I just picked up a 67 mackerel dime and was hoping there was a way to tell between the 80 and 50 %'ers. I guess I will just label the 2x2 with 65% lol. a good compromise. As far as I can determine, there is no way to tell the two 67's apart.
For fun, I checked about 20 of the 1967 10-cent coins with the XRF in my lab. All were .500 silver.
A coin dealer, who once had strong connections to the RCM, once told me that only the proof-like and specimen strikes from 1967 were .800 silver, the business strikes were .500 silver. Of course, that is heresay, but I am not about to start zapping rolls of 1967 10-cents to prove it one way or another. Given the mintage of that series, I would have to spend days with the XRF zapping hundreds of coins to get a 95% confidence interval of that data...
"Discovery follows discovery, each both raising and answering questions, each ending a long search, and each providing the new instruments for a new search." -- J. Robert Oppenheimer
"Discovery follows discovery, each both raising and answering questions, each ending a long search, and each providing the new instruments for a new search." -- J. Robert Oppenheimer
So you can one hundred percent tell for certain what the silver content is with an XRF ? Not that it would do me any good, I don't have one. I had to Google what it is lol.
"Discovery follows discovery, each both raising and answering questions, each ending a long search, and each providing the new instruments for a new search." -- J. Robert Oppenheimer
I made a video on how to distinguish between 50% silver and 80% silver quarters using a microphone on your computer and some free audio software. Most reliable and no-nonsense way of verifying your coin composition. You can try it with dimes as it may work as well but the sound frequencies might be in different places. Hope this helps!
"A coin dealer, who once had strong connections to the RCM, once told me that only the proof-like and specimen strikes from 1967 were .800 silver, the business strikes were .500 silver. Of course, that is heresay, but I am not about to start zapping rolls of 1967 10-cents to prove it one way or another. Given the mintage of that series, I would have to spend days with the XRF zapping hundreds of coins to get a 95% confidence interval of that data..." -SPP-Ottawa
It's interesting you say that about the proof-like/specimen strikes vs. the business strikes. I picked up two of these dimes from a dealer, both had been circulated/touched by human hands, yet one is proof-like and the other is considerably dull. The proof-like "80%" version still has sharp detail on the crown (even though the obverse is dull on it), and the mackerel. The other "50%" one has a tiny bit of luster left, but the crown and fish are not as sharply struck. I do realize they're both not in pristine condition and am just throwing this out as an opinion, but side-by-side, there is a difference with each obverse even though they're both dull.
A coin dealer, who once had strong connections to the RCM, once told me that only the proof-like and specimen strikes from 1967 were .800 silver, the business strikes were .500 silver.
@SPP: Haven't huge numbers of these gone to refiners to melt over the years?
Simple market forces would have made this clear. Nobody would pay .650 today if they only yielded .500
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Posted 12/04/2012 2:18 pm
