Morgans Off Weight?

Ya, I knew you were talking 1900 era. I should have prefaced my question as an academic one

Your coin seems very interesting mccaniz. It's obviously a fake but if it is a silver contemporary counterfit you have a winner

Nothing about the weight, pictures, or anything you've described suggests it's fake. 25.9g? That's only 3% low and well within tolerance for a well worn Morgan.

It's 90% silver mcanniz so realize it is not pure. $22 is what it should cost, 25.9g is fine for the weight, and I see nothing to suggest it's not a genuine G06/VG8 piece with a harsh cleaning which is common on Morgans. Here's a similar piece on ebay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1886-O-Silv...em35eecdaf36
Again, without in-hand examination I'm not proclaiming it's 100% genuine but it looks fine to me.

Normal wear on any coin is no call for concern for the slight underweight.
Your coin looks fine to me.

25.9 is NOT within tolerance for a worn Morgan in this condition. I've seen near slicks that didn't weight that low. A weight that low should be a big red flag.

A contemporary counterfeit made using silver is a real possibility. Silver values by that time were low enough that a full weight 90% silver planchet would have only had about 50 cents worth of silver in it. A near 50 cent profit per coin at that time would have definitely made the counterfeiting worthwhile.



The government didn't have a "set" price for silver at that time. This was still the era of the Bland Allison act and the government was buying the silver at whatever the market price was. They didn't start setting guaranteed prices until the Pitman Act in 1918.

I can't guarantee the OP coin is fake but I would be very suspicious of it.



Very unlikely. At that time they were still weighing planchets individually and the tolerance was .09 grams. So even a low weight new coin would still be close to a gram more than yours, and I just don't see enough wear to account for almost a gram in weight.

Yes, you are wrong. Let's just say it's real for a second. VAM 6 has a slightly different date location and the die marker is a crack on the neck tip that is on both eds & lds specimens which means it was on the obverse die almost from the beginning. Your coin is FAKE there's no 2 ways around it. BUT all is not lost, you have a saving grace in that you MAY have a silver composition counterfit made to deceive shopkeepers in retail trasactions back when a morgan was nothing but a dollar. These have collector bases similar to say counterstamped coins. A small but fervent base of collectors. So for what you paid you possibly got much more than a normal circulated "cull" morgan if it were real.

Heck, if youre not interested in going down the hard road of trying to confirm that it's a contemporary counterfeit I'd be willing to buy or trade it from you as I already need to travel that road for the oNE I have. PM me if that interests you.

Oops, stupid google(me) sent me to 1886-P VAM 6

Thanks for that SD, my mistake how'd I overlook that

you da man as always