What do YOU grade it? 1831 bust half.

I was writing as you posted the grade. That looks like a perfect grade for the coin. It is great looking!

 

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Well done, Paddy!

 

Do you think they used the published ANA grading standards? @GDJMSP

 

I'm not an expert but been doing this for half a century plus....sometimes we look at something and don't see the forest for the trees.
I am also guilty of doing so.... however sometimes there's a curve ball your weren't expecting. And another pair of eyes catches.

 

Back then, yes. It's all there was then.

 

Pretty coin C-B-D.

 

Old dead eye strikes again! Nice catch-
I was looking on a cell phone and easily missed the hillbilly tooling and obviously the Anacs grader did too.

 

What color would the high points have been if they were unstruck areas where metal never moved?

 

I like to know the cause what caused the void. As on bust coinage that seems to be an area always affected.

 

That's true, and i cannot answer the question. Ive heard weak strike but its predominantly the 1831-1834 examples with this issue

 

That area is exactly opposite the highest part of the bust on the obverse. Old striking technology meets a big void in the die pair at that spot.

 

Makes sense....and again since it is seen in other bust coinage sounds spot on.

 

This is also why it got better as years went on. Technology of the time improved striking pressure.

 

They also moved to a steam press. New tech.

 

Do we know exactly what year that was done at Philly? And was steam operating side by side with legacy equipment, or was it a clean cut-over?

 

55 was my number. Even with the strike weakness there were too many luster breaks for a 58 grade in my opinion. Au without a doubt but not a slider uncirculated. So the 55 grade is spot on in my opinion. Nice coin

 

They would have a darker, but unperturbed, hue that blends into the surrounding toning. When there is wear, the toned area will have a significantly different color from the surroundings, normally a flat light-grey.

Let’s take this 1832 for example. You can see that much of the obverse is weakly struck (hair, drapery, stars), but you would expect all of these areas to have the same kind of color and texture on the weak spots. However, that is not the case. You can see how the highest spots have a significantly different color than the rest of the coin, meaning something happened at those areas (wear).



This coin graded MS-64, making it a classic example of a technically-overgraded coin.



Here is another MS-64 1832. Notice how on all of the high points there is a darker toning that blends in with the rest of the coin. There is one exception on the topmost hair curl on the right where there is a small spot of significant color change. I can’t see a similar spot on the reverse.



And now here are three halves graded MS-65 that I think are properly-graded. Notice how on the high points there is no significant color/texture change that seems out of place.

 

Here is an AU-58 1809. Circled in red is an example of the texture/color change I am looking for to determine the presence of wear.

 

Here is my AU bust half. You can also see the same significant color changes on the high points.

 

is that a scratch above the date?