I noticed an ebay listing for a mint sealed box of P&D 2014 Kennedy halves and the listing said that the seller was told that the mint started making the halves on 2-06-2014 at 10:30 am. The box of mint roll P&D kennedy halves had a time stamp of 10:32 on 2-06-2014. They were asking for a crazy price of $150 for the mint sealed box of a roll each of P and D Halves that normally goes for less than $70. Searching around I found another listing that had the time stamp of 09:56 am for 2-06-2014 so that obviously means the guy was wrong about when they started that morning. Then I got to thinking, that with P & D mint marks in the same box, those two mints are in two states far apart and there's no way that the time stamp stands for when both coins were minted! Possibly one of them, if for instance one mint had a pallet of coin rolls from the other mint that they put in the box as they struck coins. So I am wondering if anyone knows what the mint process is? It could be that the time stamp simply shows when the 2 rolls of coins were packaged and has NOTHING to do with the time they were minted? They could have been boxed later at a third location than either mint. If that's the case, that kind of shoots down the ebay sellers idea that his mint rolls are worth extra money because of the time stamp. I emailed the mint website asking what the process was but I'm not optimistic that they will answer me with useful information. Does anyone know what the process is for packaging the mint rolls of halves and if the time/date stamp signifies the time they were minted or just the time the rolls were boxed? Thanks for any insight on this........ Rodney
I don't know but would side with your guess that it is just the time when the box is packed or sealed. The US Mint might have an answer, so let's hope they reply to your inquiry.
In order for it to indicate time of minting they would have to track individual coins. Not practical when you are doing bulk. Plus every coin would have a different time so what time do you put on the package? On the other hand time dating when a given box was packed is much more feasible. I'm not sure but I believe now all the packaging is done in San Francisco. So all the coins were probably shipped there either in rolls, or more likely in ballistic bags, and then packaged there.
The more I think about it, I think you're probably right. Now , if this were just one mint, it would be pretty easy to indicate time of minting provided that the coins came out of the machine in rolls ready to pack. The person packing would just print a label for the box and the label would have a time stamp. I say that from having worked in a factory making rolls of plastic. But this box has product from mints in two separate states so it doesn't seem like the time on the box label would have anything to do with the time the coins were minted but rather just the time the box was packed like Conder suggests. Will it be okay to post a link to the ebay listing here? I almost bought into the sales pitch on this, and if he had only been asking ten or twenty bucks over the usual price I would have went for it without giving it all this thought. I would like to learn what the process is on this though. Another point is that I assumed the mint rolls would have coins in better shape than in the 200 coin bags. If these are shipped in large bulk bags to SF to be packed into rolls then the opposite might be true because of the extra handling.
http://catalog.usmint.gov/kennedy-2016-half-dollar-2-roll-set-16KB.html Probably this, except 2 years ago. They have done other coins, 2009 lincolns come to mind, where certain packing date/time had more DDs. Read the part about "Please Note: U.S. Mint coins are rolled by an automated machine process and not by hand. We cannot guarantee that the obverse or reverse (tails) side of a coin will be at either end of a coin roll."
DesertGem - Yeah, I know that's where he got the box from, I'm just wondering how the coins got into that box though. I did see this article which states that sometimes the mint contracts to have coins wrapped that they then sell as being "direct from the mint" : http://www.coinworld.com/news/us-co...ed-rolls-collector-seeks-new-coinage.all.html I like your profile picture. Minerals are my main interest. You may have heard of my company before: Dixie Euhedrals / digforcrystals.com
