Well, lately I've come around to see what so many of you say...the St. Gaudens Double Eagle is a beautiful coin. :bow: The high relief versions, in particular, are standouts and real works of art. So, I have a question about edge varieties. There's the Wire Edge and the Flat Edge for the High Relief coins. Please see the attached picture and look at about the 4 or 5 o'clock location. This is a picture of a "Wire Edge" (Rim) variety. Is the distinction between the Wire and Flat edges only in the area that I have marked in red, or is there something different about the whole area that I've marked in green? I'm thinking it's just the red area where it looks almost like the edge of the coin is curled up. Is this the only difference between flat edge and wire edge...that the wire edge has this little curled up part, or am I missing something else in the larger green area? Not that I'll ever be able to afford one of these, but one can aspire.
As I understand it the wire rim or knife edge is just what it say,s If you look at edge straight on it looks like this <=====> thus the wire rim
GD, sorry, I looked all over there and don't see anything that explains the difference in the edge varieties...maybe I'm just missing it. The couple of pictures I see on the site are all looking at the coins from the obverse and reverse and I don't see any difference besides maybe what I was talking about in my original post. bigdog69, is what you're saying that if you look at the knife edge variety from the side (looking at the rim head on), that it comes to a point? And if you look at the flat edge variety from the side, that it will look like the edge is perpendicular to the surfaces of the coin, just like on most other coins?
No, not like that at all. I was hoping you see the difference if you looked at the two types. In your picture, yes, the red area is the wire rim. But that appears to be a rather beat up example with the rim bent in many places.
Edges? GD, I do really want to understand this. Please see the attached image that I created. Is this closer to how the edges actually are? If not, can you draw me a picture to help explain it? Thanks!
Well I can't draw a straight line with a ruler, but here's a try at it. The top is the wire edge/rim - the bottom is the flat edge/rim. The flat edge is just like any other coin, it's the wire edge that is different. And then I drew it wrong - duh ! It's the top of the pics that is important.
Sorry tcore I apparently don't have clue!! It was explained to me several years ago by a local coin dealer (shows what he knows) and here I am passing bad info on down the line. I have probably had one in my hand and never knew it. I have never the extra money to invest in a slabbed one before so to be honest I never seen one before.I have had several raw 1907's in my hands and apparently was looking for the wrong features. I do offer my apologies for giving you the wrong information on this subject. O-well open mouth insert foot Thanks GDJMSP for setting me straight on this!!!! now I've got to go to see if I can take another look at all those coins I passed up over the years
No problem bigdog. Don't feel bad about it. I'm just trying to learn more. So, we'll all learn more together! :high5: Take a look at the original picture I posted. It looks to me like on the "wire rim" varieties, they too have a flat part (before the "wire rim"). If you look at that coin, since it is in high relief, the surface is very concave. When it comes up out of the concave part of the coin, notice that it looks like it levels out a bit (the part I've marked in green) after it comes up out of the design. This is especially noticeable on my picture in the upper right (notice the shadow difference) as well as at the lower right (right by where I marked in red and green). You can definitely see that the coin surface changes angle right past the stars and it appears to level out. Then comes the "wire rim" on the very edge (where I marked in red). So, after doing some more looking, both edge varieties appear to have a part of the surface that levels out (where I marked in green). The rim or edge difference only seems to be at the very edge where I marked in red. Please see the attached picture and let me know if this is a more correct profile, if not exagerated a bit. So many of the coins I've looked at are in PCGS holders and I think that it's hard to see the edge in those as it gets covered up a bit. bigdog, I doubt there are many raw 1907 High Relief double eagles floating around nowadays. Heck, it looks like NGC has slabbed around 3000 of them alone. I suppose there are probably some old folks that have some stashed away somewhere, but I imagine most have been graded and slabbed by now. I think that if you were examining 1907 coins, you would know the difference right away if you saw one in high relief. Also, look for the date in Roman Numerals on the high relief varieties.
Aha! So it is just that one little piece that sticks up on the edge that differentiates them! Thanks for all your time and help GD!
