Is This AT???

Of course the "factual" (as if...) difference between the "A" and the "N" is intent. Did you do something with the "intent" of toning the coin? If you did, it's artificial. If it's accidental, it's natural. But of course the TPG's can't use that standard, so they've conned the hobby into "respecting" their bald-faced guesses with little to no reason behind them. That's why I refuse to play in the toning worshippers' playground. I try to value moving shimmering luster, and ignore color.

 

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Your avatar reminds me of this ancient coin in my collection. Yep, it is a surfing cow. (Maybe it's just a cow device placed over a dolphin device). Cowabunga dude!


THRACE, Byzantion
AR Siglos (drachm)
340 - 320 B.C.
5.30 grams, 16 mm
Obv:Heifer standing left on dolphin swimming to left. Archaic Greek monogram (yΠ)[Y] above
Rev:Incuse granulated mill-sail pattern.
Grade: gVF or better with sharp strike on good silver fabric. (yΠ)[Y] Monogram above Heifer shows complete ligate (yΠ) with the final [Y] off the flan.
Other: Surfer Cow Coin or boogie board bovine purchased from Sphinx Canada in May 2014. Ex Forum Numismatics

 

NICE!!!!

 

Guilty as charged, friend.

 

But it's beyond that, Dave. Nobody knows from one minute to the next what we even mean by AT, outside of a vague fear the coin was "doctored;" or, for that matter, by what PCGS means by QT, outside of a vague fear the coin may have been "doctored." It's that vague fear of coin "doctors" around every corner that sustains those arbitrary standards upon which we're henceforth accustomed to paying the TPGs to adjudge the grade-worthiness of our toned coins. As such, in 2010, PCGS sues the coin "doctors" in federal court, and lets that complaint sit for the limit, six months, without ever being served, while generating marketing mileage on the stunt from here to China and back. Ohh, how does this marketing grading freaking work? That's a real tough one for some of us, still...isn't it?

 

Imagine how I feel. Coin Doctoring is my specialty.

 

Who else suddenly has a craving for chick-fil-a

 

I'll tell you this. I'm a customer if I like the toning and I'm not even going to ask you if you did it or not. And I mean it.

If it hurts the coin, i.e., as in a cleaning, a stripping of the "skin" or surface metal, a disruption of the mint flow lines, any number of casualties to the technical attributes, really, that's different, right, and I'm giving you that one back? OK, just so we know. Excepting that, the coin is OK, doctor away, as I could care less.

You know, we worry so much about being taken advantage of by coin doctors, what does one call paying people to adjudge whether one's coin is grade-worthy based on their imagination? I call that being taken advantage of worse...

 

And PCGS has a "coin sniffer." Tell me they're not out there on Pluto or somewhere by now...

 

Actually dave I'm the same way. That was just a joke as I thought those pics looked like their billboards. I have never eaten there. Not once. I don't believe in companies that dictate their business model based on religion. Same goes with hobby lobby. I find it crass at best.

 

Beware ye of Laura, of the House of Sperber, for 'tis she who hath hate in her heart for thee, Herr Doktor.

 

She is my favorite human being in numismatics. I admire those who refuse to accept an undesirable status quo, and to my mind she broke the back of "institutional doctoring" among major players.

I would not touch the kinds of coins she's incensed about. They don't need help. My interest is in PVC, verdigris and the other foreign substances which can afflict otherwise-decent coins. There are some coins which *require* conservation in the interest of preserving the best that coin can be - even if that's only a Details slab - and that is my focus.

But, since I'm not NCS, I'm a doctor.

 

I dissent, sir. Conservation is what it is, whether performed by one who does so as the middle letter of a corporate identity or not. Chemistry is chemistry. It is not subject to a private interest. In other words, "sauce for the goose..." Of course, having not earned the Ph.D., much less the M.D., I'll settle for being a coin nurse practitioner.

 

I don't know whether to love you or hate you, but you are never not interesting. Don't stop posting.

 

I occasionally sniff coins too. To me, most of them smell kind of metallic. I have smelt a British brass thruppence that smelled a little musty, like an overused wine barrel. I think I remember drinking it; I'm not sure.

 

I sniff coin's!!! I think the answer to the OP was in the first few responce's...Do you like it? To ME that is the esscence of collecting,What you like.If your trying to build a prtfolio get a lawyer&change to higher quality,Etc.I'm trying both,Have been for some time.I paid $55.00 for the two eagles graded&$20.00 for the raw...NT? AT?? who care's really,Unless you like them and want to pay a premium.And for the bleh of it a 58 D Lincoln Cent...HAPPY HUNTING ALL!!!