| Author |
 Replies: 7 / Views: 1,307 |
|
|
Valued Member
United States
467 Posts |
I always wondered, when looking at Morgans, why such the difference in strike quality between the mint striking these coins. Did New Orleans just have the worst equipment, or quality standards?
|
|
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
3210 Posts |
New Orleans didn't have pride in the quality of the coins they made. Philadelphia coins were usually nicely struck sometimes not. San Francisco coins usually were the best strikes overall.
|
|
Bedrock of the Community
United States
12057 Posts |
As QDB relates in his Guide to Morgan dollars, dealers in the 40s and 50s could tell where a Morgan dollar was minted just by looking at the strike, without needing to turn the coin over, which made going through bags looking for key dates a lot faster. Member ANA - EAC - TNA - SSDC - CCT #890 "Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done." -- Louis D. Brandeis |
|
Pillar of the Community
 United States
4591 Posts |
You also see differences within a mint across the early years. San Fran's 81s are just glorious - they were dialed in perfectly. Much nicer on average than the 80s.
-----Burton 50+ year / Life / Emeritus ANA member (joined 12/1/1973) Life member: Numismatics International, CONECA Member: TNA, FtWCC, NETCC, EveryCountry (online) coin club Owned by three cats and a wife of 40+ years (joined 1983) Author: 3rd Edition of the Sample Slabs book, https://www.sampleslabs.info/ |
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
4469 Posts |
There were a number of issues at play that caused the Orleans coins to be the worst. There was no standardization on how to polish the dies. If the dies were polished correctly, the metal flow to the center of the coin could be enhanced. The SF mint is given credit at being the best at polishing the dies. Some of the experts believe Orleans did a poor job of polishing the dies compared to the other mints. Orleans was also on the high side of strikes per set of dies when compared to SF, CC. Worn dies caused the center of the coin to be softly struck. The P mint did have the most strikes per die set and CC the least.
|
|
Valued Member
 United States
467 Posts |
How would polishing affect strike depth? I understand over polishing would lead to weakened devices, but in the case of New Orleans, it just seems it was more of pore set up then anything, unless they were using previously used dies or something like that. There is a huge difference in strike quality.
Is it possible they were getting their planchets from another supplier who did not hold them to spec? Or was there no planchet spec to begin with?
|
|
Bedrock of the Community
United States
17884 Posts |
The problem at New Orleans was caused by annealing problems. Not of the dies but of the planchets. New Orleans was having problems with die life and poor strikes and Philadelphia set a man down (I forget the name.) to try to find out what the problems was. It turned out that in order to try and keep up high production they were rushing the planchets through the annealing furnace and not maintaining proper temperatures. Ihe improperly annealed planchets were too hard and resulted in poor strikes. In order to compensate they had been increasing the striking pressure which resulted in shortened die life. While he was there they ran the planchets through the furnaces properly and the coins struck up just fine. After he left they started slowly pushing up the rate at which they ran the annealed the planchets and the striking quality declined again. I believe it was Roger Burdette that found the documention of this.
Edited by Conder101
12/05/2015 11:38 am
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
4469 Posts |
Basining/polish of the fields helped metal flow when the coin was struck. Lee Roy Van and Wayne Miller noted for some reason Orleans Morgan's were struck in such a way that metal flow moved toward the rim of the coin and not the center and the end result was a flat struck coin. I believe there were multiple issues at play: worn dies, improper basining, improper annealed planchets as noted by Condor, and poor standards.
Edited by Slider23
12/05/2015 12:11 pm
|
| |
Replies: 7 / Views: 1,307 |
|
Posted 12/04/2015 7:03 pm
