Okay, One of the Negative Sides of Slabs

I have a 1795 half cent in a PCGS slab.
I'm trying to ID the variety using Ed Fuhrman's book, The Half Cent Handbook/Liberty Cap Varieties 1793-1797.
The slab ID's the coin as Lettered Edge.

Using Fuhrman's book I've got it ID'ed as a C-2.
But here's the "fly in the ointment".
There are two varieties of a 1795 C-2, Thick Planchet and Thin Planchet.
The coin on a thick planchet is a rarity 3+.
The coin on a thin planchet is a rarity 8.
BIG value difference between the two.
But it's easy to differentiate between the two; just weigh the coin.

Oops!!!
That's the downside of a slabbed coin.
I cannot weigh just the coin.
And "no", I'm not going to crack it out.

I'll work on the assumption that my coin is on a thick planchet.
Highly unlikely that I've got the R-8 variety.

 

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Buy thick, sell thin...

 

You could crack out a common coin from a similar generation NGC then weigh the empty slab.

 

Went back and reviewed Fuhrman on this. The weight standard of the thick planchet was 104 grains and the thin planchet 84 grains.

I pulled my 1797 half cent C-1 (PCGS VF-30, photo attached) and weighed the coin and slab together. It came in at 567.90 grains. Fuhrman says this year's weight varies all over the place, from 70 grains up to 98 grains despite supposedly being struck to the standard of 84 grains. Let's just say that my coin is 84 grains.

Then the weight of the slab minus coin would be 567.90 - 84 = 483.90 grains. The upper and lower boundaries of the slab weight using the Fuhrman stated coin weight variance would be 497.90 and 469.90 grains.

Let's say your slab minus the coin weighs the average of my slab's upper and lower boundaries: (497.9 + 469.9)/2 = 483.9. Huh, funny how that is exactly the same number I got when I used 84 grains for the weight of my coin.

Fuhrman says the weight of the 1795 C-2 Lettered Edge Thin Planchet should be between 66 and 83.6 grains based on the known weights of the 1795 C-2 Plain Edge Thin Planchet coin. So that would predict the weight of your coin and slab to be between 483.9 + 66 = 549.90 and 483.9 + 83.9 = 567.8 grains.

If your coin is the Thick Planchet Lettered Edge, then the weight of the coin and slab using the standard 104 grain coin weight would be 483.9 + 104 = 587.9 grains.

There are a lot of assumptions in the above. I'm not claiming you can really tell anything from using a methodology of this sort with regard to your coin, particularly if you have a Thick Planchet that varies significantly from the standard weight and also if your slab is a different generation.

All I am saying here is that if you conduct an analysis of this sort you might gain enough information to justify (or not) sending the coin back into PCGS for a crackout and analysis. Might be worth a call to PCGS to discuss it.

Also, you might want to consult our EAC friends and dealers (Tom Reynold et. al.) to see if they can provide any guidance from their vast experience in dealing with this kind of quandary.

Finally, even if it's the less expensive thick planchet, depending on your coin's grade, the reholdering fee plus expenses to crack it out and have it analyzed would be a small fraction of the value and if it turns out to be the thin planchet, it would be a minuscule fraction of the value. Why not take the gamble?

Pictures please - you know the CT motto: "If there's no photo, there's no coin."

 

Whoops, forgot to include the photo of my own coin.

 

I’m no good at this sort of thing but I do wish you the best in identifying it.

 

Send it back for reholdering and request the weight. Call customer service - I know one of them will do this.

 

Great minds think alike.

 

It's been tried before with inconclusive results. Even similar looking slabs may have different components.

 

Call PCGS. They may be able to put it in a slab with prongs that hold it in the middle. Then you can see most of the edge. I had them do this with a crown of Queen Victoria so I could read the edge. Done for a small reslabbing fee at a show. Of course, if you want to pay for variety attribution, they can do that too.

Cal

 

Love to see a photo of this if you can manage it.

 

I don’t currently have the coin I mentioned earlier at hand or have pics. But below are examples of crowns in prongless and pronged holders. Because of the size of the coin, even with prongs it’s hard to read the edge inscription. But it’s enough to read the reginal year. With smaller coins, the prongs are longer, and the edge is easier to see. Most of my smaller PCGS-graded coins are in pronged holders.

Cal

 

Or just weigh a slab with a known coin in it (like a copper Lincoln cent) to deduce the slab weight.

 

Would have to be a slab with a half cent of known variety or other coin of same diameter because the insert weight will vary with diameter of the coin. Insert would have to be of same type (prongless vs pronged) too. Coins are denser than slab inserts.

Extreme example is empty slab for a silver 3 cent piece weighs more than empty slab for a Morgan dollar.

Cal

 

Like this?

 

Thanks for the additional responses.
I'll get to trying them out soon.

 

And there may also be a tolerance range for the slab weights that would need to be taken into consideration.