Replies: 5 / Views: 135
Posted Today 3H 11M ago
1945 Mercury dimes, especially the Philadelphia mint coins are typically weakly struck because the U.S. Mint was operating at maximum wartime capacity under extreme production pressures. The Philadelphia Mint produced over 159 million Mercury dimes in 1945. To keep up with massive demand near the end of World War II, the mint reused dies and hubs far past their optimal lifespan, causing fine details like the central bands on the reverse fasces to soften or flatten out. Wartime production demands created operational bottlenecks in the planchet preparation and annealing processes. If planchets were not properly prepared or slightly underweight, the metal failed to fully flow into the deepest recesses of the coining dies. The rush to churn out hundreds of millions of coins meant less quality control over die spacing and pressure calibration across high-speed presses.
I think that this is why your first two 1945-P examples lack detail and still grade gem. Happened to a lesser degree in SF but still happened. It doesn't have to do with toning, but the special war time circumstances in 1945. Still slightly over graded imho but probably weakly struck uncirculated examples produced by overused dies.
I think that this is why your first two 1945-P examples lack detail and still grade gem. Happened to a lesser degree in SF but still happened. It doesn't have to do with toning, but the special war time circumstances in 1945. Still slightly over graded imho but probably weakly struck uncirculated examples produced by overused dies.
IN NECESSARIIS UNITAS - IN DUBIIS LIBERTAS - IN OMNIBUS CARITAS
THE MAN IN THE ARENA, Theodore Roosevelt at the Sorbonne Paris on April 23, 1910: "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."
My coin website:https://fairfaxcoins.com
THE MAN IN THE ARENA, Theodore Roosevelt at the Sorbonne Paris on April 23, 1910: "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."
My coin website:https://fairfaxcoins.com
Edited by numismatic student
Today 2H 55M ago
Today 2H 55M ago
