Where Do I Start With VAMS?

heres where my signature holds true

yes I completely understand. I'm not doing this for money, but I've seen some normal coins be worth much more because its a VAM. for me, thats an added plus ive been collecting all sorts of coins for years now and know that making a fortune is extremely rare. I realize that my original post seems like I was saying I wanted to do it for money, but I really don't expect to make anything from this. the original post was me just typing random thoughts as they popped into my head hahaha

I could teach a multi-day class answering the "where to start" question. Wait a minute, I do.

To answer your question here will necessarily cut the information short, but I'll give you some bullet-item advice:

- Never lose sight of the "Collect what you like" rule. Coins and varieties that are interesting to some do nothing for others, and that's OK.
- Learn your way around a silver dollar. The "Attribution 101" page on VAMWorld is a good place to start.
- Don't do it for the money or you'll get frustrated and give up, which is not the point of the hobby. It looks like you have this down.
- Use a good loupe. The largish "16x" loupes that are about $15 are junk. A decent 10x triplet is recommended.
- Keep it simple at first. The Top 100 list, and others like it, were created so that you don't have to sort out 5000 different varieties.
- Don't be intimidated by 1878. The 8TF and 7TF Rev. of 78 are thoroughly researched and not difficult to attribute, even through there are A LOT of them. They also have lots of interesting features that show the design's evolution during 1878.
- Make no attempt to correlate the assigned R-number to a value. This number was an estimate at time of discovery. There are coins initially estimated as R-7 that are worth generic, common money.
- Join VAMWorld (free) and the SSDC ($22/year) and participate on the VAMWorld discussion forum, keeping everything above in mind. People there are generally excited about the hobby and helping others.

I highly doubt every combination will be identified even in a thousand years due to one major factor... The Pittman Act

Great advice listed thus far and I'll add the suggestion to have a look at the WOW list. There are a lot of interesting to look at varieties and to me, VAMming is all about collecting Morgans that were struck from dies that were pushed to the limits and beyond. Welcome to the insanity.

Messydesk is a vam-fu master!

Vams are classified by die pairings or "marriages". Once one die is switched out now you have a new die marriage / pairing and it becomes a different VAM. But, different stages or big, noticeable die events like clashes, Cuds, gouges etc from the same marriage creates a sub VAM of the same VAM pairing denoted by a letter after the number.

Don't worry about being overwhelmed. When I started I took out all my morgans and went down the list only checking them against the 3 big "lists". Once you start getting the basics down you then start getting familiar with date & mm positions, reverse types and even the different nuances of specific dates / mm's at a glance which will make you faster. Vamming has a process and once you get the hang of it it becomes much less confusing. Although it can get very addicting so be warned that Once you go VAM you can't go back