Pushing the limits of market acceptability?

Just out of curiosity, I am finishing up the last of my auctions and came up with this specimen in taking a look around at toners. Doesn't it look a wee bit over the top in terms of market acceptability? Does anybody think that it has been "juiced" a bit? I do, and wonder if anybody agrees. This is NOT my coin:

 

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Whenever I see blue, I pause

 

I lean towards agreeing with you on this one. The relative regularity of the coverage argues in its' favor, as does the hint of reverse toning, but like Treashunt the blue/red only skeeves me out somewhat. I suspect NGC wouldn't have slabbed it in that color, especially these days, but danged if I can figure out how it could have been AT'ed in the slab in that single-sided fashion.

Interesting coin.

 

not for me but it has a nice reverse

 

Could it happen naturally? Yeah, but it would be exceedingly rare. I would be a lot more comfortable with it if there were a touch of progression, a little patch of glossy black, etc. It can happen, but I have only pulled out of an old card book one that would look similar to that, and it had a tiny touch of glossy black.

 

That is why I have questions. It is a little too uniform, not progressive, and has definite borders. I have owned and sold "blue meanies" before, but this one has that artificially intense look. Wonder if there is a sealed pinhole in the slab, where it could have been gassed?

 

TPG slabs are not airtight. That has been demonstrated time and again; a certain Ebay seller (by his own admission, IIRC) does/has done it to great success. I know how to do it; all you have to do is create the right gaseous atmosphere. What I don't know is how to do it one-sided in the slab.

 

I have never done it, but I was told that a pinhole in the corner of the slab works. The person who told me this does it a lot-- he's a coin doctor. The corner is very easy to reseal, as it is a tiny hole. To me, the giveaway on this coin is the fact that there is no toning transfer to the reverse. Blue album toning usually has at least some toning on both sides of the coin.

 

The imagination of some of these guys selling coins is endless.

 

Being an older one wonder if that label played a part in intensifying it over time.

 

The coin is nice but the toning looks AT to me. The one spot that didn't tone makes me think that's where they were holding the coin. Blue with Red highlights always makes me wonder.

 

I disagree it's pushing the limits or juiced or artificial. But that's not to say it doesn't go on. With this one though, only that there's too much caution or imagination being applied. If you bid and get it, and are not happy when it arrives, return it. But also take pics one way or the other and post them to this thread for us to compare and discuss.

From my take on this, from these low resolution seller photos, it does not appear juiced. It's evenly lit and an in-focus shot, though with unmistakable glare from the lamps on the holder making the shots very flat and contrast-y. What I suspect you would likely see in hand would be a more vivid range of colors from warm reddish-violet in the truncation across to blue/blue-violet and a touch of greener turquoise nearer one to two o'clock. There is also a noticeable white area totally without toned around two o'clock and if you take the image and bump up the contrast to eliminate the glare, you see the higher points of the devices and legends are white(r) than the flats of the colorfully toned fields. I suspect the richer areas of colorful tone are actually more on their way to the black end of the spectrum of such toning, and that this coin continues to progress in that direction. At some point, who knows how soon or long, it will become too dark to please the toner-market. That's likely to happen to many toners and where caution should be applied considering how much one pays for color.

With the coin isolated from the background, The seller's pic untouched (l), with contrast bumped up (r):

 

That still does not explain not a trace of blue on the reverse, or the fact that few people ever see that level of intensity on a coin, and in such a predictable pattern. Blue album toning, as I said above, is usually more progressive, and almost always transfers from the obverse to the reverse. The reverse is almost white. I am not buying--in fact, ending up selling off my toned coins, and this weekend is the last lot. I just saw this one, and it screamed "wrong" to me, as an experienced toned Morgan collector. No desire to buy this one.

 

Full disclosure: first of all I'm not a coin collector, but do lots of study and research.
With that said, IF you're considering purchasing this and have questions or doubts may I suggest you follow my personal caveat: "when in doubt -- PASS".

 

You didn't read my post--I just looked at the coin. I am not buying--in fact, am in the midst of selling my toned Morgans. This isn't and would never be my coin. I would not consider the coin, as I think it is AT in my opinion, and it either escaped the NGC graders as such, or was doctored after the fact.

 

No picture on the NGC site, which could increase AT suspicions.

 

It doesn't matter what kind of coins you collect, metal oxidizes. NT vs AT is certainly an issue of concern. However, you can easily find coins with all white surfaces on one side and a range of colors on the opposite side, completely natural toning and accepted by the market. If you reject such pieces, and although you're a part of the market, that doesn't automatically make those pieces market unacceptable, nor is this piece in any way pushing the limits as the thread title suggests. There are plenty of them out there in untampered with TPG holders, too. Like I said, I think people are leaning to, too much caution here, but it's a moot point since you are not buying the piece any way. We'll not have a chance to improve this thread discussion without more shots of the coin and at least one member's in-hand inspection of the piece.

 

It's in an old holder and many from the era are not scanned by NGC. That is not a reason for suspicion. If you need more shots of the coin, ask the seller to send or post more for you. If you don't get them before the auction ends, then don't bid and move on, there are plenty of fish in the sea.

 

The purpose is purely educational, as I know that there are plenty of one-sided toned coins, but not generally of that toning pattern. As was said previously, blue album toning tends to be on both sides of a coin, or leaves a peripheral residue on the other non-fully toned side. It is a pretty unmistakeable kind of toning, and this looks suspicious to me for two reasons--one, the fact that the obverse is highly toned, and the reverse bears NO semblance of the color transfer. Two, the coin has a certain symmetry of toning, and a pattern of non-blended toning. In my 40 years of collecting Morgans, this is a general pattern that emerges. One exception to the above mentioned reasons is textile toning, where one side of the coin (either obverse or reverse) sat in a damp mint bag, and there was textile transfer to the coin--however, this toning pattern does not appear to be textile toning.

 

I said TWICE, that I am not interested in buying it. This was an educational post, and an opinion post.