Roll Of Cleaned 1886 Morgans?

Welcome to CCF!
If you did get cheated, he has a good history of quick refunds so you should be OK.

Welcome to CCF, Chris.

Your remarks about the rims don't preclude the possibility that they're Uncirculated; remember, these coins left the Mint in $1000 bags, and easily acquired such marks by banging against each other in the bag. I would not expect standard business Morgan mintage to be all that sharp at the rims, anyways.

Your best bet to determine whether they've been cleaned is to search around this forum for our (many) discussions of cleaning, and see what symptoms may or may not match your coins. I_will say that the luster represented in the seller's photos is encouraging. Many cleaning operations will leave such luster lacking.

There are two types of cleaning, mechanical and chemical. Mechanical cleaning (rubbing, brushing, etc.) will reveal itself under bright sunlight - you'll probably need to use a loupe and rotate the coin to various angles. Look for parallel lines - people tend to clean with regular movements, creating such lines, and more often that not they'll proceed in an east-west direction on the coin. These lines will continue onto the devices of the coin. Mint polishing can also leave these lines, but you will find them generally north-south, and will be at their heaviest right at the intersection between field and device, without continuing onto the devices.

Chemical cleaning is more subtle. Look for signs of crud in the more detailed areas of the coin - around the stars and inside lettering - when the rest of the coin appears "clean."

The seller's record speaks for itself, and I won't comment on it. I will say, though, that he sells enough stuff to make it difficult to believe he has time to clean them all.

The trouble is, his return policy indicates (rightfully) that he will not accept returns if the original holder has been opened, making it difficult for you to decide if they've been cleaned without invalidating a return.

You're looking at $45 per coin. As long as the cleaning, if present, isn't blindingly obvious, the day will come when you can profit on their resale. So in any event I won't accuse you of having thrown money away; at worst you've learned a $200-300 lesson and the knowledge you're obviously taking from it is far more valuable than that.

Welcome to the wonderful world of BU roll collecting! I would bet the coins you received are mixed MS-60 to MS-63 Morgan dollars with a few "slider" AU coins that can be passed off as BU. A roll of 86-P's in that condition wholesales for about $775 so $900 is not too bad a price.

Dealers, even reputable ones, often sell such coins raw as "Choice to Gem" which is really a lie since that implies MS-63 to MS-65 but since grading is subjective they never really get called out on it.

EDIT: Also, since an 86-P is dealer wholesale $60 or so in 63, $80 or so in 64, and $160 in 65 you can bet you're not going to find any of those in a hand assembled "BU Roll" that sells for only $900 ($45 per coin). He'd be taking a BATH at that price if the "choice to gem" claim were legit.

MS-60 and MS-61 Morgans, particularly, tend to be ugly looking banged up coins that few collectors really want except for key and semi-key dates. Hence, many end up sitting in these rolls.

Hello Everyone,

Thank you all for your thoughtful responses to my posting. I would like to get some photos taken of these Morgans, and will post them when I do, but it's been a hectic weekend... I'm sure you all understand.

Thanks again, I'll be back...

Chris

Hello Everyone,

Whew. I'm feeling at least a little better about my purchase -- I've browsed through the archive of photographs at this link, which I found at the bottom of SuperDave's (did I get that right?) signature:

http://www.mycoins.us/WINS/Morgans/morgan_set.htm

After looking at the photos found at the above link, I'm realizing that the rim of a Morgan is not supposed to be razor sharp -- unless I'm mistaken, a Morgan dollar has sort of a "rounded" rim, between the beading on the face of the coin and the ribs around the rim. (I realize, as well, that making this statement shows how incredibly uneducated I am about Morgan dollars... showing my ignorance here I guess.)

At any rate, thanks again for all of the useful information. Still haven't decided what I'm going to do with these coins, but I will try to get some photos posted and would appreciate anyone's input who cares to take the time to look at the photos, if/when I finally get them taken and posted.

Thanks,

Chris

I crop and compress images in Microsoft Picture Manager and then upload to photobucket.com.

Hello All,

OK. I finally got some photos taken of a few of the 1886 Morgans I originally posted about at the beginning of this thread. Although I'm afraid the compressed images may not show the level of detail you experts need to see in order to ascertain whether or not these coins have been cleaned. I am only posting the obverse/reverse of a single coin, and a group of 6 from the roll -- not all 20. The single in the closeup shots is in the lower right of the group of 6.

As I mentioned before, my primary concern is that I grossly overpaid for a roll of cleaned (I guess the phrase is "slider"?) coins. I am certainly NOT any kind of exerienced collector, but if the dollars have been cleaned, I don't think it was by manual/friction means -- the smooth flat fields surrounding Lady Liberty (obverse) and Eagle (reverse) do not appear to have been "scraped" or "scrubbed" (to my untrained eye, there are not any tiny swirling or parallel grooves or lines).

However, these coins are just so darn bright and shiny! There is simply no evidence of toning that I can see at all. To my untrained eye, they look like they were minted yesterday -- or perhaps soaked in Tarn-X the week before they were shipped to me? I guess that is what I am afraid of -- that they have been chemically cleaned, and are not worth any more than the spot price for silver.

I would truly appreciate any opinions that the collective wisdom of this community can offer. And feel free to ask any questions, I'll answer as best I can.

Thanks for taking a look,

Chris