Authenticating Gold Coins?

Is there an existing thread or tutorial here about authenticating gold coins to which someone could direct me? I searched around some and couldn't find any.

I received a Liberty Head $5 and a $2.5 from a customer for trade, and I never deal with gold so I need a refresher on authenticating them. I can post pictures and ask for advice if needed, but I figured this info must exist already and don't want to clutter the forum with repeat questions.

Thanks!
Tom

 

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Hmm, not really what I was asking. I know the basics of numismatics. What I don't have experience with is detecting the look of the common counterfeit types for Liberty Heads such as transfer dies, just because I don't look at the lettering and details of these coins normally know what it should look like. I'm sure the Whitman book would help with this if I ordered it, but I was hoping to use the Coin Talk community for help instead.

 

There are various threads here that discuss classic US gold coin counterfeit detection but you will have to use the CT search tool and do a lot of reading. You will have to post good close up photos of your coin(s) to get comments if that is also what you seek help with and comments on. Most of the discussion seems to be on a case by case (coin-by-coin) scenario and there are a lot of dealers and experienced members here who can reply once you post some images to go by. There are a couple of threads like this out there that I am aware of off the top of my head: Matt's Counterfiet Gold Coin Thread

1911 D $2.5 Indian, 1860 Clark Gruber $5 some are hit/misses, but the comments may yield answers that you are after in some cases...

 

Thanks for the help. I checked out the thread you linked to, which only confirmed my suspicions that detecting counterfeits of gold coins takes experience in looking at the real thing over and over, which I certainly don't have. I'll start a new thread asking people's opinions of my specific coins with pictures.

 

Check out this thread by Budgood.....


http://www.cointalk.com/t39581/

 

hmmmm, I am wondering what's the chance of getting a gold plated tungsten coin.

 

Tungsten (which has the same density/specific gravity as gold) is an extremely hard metal and would require an extremely high pressure coining press (perhaps over 100 tons pressure) and equally hard dies to do a decent job if the coin was thinly plated.
The alternate is to have an inner core that is no thicker than the thinnest portion of the coin and then have an outer section that is 90% gold/10%copper.

This can only be done by a highly sophisticated operation that would need to sell hundreds, if not thousands of coins to break even.

 

How about dropping them on a scale. They should weigh a certain amount, although I don't know what that is off the top of my head, as I'm not a gold collector. At least they should point you to if they are gold or not. If you mean, are these gold coins from the year printed on them, or did someone make gold coins that looked old, then you'll need someone with a trained eye on that.

P.S. I don't know why you would accept gold coins that are worth $100s of dollars when you don't even know if they are real. ??????

 

GoldCoinLover had a pretty good thread on them too: Understanding Counterfeit Detection.

 

A customer sent them to me for approval...it's up to me whether I want to take them, and I am the one to make him an offer.

 

In my experiance, fake gold coins don't neccessarily have to be of lesser gold or an incorrect weight.
There was a well known case of an Italian chap back in the 60s who made a lot of money forging sovereigns with a gold fineness that was slightly better than the real thing, but he made a lot of money because of the slight numismatic premium that even normal sovereigns carried...

 

If you don't mind paying a little premium then purchasing coins slabbed is a bit of insurance against it. Stick to MS69 and look for coins that are not that popular at the time. You might be able to get close to spot or sometimes even lower. (slabbed early spouse coins were in this category at one point last fall) The only gotcha is that if the slab is counterfeit too. IMO, a NGC holder is better for this purpose than a PCGS one simply because PCGS refuses to release official diagnostics for their holders. NGC is also putting photographs online now.

The only time it would make a lot of sense to fake a gold coin, as it is difficult to do in a convincing manner, would be if it was a coin with a high numismatic value.

 

That worries me about the First Spouse series. They're already making fakes that look like the real thing.

What keeps someone from buying coins from the Mint, submitting them to a TPG, putting a fake in the original packaging (w/COA), and selling the fake on eBay...or anywhere else? ...nothing I can think of!

That's why I think serious FS collectors should order their coins directly from the Mint...and since the Mint resells returned coins, they should also order their coins on the first day of release. :thumb:

 

I suggest checking the weight first. The Redbook or other references can give you the real weights. I have some high-quality Chinese Liberty Heads purchased on eBay (as copies) for $1.60 that are almost impossible to distinguish from the real thing -- except the weight is way too low, by almost half. And the "copy" stamp is missing, although the eBay listing shows the stamp.

 

Back in the 1970s, my boss was offered a high grade 1887 £5 piece. It was so good and so convincing, that was only when the client produced a roll of identical coins that he realised it was a fake and reported them to the police. Scary stuff considering he is probably one of Britain's most knowledgable people when it comes to British gold.
Although these fakes are excellent, it should be pointed out that it is still possible to tell them from the real thing if you are familiar with the die charectaristics...

 

Thanks Raider. I put alot of effort into that thread. To the OP, hopefully when you read it you will learn something. If one person can read it and learn something, its a winner for me.

The PCGS Guide to grading and counterfeit detection is excellent. It shows you what geniune coins look like, so anything that looks less looks suspicious. On the other hand, the book from whitman tells you what fake coins look like. It's a perfect match, get both! Also, in Numismatic News often times Michael Fazzari an authentication expert will chime in on how to spot fakes. I have some of the issues taped up on my wall. The key is to zero in where the fields meet the relief. Look for sharp crisp letters, die polish, and it shouldn't be grainy.

You may also want to read The numismatist from the ANA, Brian Silliman authenticator and NCS conservatist has counterfeit detection issues and how to spot problem coins. You may also want to take a class. This summer I am going to try and take the 2 week course in Colorado on counterfeit detection. I took a class on it in 2008 locally here in phoenix, but it was only 1 day. Still, you get to look at lots of counterfeit gold. It was a great experience.

Good luck! And Doug is right about the middle east, I had learned from pawn stars about it. I didn't think people would counterfeit double eagles because of the gold content as much as the smaller denomination, but I was wrong. They cranked these out like nothing! If it looks too good to be true, it may just be.

Oh, another good book that is interesting. Numismatic Forgery. It's a great read.

 

Thanks for all of the advice, guys!

 

As I am from middle eastern descent, I can vouch that there are still these factories, they operate more on the down low, however they still operate and produce coins that are astounding. So many ST.gaudens, if you held an uathentic one and the coutnerfiet side by side, you wouldnt be bale to tell the difference...
Fortunately I keep my coins authentic, IMO some of these gaudens that are slabbed currently or in collections, were actually minted in the middle east than the US.