i know hot to times the weight by the spot price i also know how to times by face value but i dont unserstand the face value part say you have a dollor face having 4 quarters has more silver in it then haveing 2 halfs this is what confuses me
Well, in fact, four quarters would have .00002 troy ounces less than 2 halves. The denomination was made so it was divisible. Take the silver weight of a half .36169/2=.18084 which is the weight of a quarter in troy oz of silver. Divide that by 2.5 .18084/2.5=.072334 which is the weight of a silver dime (Actually .07234 but very close) Silver dollars do have more silver though, but for that I don't have an explanation.
Unless you're talking about the 40% halves... For the most part, if you're comparing the 90% silver coins, they'll have the same amount of silver per dollar of face value. As Caz said, the Morgan and Peace dollars to have a bit more silver content in them than the later 90% silver coins do.
[TABLE="width: 238"] Silver Price $30.72 Troy Ounce Per Coin Price War Nickel 0.0563 $1.7295 Dime 0.0723 $2.2211 Quarter 0.1808 $5.5542 40% Half 0.1479 $4.5435 90% Half 0.3617 $11.1114 Dollar 0.7735 $23.7619 [/TABLE] Price of silver x the troy weight = silver value per coin
That's due to the Coinage Act of 1834 (that date may be off, but it was somewhere in the early to mid-1800s). They lowered the weight of all silver coins except for dollars. That's why Bust dimes are a different size than seated dimes, for example. Why they didn't adjust the weight of dollars, I'm not sure.
