OK, I have decided one of my long term collecting goals is going to be to put together as nice of a US type set as I can. I plan on creating my own criteria of what a type set consists of...but will probably use the NGC registry set as a starting point. My plan is not to include early golds and possibly a few early single year issues. I want to include circulation strikes as well as proofs for most of the issues. My current question deals with strike quality. I want to plan this set to include common dates for the most part...but I want to pick dates/mints with good strikes. For example, I know the best struck Morgans were probably the 1880-S and the 1881-S. So, those would be good issues for this set because they show the coin in it's most complete form. Unfortunately, I don't know what years were the best struck for most series. So, those of you who collect and know a lot about specific designs (because I'm not an expert in most designs)...please advise me in the strike quality of your favorite design. Thanks.
Sounds like a great set to put together: Walkers: 42-P and 43-P are good choices. Buffalos: 38-D and the 37-P, as well as the 13-P Type 1.
I would look for the first affordable example in the series that shows a strong full strike. In many series the later dates will suffer detail loss due to hub deterioration. In the Mercury Dime series, most of the 1939-1945 coins are available in high grade at affordable prices but lack the overall details provided by a full band example from 1920.
Strike quality is more important to me than an ultra high grade...and I'm willing to pay the appropriate amount for it. I have several examples of 1940s Mercury Dimes and they seem to all have softer strikes. So, I think the 1920s are probably the better option.
You can probably get a pretty good idea of what dates would be known for a good strike for many of the denominations by using this as a starting point - http://users.scronline.com/lockem/20thcentury.txt
