My friend who knows nothing about coins brought over his grandma's coin collection and we went through it. A few interesting pieces, one of which was this trade dollar. I'm not to familiar with these, so I could use a little help with the grading. This is my first photo upload, so I hope this works out.... I scaled the photo down to 200 pixels wide like the instructions said.
OK, I guess that didn't work out so well, the pictures aren't very big. Try these links: http://proofmoderns.com/1877s_Trade_Dollar_a.JPG http://proofmoderns.com/1877s_Trade_Dollar_b.JPG
If there was such a grade I would give it an F-16 - halfway between an F12 and a VF-20. Value? $110+/- IMHO. The '77S was the highest mintage coin of the series - almost double the second place '76S, and a million times the final '85 Philly.
The coin looks ok----the Trade Dollars are faked alot....I would suggest that you weigh it and make 100% sure that it is real. Speedy
I think it looks real, but can't be sure without further investigation. I would think it might be about a VF30 or VF35.
Speedy, weren't they also damaged a lot? If my memory serves many had a hole drilled through their center. Something about the Spanish coins having more silver in them... ?
Speedy, most of the counterfeits I have seen actually weigh correctly (scary!). The best 4 ways I check for counterfeit trade dollars are to check and see if it has irregular reeding, check and see if there are raised lumps of metal on the surface which would indicate a cast copy, also in the hair there might be two holes where the counterfeiter chipped away at the die, and finally check the eagles eye. On normal coins the eye is incuse, but on a lot of the counterfeits it is not. I can't tell from the pictures if the coin is real or not. I hate counterfeiters
Alot of them were chopped marked---by people in china...IIRC Zane Ouch---is the trade dollar one of the most faked coin ya'll see? Speedy
I don't know----it looks pretty good to me....sometimes you can tell just by looking at the detail and this one looks fine.... I would do what Zane said....and that would tell for sure. Speedy
My vote goes to REAL....denticles are perfect,fields smooth as glass,eagles eye appears to be normal,wear and tear & toning..normal.If it doesn't say "made in China" on it anywhere,I'd submit it to a TPG...what the heck, send it to Zaneman..:smile
Nobody has ever posted a picture of a Trade Dollar here without at least one comment that it looks fake. It seems to be almost an automatic response.
From my experience, it definitely seems that besides random counterfeit gold pieces, trade dollars are the most frequently encountered counterfeits. Some of them are really poor copies, but most of them actually weigh within tolerances. They also tend to scrub the coins up, to hide imperfections that indicate they are counterfeit, but thankfully they can never remove all traces.
I'd say VF25. As to its authenticity - if the die clashes I see on the obverse are any indication - it's real.
Another good indication that it's authentic is the crud that's accumulated around the designs and inscriptions.If you go to the photo links and click on the pics..twice to supersize,they are so clear and detailed that you can actually see the crud buildup...this is not the fake,applied with a toothpick in a Hong Kong basement type of crud,it's REAL crud.Check it out and you'll see what I mean. The Crudmeister.
After double clicking the pictures (thanks Mikjo0), I also think the coin is for sure real. I didn't even really need to look though as GD spotted die clashes on the coin, and to the best of my knowledge, those never appear on counterfeits. As for the grade, I believe the coin is a vf-35.
