Hello there, I'm a new guy so be easy on me. I work at a bank and found a 2006 South Dakota state quarter. The special thing is it does not have the usual copper clad sides to it. It has all silver on the sides, all the way around. Any easy way to tell if it's pure silver? It was minted P so I wasn't sure if it was intentional. I tried the sound test, but it doesn't have an obvious difference in sound to a standard quarter. Any idea what's going on here?
The silver was only used to make the Proof coins and they were all made in San Francisco, S mint mark. Sorry the the copper inner core does not always show so it's probably a clad coin.
A ton of these "State Quarters" were sold on HSN, QVC, Coin Country, plated in silver and gold. What I suspect you have is one of the silver plated varieties. Folks bought these thinking they'd be valuable down the road but when they brng these sets into a local dealer they command barely "face". Lots of the "brick and Mortar" guys just cut 'em loose and throw 'em in the change drawer.
As Green says there are tons of these plated coins out there floating around. We get a question like yours about them maybe once or twice a week. (They now out pace the "I have a two headed coin, is it real" question.) If you really want to check for sure, first try weighing it. A plated clad quarter will weigh about 5.7 grams, a silver one will weigh 6.25 grams. If it weighs close to 5 grams then it may be a quarter struck on a nickel planchet. If it does weigh close to 6.25 grams and you want to really make sure you would need to run a specific gravity test on it. A plated clad quarter would have an sg of 8.92, a silver quarter has an sg of 10.34
So I have a 2006 South Dakota quarter that appears to be silver but has gold on it. I know nothing about coins. This showed up in hubby's pocket change. There is not a mark on this coin! I cannot find it anywhere except on ebay as part of a handmade commemorative collectors coin jewelry set. It is most definitely gold on Silver.
They plated some of these back in the day......the amount of gold is miniscule and really adds little to no value to the coin......welcome to the forum Tonja. Stick around for a spell and maybe us 'geeks' can get you interested in the hobby.
