Fake £1

@ RED, sorry I just see error about that £1, I don't think anyone has got anything like so close to that first edge insignia in nickel brass. Lead/tin I've no real idea about.

Queen's portrait on the £2 is actually not a bad likeness of the real thing, maybe it is a brand new engraving. The closed eye is funny.

Meanwhile over in Wales... http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/321732032862

What alloys do those ground discs look like, incidentally? Weights are terribly off, but maybe that is to compensate for the alloy so as to fake an electronic reading.

Most striking thing about Coin-Mech's fake Kitchener was the missing bottom to the Y (once I noticed it!), https://www.facebook.com/WillingsSe...pe=1&theater but I don't know if they're all like that.

By coincidence - I was recently given these.... :)

@ RED, I saw same pictures as you. The example had a smooth edge and that medieval font again on the obverse, this time without a date there and what looked like the real IRB portrait. I presume then, a different factory to the HMS Belfast but they hired in the same typesetter, or have little to hand for physical type of that size.

aah yes, sorry, one of the emails was just to me but didn't know which one LOL (It was regarding my local bridge £1's)
Compare it to this picture from an ebay seller, the clearest yet of the HMS fakes...
some mighty strange font in use on the obverse that never really shows itself in the other pics





My last attempt at getting hold of a bunch of sample £2's from china failed :(
(I was asking for 2 of each; HMS Belfast, Britannia, Magna Carta, 2015 Technology and Mary Rose. All from the same seller)


Andy; That blank £2 certainly looks very close to real from the picture... the pound not as neat but the processes and machinery is there.

Does that pattern happen to be on it twice, with about a centimetre gap between them ?
The pattern is identical, although much clearer than my circulated examples, to the Trevithick Train £2 edge pattern.

Sorry Ten... your post hadn't showed when I posted those giant pics.... I have got at least one with a seam in it like yours, egyptian10 has it, but it's not shown in the pic. Not sure which others do... shame, I've just reorganised (and renumbered, sorry folks) a load of my collection too.
I'll have a look tomorrow when logging and sorting some more.

RED, here is another Egyptian Arch with the ridges inside, and a Forth Bridge I found with the same unusual edge insignia. Coin 1: from Guildford, March. Coin 2: London, unknown date.

There is some die clash on all faces. They are a uniform dull greenish-gold satin. A brushing grain i.e. faint one-directional striation can just be made out on the obverses if lit appropriately though it doesn't show here.

The pathways clearly come from the same edge die configuration; unusually they are 'infilled' in places.

ooh that's interesting.

COIN1
My 'batch' of fakes didn't have any evidence of the die clash as seen in Coin 1,
HOWEVER going back over the images (I STILL need to upload these!) I believe some DO show the spot,
albeit faintly (Remember the quality is terrible on these coins)

BUT I collected another one locally (below) that I pinned down as from the hoard... and yet on close
inspection after reading the above, I found it DOES show the die clash, and possibly the dot too, and yet has the ")" mark in the motto in a different position [The ")" which I believe has been suggested is from the roller rolling the design on?] which means it is not from the same setup or batch, but is using a copy of the same dies and very similar equipment.



The one I spotted on ebay in Essex (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181738952924) shows no die clash
but again, could be showing evidence of the dot.

COIN2
I haven't come across one with such a prominent rev die clash on the obv.
What strikes me as odd is the clash marks between the D.G don't appear to match the rev design
They do in a very vague sort of way but not enough to be confident it isn't something else.

The greenish-gold tinge is exactly what my hoard showed, although now the coins I managed to keep back seem to have lost it somewhat... and don't feel as slippy anymore... (I even wondered whether this was a coating sprayed on the coins to disrupt the coin mechs and allow the coins to pass through)

As for the 'bitty' pathways design... I'm positive I have or have had one of those, will have to have a look and try and see which design it corresponds to.