Silver Loss from Wear on 90% Silver Coins (calculation)

Beautifully put! And what was true 2100 years ago is still true today!

Semper Fidelis

 

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" . . . apparently no more worn nor battered than most of the metal money a few years old." " . . . short in weight by 5 to 15 per cent." Now imagine that!

 

I guess there's the difference between you and me. You carry gold in your pocket and all I have is copper.

 

Healthy "skepticism" is always a good thing. The problem here is that the published information was allegedly based on an investigation by the Secret Service in New York. Further more, the article states that the Gold was recovered after the "sweating" by the burning of the burlap bags in which the Gold was sweated and then the "gold dust" was gathered up and melted; not " . . . sanded, shaved, etc etc . . ." but certainly, " . . . rubbed or scraped on rough surfaces . . ." the effect of which, anyone who was brought up on a farm in the 50's and handled burlap would know. As to your comparison, I assume your pockets weren't made of burlap, were they? As far as "skepticism" goes, one is never absolutely certain in which direction one should be looking.

Semper Fidelis

 

What is it that a rich man wraps up and carries in his pocket that a poor man throws on the ground...(old riddle)

 

I'm sure booger isn't the correct answer.

 

Coins, but I've seen a lot of other answers . . . and YES a "booger" is one of them!

 

I would guess time or health.

 

The indelicate answer is snot.

 

So I went through probably 10,000 coins I had accumulated in jars at the end of the day for the past 30 years. When I retired, for each denomination I carefully culled out every coin that had silver content. Then I carefully did my research and checked each coin, looking for the ones that would help make me rich. (Of course I didn't find any.) But knowing there was intrinsic melt-value, for example I counted out my Mercury & Roosevelt dimes. A friend of mine, who collects and sells, confirmed I had nothing of great value but did know someone who would purchase the coins for their melt value. Thinking that wear would probably be a factor and wanting to show I was being up-front about this transaction (and knowing I still had quarters and halves and even war nickels I wanted him to purchase later), I weighed the lot and found there was indeed a loss due to wear. I gave the bags of dimes to my friend noting the weight for each bag. The outcome? The buyer asked for the amount of dimes in each bag, I gave it to him and he paid me by the count, not the weight. Lesson learned....weight is important when trying to identify coins, but wear loss is infinitesimal in the grand scheme of things.

 

Morgan silver dollars are supposed to weigh around 26.73 gm.

My grandmother lived near Reno and pulled these worn specimens out of circulation in the 1960's along with many others.
They no doubt were used at the casinos there.
I graded them using the Redbook grades.


United States Dollar 1896-O Very Fine 26.20 gm
98% of normal


United States Dollar 1897-O Fine 25.94 gm
97% of normal

 

Interesting to note wrt wear rate on coins.

I have an analytical vintage Philip Harris Apothecary balance and weights which is set up nicely to an accuracy of +/- 5mg.

Actual Weight of a UNC 1819 George III Crown @ 92.5% silver = 28.276g

My recorded weight of a GVF 1819 George III Crown @ 92.5% = 28.21g ( = loss of 0.23%).

I think using a wear rate/loss measurement can also support the grading and of course whether the coin is genuine too.

Regards
Joe