How To Grade A Split Grade Coin?

OK, this one has hung around for long enough, I'll take it. John, we have to pull ourselves back, a little, I think. More often than not, one can "split grade" most coins. ANA doesn't tell us how we're to "weigh" the competing grades against one another. Custom, if you will, as a general proposition, would dictate we'd emphasize the obverse grade. Then, again, there's an old saying: general propositions do not decide concrete cases.

Bottom-line, I could try and walk you through how I'd do it, but I'd have to see a specific coin.

Thanks you two, that answers my question.
John1

I realize I'm jumping on an old topic, but I've wondered for a while....In terms of split grading why don't grading services be as accurate as they can and simply designate, however they might choose, the grade for the obverse and the grade for the reverse? And yes, I'll go there, go ahead and assign a grade for the rim while you're at it. Maybe they could indicate 66/65/68 meaning the obverse is a 66, the reverse a 65, and the rim a 68. Or however they choose. This would be a boon to the grading services as now everyone has to have their coins regraded. They can then wait 20 years and convert to a 1-100 grading system and everyone has to get new slabs again. (Are you reading this PCGS and NGC?)

It's just too cumbersome to apply 3 separate grades for a coin. Not only that, but valuation would become a lot more complicated for many coins. I feel that for a majority of coins, one grade is more than enough to describe the condition of the coin, and a split grade is only really needed for coins that have sides that are so vastly different from each other.

I feel like it would be better to have it as an option that costs more money like adding a variety or error designation would, I would imagine this option being popular for Morgan collectors. Outside of that, it really doesn't make that much sense to me putting it in as a standard for all coins, this would make grading modern commemorative coins and eagles a lot more time consuming and useless than it already is (not to mention probably inflate the prices of MS 70 modern stuff because 69/70 or 70/69 would suddenly be a lot more commonplace)

Interestingly enough, assigning 2 grades to one coin is not a new idea, ANACS originally started out doing just that before they switched to the standard one grade practice we see today: http://www.greatcollections.com/main-ANACS http://www.anacs.com/contentPages/History.aspx

Most grading starts with the obverse on the theory that's what you see first. That grade is the maximum. If the reverse is then significantly worse, the overall grade goes down. If the reverse is significantly better, the grade stays the same.

G4... my general rule is that the reverse cannot RAISE the grade, but it can lower it.

G4 obverse + G8 reverse = G4

G8 obverse + G4 reverse also = G4