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Post some Doubled Dies


syzygy

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This is one of my favorite coins, that I own. I've posted it before and decided it was MDD. I think it's pretty.

 

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Cool thread. There are some really cool dd's. I love the peace dollar. Talk about spikes.

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1925 Stone Mountain commemorative half with doubling...

 

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Blackhawk, is that machine doubling or a DD? The Cherrypicker's Guide, Vol II lists a DDO with doubling on the date and STONE MOUNTAIN. The very small pic in the book looks a lot like your coin. The value is no different than for the normal and a notations says that a significant percentage of these halves were struck with that obverse doubled die.

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Blackhawk, is that machine doubling or a DD? The Cherrypicker's Guide, Vol II lists a DDO with doubling on the date and STONE MOUNTAIN. The very small pic in the book looks a lot like your coin. The value is no different than for the normal and a notations says that a significant percentage of these halves were struck with that obverse doubled die.

 

I believe that the one that I posted photos of is the DDO that's in the Cherry Pickers Guide.

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Can't wait to go upstairs and check my Stone Mtns!

 

Of the 6 Unc Stone Mtns in my collection, not one is a DDO. Bummer... :/

 

ANywho, a show on the travel channel about coins is on right now. Incidentally they're talking about errors and the Sac/Wash mule that came out a few years ago.

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  • 1 month later...

Guess I should just jump in feet first and get used to things...some of what I've seen here disturbs me in a way.

 

Okay...basics to basics. Machine Doubling (note that I don't call it Damage) is the effect of loose parts in a machine that manufactures hundreds of thousands of coins per day. Many machines making many coins - well into the millions per day, tens of millions per week. Inspections of the pieces coming out of the machine is sparse - a couple of times a day. THUS...millions and millions pass through to bagging without a human eye looking at them to make sure there's nothing wrong with them. Machine doubling can happen on a dozen or a dozen million coins every day. The main point is this....the dies are inspected one for one. The coins are inspected one in a few million.

 

Now..for the dies. If a die receives doubling from a hub during its creation, the die setter is supposed to notice it. Hundreds of spectacular doubled dies were created over time that never made coins because the die shop did their job - they noted and destroyed the dies before they had a chance to make coins. It's only when the die shop didn't properly do their job did a die make it into manufacturing coins that received its doubled image. Now..we may argue that doubling is doubling, but when the doubling is the result of someone sleeping on the job and not inspecting a piece well enough, and not as simple as a set screw coming loose, there's where I want to be collecting.

 

Okay...so, machine doubling is 'neat'...sure, I'll give you that. Only thing is, machine doubling is very common. In some years' coins in certain denominations it can be gruesomely common - like 1968S cents...1969S cents. These things are SO common, finding a nicely struck piece without machine doubling is actually a bit of a challenge.

 

You might say that die life is a million or so coins, so a doubled die is repeated a million times over. In theory this could be possible, but my question is, WHERE ARE THE MILLION DOUBLED DIES?? 1969S cent - fewer than 200 pieces known in any grade. 1970S cent - fewer than 100 pieces known in any grade. 1958 cent - only two pieces known. 1936 DDOs, any of the three main dies - rare in grades above MS65. 1980 DDO cent - fewer than 500 pieces known in any grade. 1983 DDR cents - around 1,500 pieces known, and this is a modern issue...should be a million of them out there! Where are the other 998,500??

 

The fact is, there are NO known doubled dies in existence for which there are more than 30,000 pieces spoken for, and the king of kings, the 1955 doubled die cent is the most spoken for doubled die on the planet...and it's considered a rarity and goes for king's ransome money! At present we are around the one-thousand mark in cataloging different Lincoln cent doubled dies. In OVER 700 of these cases there are fewer than 100 pieces known to exist, and in at least half of those there are fewer than ten pieces known to exist. WHY?? Well, in part because they are truly rare. In another part because people are skipping over them every day, loupe in hand, and have no clue what they are looking for. Yes, true.

 

Yes, you have some nice machine doubling there. Some of it is very interesting to look at, and I'm sure very interesting to collect. I give it to you that it's indeed mint created doubling, and in a stretch it would be classified as a mint error...but it's not even in the same class as hub doubled dies. Sorry.

 

Oh...and as for posting images of doubling...gosh, so many to pick from. My site has over 11,000 images of doubling.

 

I think I'll pick the one published in all the mags of late - the 1982 DDR, recently discovered in Quincy, Mass, and submitted to me for photos and attribution. I nearly fell out of my chair when this one came in. Meet the 1982 cent doubled die reverse, 1982P-1DR-001. This thing sat dormant for 25 years waiting for someone to discover it, and to date is the only known piece of its kind...even though die life at the time this coin was struck would firmly suggest there are at least 15,000 brothers out there....somewhere.

 

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(((the 1982 DDR, recently discovered in Quincy, Mass,)))

 

Oh my gosh, I have over three hundred rolls of pennies that I might have to go back and check each one to see if one of these was missed.... you are quite a task master.

 

However, I do appreciate your experience and talent!

 

Corky (very disturbed, most of the time)... :ninja:

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I have to agree with you, on all but the point of rarity.

 

Not to start an internet arguement or anything, but the fact that millions of machine doubled coins are similar is true, yet each coin is either unique or only a few of a kind. Think about it like this, the machine is jostling around smearing metal all around, but in those motions each coin has a unique look, a different degree of movement, and is an all around different coin. Sure millions are similar, but rarely is everything exactly the same. The worst machine doubling I've ever seen was on a single 2000-P Sacajawea dollar, the lettering was nearly obliterated and the metal had a "rippled" look to it. Elitism aside, if a coin is interesting, I'll collect it pure and simple.

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I'm not arguing that each one has its own character, as does every coin. Every nick, mark, blemish.

 

The point here is that because a coin receives unavoidable chatter doubling in a press doesn't make it valuable. Footprints in the mud are all unique in their own way. The point is, when the die was made wrong, it should have stopped at that stage, but in many cases it didn't. Thing is, it happened far less than normal dies were made, thus are scarce. When the number of coins that have ever been found with doubled dies are considered, the whole subject rings of scarcity. There are some doubled dies I have been searching over 25 years to locate and still haven't.

 

The overbearing point here is that just because doubled dies are difficult to find and considered scarce and valuable by a majority of the market, this doesn't mean that machine doubling is the second best thing and should have value too. By and large, machine doubling is too minor for what it is, and is way too common to carry any premium value. There are a number of exceptions to the rule that do bring modest premium, but the rule still stands, and I didn't make it up.

 

Best thing, if you want resell value in your collection, is to learn the characteristics of doubled dies, learn the difference between doubled dies and machine doubling, and start seeking the doubled dies. They are a far more rewarding and valuable find, and are scarce - so don't plan on turning one up in every box. I do know people, however, who go through $100 in cents per week, and have turned up hundreds of doubled dies. It's all in a matter of knowing what to look for and what to toss back.

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Don't get me wrong I'm not arguing about value, just uniqueness. I wouldn't pay a premium for a machine doubled coin, but I wouldn't avoid buying a coin because of it either. True doubled dies are surely the only thing that carry any kind of nice premiums, and have a true collectors value. I just like the fact that machine doubled coins are a easily found oddity, it's just something that looks interesting, little more.

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