Error Coins: September 2011 Archives
Part 3 of the pictoral entries from the Royal Australian Mint's Unexpected Treasures exhibition is a treasure trove of errors for the delight of collectors. Wouldn't you love to have some of these errors! Sadly the errors on display all belong to the Mint's own collection but the Australian Coin Collecting Blog are proud to bring them to you thanks to Chris Zark and our Melbourne Correspondent 'SJS'.
Below is a stunning example of a very dramatic error. Visitors to the Royal Australian Mint in Canberra would have seen this coin before in the error display upstairs. Heat and pressure have welded a bolt to the coin, part of the press feeding mechanism! Now the press would have needed some dismantling to retrieve this error coin.
1992 20c Proof
When dies are mismatched in the press and that particular pair of dies were not intended to mate then you've created a Mule! These combinations are always human error or a deliberate striking. This 1991 5c proof has an Australian reverse and a New Zealand obverse.
1991 New Zealand Australia 5c Proof Mule
Sometimes a blank of the wrong type or size gets mixed into the hopper of blanks ready to be struck. If a coin is struck on a wrong size blank then the result will be a weak strike or missing design because the planchet size or the pressure of the press is set incorrectly for that size blank. Below we see a 1981 20c on a Cupro-Nickel 10c blank and a 1980 2c struck on a Cupro-Nickel 5c blank.
20c on 10c Blank (left), 2c on 5c Blank (right)
The Australian Coin Collecting Blog is proud to bring you Part 2 of the pictoral entries of error coins displayed in the "One in a Million -Unexpected Treasures from the Royal Australian Mint" exhibition. (See Part 1 here) These errors have been picked up by the Mint during production and have never before left the Mint premises. Thanks to 'SJS', our Melbourne correspondent and Chris Zark we're happy to be able to bring you some images of these stunning error coins, some worth thousands of dollars.
This 2009 Australian Citizenship C mintmark one dollar was labelled as another "bottletop" by the RAM. The reverse image (left) looks at first glance like a dished double-strike. Look more carefully though and there are 3 clear strikes! These 3 strikes were made with the coin out of collar resulting in the slightly dished pancake-like appearance of the coin. The obverse..ahh..other reverse shows a late state brockage (of many many strikes) as the image (however distorted) is reversed and incuse as it was struck repeatedly against a struck coin (in this case the die cap) and not the die itself. So, in our opinion, this coin not technically a die cap.
2009 Triple Struck with Brockage
Titled "Once Bitten" a display of 2 double clipped coins showed one struck and one blank. These types of errors easily escape the mint unnoticed. Clips are incomplete planchets arriving at the Mint in large drums from their South Korean supplier Poongsan. Have a close look at the 10c and you can see it has also been struck only partially in the collar making it a triple error coin -a double clipped broadstrike error!
The Royal Australian Mint recently showcased an exhibition of error coins in Melbourne. The display was titled "One in a Million -Unexpected Treasures from the Royal Australian Mint". Thanks to 'SJS', our Melbourne correspondent and Chris Zark we're proud to be able to bring you some images of these stunning error coins.
The Die Cap error is sometimes called a bottletop. This stunning example is of the 2000 subscription silver proof Proclamation penny.
Die Cap Error
1980 1c Die Cap
A Brockage Indent is a rare error and to have the mated pair is a one in a million!
Indented Brockage Mated Pair
Take a look at part 2 for more spectacular coin errors.
Over the next day in Melbourne a display of "whoops" coins from the Royal Australian Mint
is being shown in Federation Square. It highlights mistakes and mishaps in the minting process and also explains that some can be found in your change if you look carefully enough.
A unique collection form the Mint's own collection includes ramstrikes, misstrikes, double strikes, brockages, brockage indents, die fill, split planchets, wrong planchets, clips, cuds and die adjustment (differing pressure) strikes. The sorts of errors some of us can only dream to have in our collections.
Also displayed is a collection found in circulation by one of the countries most passionate dollar collectors. 'Goldseeker' has 'noodled' over 2.3 million aluminium bronze dollars searching for 2001 Centenary of Federation Upsets, Rabbits and the 2000 $1/10c mule. Goldy's display features a clockface of (a selection of) the degrees of upset that can be found on the 2001 COF dollar (the die rotated the entire 360 degrees), a selection of rabbit eared mob of roos dollars and a high grade mule.
