much too easy to fake. Lots of people could be ripped off with polished edge coins.

Aren't they supposedly coated in a thin layer of something to protect them? If so, any polished edge would be missign this layer and you could do some simple non-destructive tests on it. Also in extreme cases, the diameter would be a little off.

I got to look around the Mint in Philly as part of a media tour at the beginning of February. Everything in the Coin World article is true. Here's a repeat of what I posted on one of the other discussions...

Besides the usual errors like off center strikes, double strikes, etc, expect to see the following types of errors that will be unique to the dollar coins, which in my opinion are highly likely to occur:
tens
- missing edge lettering
- edge lettering only, on unstruck planchet
- planchet missing both strike and lettering
- struck on unburnished planchet (kind of brownish from the annealing process)
- struck on planchet that wasn't rolled to give it a raised rim before striking
- some combinations of the above

After the coins are done, they get put into humongous Kevlar bags - I mean humongous - each one holds tens of thousands of coins. The weight and pressure on the bottom coins must be enormous, so it's easy to imagine the lettered rim of one coin pressing into another coin and leaving a readable mark.

Since the Fed ordered 300 million Washingtons and the Mint has really rushed to get them ready, using a jerry-rigged production system that they're not real famiilar with, my hunch is they're not checking too carefully for errors as they go.

Start hunting!

-- Matthew

No one obviously realizes the massive amount of error coins appearing in the last several years. Could it be the Mints quality control? Not really. The Mint realized that at the rate plastic is taking over our monitary system they have to do something to preserve thier jobs. They produced a new department called MESS. This is the Mint Error Secret Service. They are responsible for creating, distributing, publicizing error coins so the public will go nutty tring to collect coins in hopes they find one of the errors. Now with the the new Dollar coins that no one uses and they know this so they issue massive error ones so people will hoard these coins and the Mint will still have their jobs.

I've got one of those so-called incuse dropped letters on the left cheek of Washington, near his jowl. It's the numeral 0.

cool. i'd love to see a pic if you have one, edix.

My scanner cannot capture the image, since it is very small and very shallow.
I need to hunt around for someone with a digital camera to shoot it.

The "Goddless Dollar" story hit the national press this afternoon and the smooth edge dollars have skyrocketed back up into the $300 plus range.

I noticed that as well! Those who are finding these practically by the roll must be having a party.

So its a 50/50 chance which way it prints. Really sad part about this I'm spotting "Upside-Down" edge coins going for $50 + Just watching in the last few minutes. I went ahead and picked up a roll yesterday. Out of 25 coins, 8 showed "right-side" up with Washington on top. The other 17 were "upside-down".

One of the things I noticed is the poor shape of the coins. The roll I got was a Denver. It looks like with all the extra handling higher grades then MS65 are going to be rare. I may just have a bias against these coins though.

Looking at the edges show a ton of odd marks. But found one with what appears to be an incuse "O" pressed in to the edge. It is something different from the normal dings I see.



For some reason I believe a lot of "Errors" are going to show up. Also with the right size letter punch you could do a lot of "Errors" seems like these could be asking for edge problems.

...and now the mint acknowledges the "no edge lettering" error. Will this acknowledgement lead to an increase in quality control such that we will not see much of the error in subsequent issues?

BTW, a grading company is offering a fat "reward" for finding (and submitting) a genuine edge-lettered SAC

As long as the edge lettering is a seperate process these errors will happen but not likly in this quantity.

Okay, now its getting ridiculous an "Upside-Down" one just went for $152.

It's amazing how Tuesday these were trading for $30-$50 each. One Wednesday they were trading at nearly $300.

Talk about a price increase!

The upside down lettering is just a huge scam. 1/4 of the roll I have was upside down, it's the luck of the draw!

I wonder how long will it be before the buyers will understand they overpaid for a common coin. Just imagine someone coming up to a coin shop and trying to sell or value their coin and being told its worth a dollar. Especially after buying one for $152.

Don't know how rare the no lettering is going to be but one just sold for $405.

$478

They can't be extremely rare. People were selling them by the hundreds in dutch auctions. Mainly out of Florida it seemed.

So, we have a lot of people, whether they be collectors like us or scammers like you : p, that are looking through rolls and seeing what interesting varieties there are. What do you say most of those people do with the coins that are normal? Send them back to the bank or spend them?

If you think the latter, don't you think this will help the dollar's circulation?

Probably send them back to the bank. No one, except a few of us, really want to carry numerous dollar coins in our pockets.

Bank managers could make a small fortune off these dollars. Pay the employee that finds one $10 and flip it for $400+.

I'm trying to figure out who the scammers part was directed to. For some reason I don't think anyone who has been posting here is selling them on ebay. To me ebay should think about blocking the sale of "Upside-down" dollars.

On the blank edge side a NGC certified one with 2 days to go is up to $1,200 .

As to me I always look at all my coins for varieties and errors. And I will be keeping mine. (Except the ones I want to trade, so I don't need to blind buy rolls to find a few Philadelphia mint ones.)

Wow. Not only is it missed the edge lettering, it's a 66 to boot!

I wonder if there will be a 67?

I did a search under U.S. coins dollars of "Upside" and as of this posting 2489 items listed. At least they are not going for $100 + now.

Side note in a article in todays local newspaper it has been estimated about 50,000 no edge lettering dollars have already made it out.

From the ones I saw any higher grade dollars will be rare. The process seems to be real prone to damaging the coins.

Hmmm I wonder if the process maked it difficult to produce proofs of high quality (i.e., not banged up). As I recall the release date for proofs was moved back.

I was being sarcastic and felt the need to use the word "whether." Don't worry, you're all good people in my book.



Anywho, I think its safe to assume these 'errors' will be old news in a few weeks. But do you think the release of the next design will stir up the muck again to a significant degree?

If they use a engraved collar it would probably turn out good. Using a rolling method, I could see a lot of scrapes turning up and rejects.

Uhh... guys, speaking of the washington dollar errors:

I found some nickels with missing edge lettering... and some quarters with upside-down reeding

Are these more error varities we'll be seeing hit the fan??

The proof wiil not be made the same way. The edge lettering for the proofs wiil be in a 3 part collar and stamped along with the rest of the design. Unlike the circ. coins the lettering on the proofs will always be up and positioned the same on every coin. The only downfall will be that the seams of the 3 part collar will show on the coins edge too.

HSN was just selling Washington dollars with missing edge lettering.

While they were talking about the ugly coin they sold 1200+ @ $400 a pop!!! not bad to make a quick half million