I'm trying to attribute the VAM number for some Peace dollars and am finding their attribution system far less intuitive than the corresponding Morgan numbers. For example, this curculated Peace dollar has major doubling on all letters of "LIBERTY" as well as on the tiara and to the right of Liberty's neck. Even the 1 in the date has doubling at the base. Yet, I can't find a corresponding VAM. Surely this would have been catalogued long before now.
The doubling you are seeing is MD as you can clearly see it has reduced the size of the devices not added to them. Work out which reverse you have first as that can narrow down the choices to look for other markers
Am I understanding correctly that mint mark placement is seen as the primary reverse division? (high, medium, or low S)
Not just. IDing the reverse against the listed reverse markers can help you greatly in your search. http://vamworld.com/wiki/1926-S_Reverses
I've tried to break that habit and just use the term "machine doubling" to avoid equating it with a coin that is double struck, which is totally different.
I like it because I think it's the clearest expression of it. It puts one right at the scene of the doubling, the strike. Thus, it's strike doubling, when the doubling is from the strike, and it's die doubling, when the doubling is from the die. In both the cases, the affected areas appear doubled. In fact, in some, so much so, it throws even the so-called experts off a little. Whether I can replace with smear, or slide, twisting, turning, slipping, or likewise, to differentiate the occurrences due to the strike, "doubled" works for me, because, again, it's how it appears. So, there's where I am, I want to know where the "doubling" happens, differentiate it on that basis. To each their own, that's what holds me.
I want to add another thing that I think is unnecessarily confusing, particularly for collectors who are trying to learn, about using the terminology, "machine." They hear that and immediately think it's being used in the physical rather than in the activity sense. It's being used in the activity sense to describe something that was worked over, or, i.e., "machined." It's not being used in the physical sense to describe any particular machine. There's another reason I stick with convention, or what critics might reference as the old terminology.
This got bumped up on my feed recently due to some comment likes. Thought I'd bump it in the thread due to the excellent discussion about strike/machine doubling.
