Thoughts On This 1839 Go 8 Reales If CCF Or Genuine?

Those are far better photos.

The dies are not the same as the Numismatic Forgery. So I think that fear can be eliminated. The wear lines you point out are mostly die features caused by metal flow over the surface of the working die. The point emanating from the 3 is not from that same source.

If the same level of detail can be generated for the edge at the overlaps I would love to see that. Also if you can post segments of the coin like the Cactus plant it may help with a die match. These coins were struck from hubbed working dies so die variations are far less possible. There were multiple hubs however so the first step is to look at as many as possible and determine how far off the hubs themselves were.

The new ebay item shares with yours the main punch elements used to make the hub positives that produced working dies. The cap hub may be slightly different. However, the precise location of the difference is not clear on the photo of your coin. The star that is placed before the 8 in the legend seems to be closer to the long ray on the new ebay coin than on yours. The eagle hub is clearly different because of the number of images of the snake's tail loop - a finishing detail on weakly set hub impressions.

The two images are very close to identical so quality control was very good. The cap and rays design appears to have been produced by a single king punch used to make the hub so the irregular ray arrangement is normal.

Yes and no realeswatcher . The coin you just brought up is yet ANOTHER similar coin. As a matter of fact, it's the same seller I bought mine coin from. It sure looks to me to be the EXACT same coin as I purchased. Makes me even MORE suspicious.

The coin I mention a couple of days ago is another similar 1839 Go, but is in an auction format from a different seller. I can see where swamperbob is right in the differences he noted between that one & mine.

But this suspiciously similar one to the one I bought a month ago from the same seller really has me wondering now. It seems he sells legitimate coins, but this one really makes me wonder about the 1839 I bought from him.

Please let me know your thoughts on this second "duplicate" 1839 coin & based on what has been discussed so far my original question still looms. Is it genuine?

Well, I originally copied the picture from the listing and it would not fit on the forum unless I made the pixels smaller. As I mentioned, I'm not very good at pictures.

The first one is indeed the one I received. The second one you noted is still for sale right now and is certainly the same coin using the pictures as a guide. Maybe the seller did use the same pictures accidentally, how do I know? Sure doesn't seem right if he did though. I suppose anyone can make an honest mistake, if that's what it is.

But I do get what you're saying realeswatcher . It would be impossible to have two fakes exactly the same as far as the same exact post minting marks and tone (and every strike flaw also, but -to me anyway - especially the post mint characteristics.

After all this, I think I'm going back to collecting only the 1887 to 1897 8 reales because with the dragon's teeth, they make for a lot easier (or at least more chance of being accurate) authenticating by collectors such as myself that don't have the expertise more advanced collectors have. I've got a couple of counterfeits that I bought years ago and I have no trouble knowing those are fake by my primitive in house methods.

I don't have, nor can I afford, an expensive XFR machine and have never done a SG test in my life (although I could if I ever could find the time to these days). I have to rely on weight, size, and visual (& the ring test) tools. I'm not paying TPG fees (especially for coins that are only worth about what the authentication fees are) and don't want most of my coins slabbed anyway.

Lucky Cuss , you're probably right. I've been collecting coins off and on for a long time. Most of my coins from long ago were taken out of US pocket change my father would get (yes, I'm that old). So not too worried about those being fakes. But I've tired of US material and years ago started collecting Mexican coins because - well - they just attracted me with the different eagle types, the devices that were so different from the same old stuff from the US. I had about maybe 25 or so cap & rays 8 Reales almost 15 years ago and several other Mexican coins.

After doing a host of other things for the next 15 years, I got back into collecting again and picked back up on the 8 Reales. I went through the ones I bought years ago and found 2 or 3 of them were fakes. An obvious one that was well underweight and one that had started to lose it's silver plating too. So I became more concerned with not buying any more fakes. I know people collect counterfeits and CCFs exclusively, but I would rather go the other route. So when I found out about the dragon's teeth (I had not known that until fairly recently), I started collecting them by date & mint that had dragon's teeth. When I realized there was so many different dates, mints, & assayers from 1887 to 1897 alone, I changed course & started for a one a year set from 1823 to 1897. And I've come within 4 years of getting all 75 coins in that type of set (if mine are all real!). But these last 4 are proving not only expensive to acquire, but not readily available either. I do have a 1865 Ho that is encapsulated from NGC and was by far the most expensive one of all the 8 Reales I have. And if I ever am lucky enough to obtain an 1823, I would try and get one that's already authenticated for peace of mind (unless I was to luck out & find a raw one cheap, you can always hope, right?). As far as the 1866, they don't even come up for sale from what I'm seeing. If one did, I think it would be out of my league price wise.

But to get back to your suggestion. I do see what you are saying and I think you are absolutely right that the 8 Reales from the first Republic are going to be the ones that appreciate in value the most over time. I was initially surprised that most of the ones I've acquired were priced as inexpensively as they were. If they were US coins from those years, they would be much higher in price it seems.

So Thank you for the info, thoughts, and the link. I will try the SG tests on mine when I get a chance and hopefully not have any more "surprises". And you're also right about the latter standardized pieces being overpriced at present. It seems any that are fairly high grade are going for at least $35 and more like $40 and up. I wish my Morgans were holding their values like that. They seem to be going down lately. At least the majority of them from what I'm seeing.
Thanks again!