Bob Gurney can of course chime in after me as I only spent two years with these C&R CC's and he has spent 50 years + ... however preliminary results have shown this so far based on my research and a few conversations with BG:
1. Most of these issues seems to be silver electrodeposited and not Sheffield Plate (SP) as are the Bust types seen in the
Amazon Book for the GNL Type 1 SP's.
2. The advantage of electrodeposition is that the silver can be deposited on any metal substrate - remembering Sheffiled types prefer copper over brass or bronze.
3. Leading Mexican numismatists IMO are still in the dark ages on all of their counterfeits. They are not appreciated - they are avoided and there is no real respect to own or sell these issues. Sort of like the 1950's with Eric P. Newman and his Bungtown English/Irish 1/2d's from England and starting from this bottom level. Time will improve this unfortunate situation - decades unfortunately.
4. Most dealers if you believe me in (3) simply call these cast bronze pieces - sometimes they will mention silvering. Whatever ...
5. Some appear as silver wash, some Sheffield and some electroplated Ag. Not sure of percentages and probably at 60 years old never - will. LOL.
6. They come in brass and bronze predominantly as host coins and most APPEAR as not being silvered as it has been removed with age but traces show up with XRF - I have not encountered many high copper types yet but I have only analyzed about 30 examples by XRF. I expect most are brass or bronze - still in its infancy ...
7. As with all Mexican coppers many are environmentally hit hard for obvious reasons (i.e., climate and the latitude). Even when you examine the Cu REV stuff - how many CLEAN mint state issues do you see with perfect 95-100% patina with traces of mint red?
John Lorenzo
Numismatist
United States
Posted 04/21/2015 09:05 am
