So have purchased three commemorative 1972 royal crowns in the green box, i am used to verifying morgans by weight so thought id do the same for these but.... all the information on weight i can find puts the cupro-nickel and the silver version at the same weight??? how can this be possible? both supposedly weigh 28.28g There is a cupro nickel proof version also which i imagine looks a lot like the silver one any idea on how to test these? Thank you
One easy way is the tissue test. Take a known silver coin, place the coin in question beside it, cover both with the same tissue. The silver coin will show whiter through the tissue and the CuN coin darker. If both are same color, the both are silver.
I think the deal with the crowns (or at least my Gibraltar 80 and 81s) is the finish. On my series, the proofs are silver and the regular circulating strikes are the CuN. I dont know if that held true forward and back of the dates i have, but im pretty sure that will be the easiest way to tell. The COA didnt specify?
No unfortunately the "coa" is nothing but a mere description of the coin and its variants ive done the tissue test and it shines through nicely but i also did it on a know cupronickel proof dollar and its shined through that too in the same way and i know that isnt silver does acid testing damage the coin (im guessing just to get a reaction it has to dissolve something!) why isnt there a diamond tester style device yet, surely the qualities of silver can be detected through ultrasound or something similar and ive seen them for gold/diamonds at £30+
You're best bet is someone with Krause catalog or something similar that will specify that the proof issues are silver and the business strikes are non precious Metals
The silver proof .925 seem to be the only ones that come in this green box with the plastic wrap so im guessing they must be silver, i honestly thought there would be a difference in weight between the two, im starting to wonder if i have ANY silver if cupronickel weighs the same as silver????
Not arguing against the tissue test...but, if both the silver and CuN versions are the same weight, wouldn't they have to be different dimensions? (diameter or thickness?)
