Over the years, I have accumulated a large amount of pocket change (about 125 pounds of coins). Aside from separating them by denomination, I haven't searched them at all, although I'm quite certain there are no silver coins. I'd like to hear some suggested strategies for going through them all so as not to miss any valuable varieties or error coins. What reference would you recommend that lists varieties to look for?
well, I guess the first thing I would do would be seperate them according to denomination. cents 5 cents dimes quarters so on so forth. Then start with the ones you know nothing about, so that you look forward to getting to the ones you enjoy. that way they will all get searched
Roll them up by denomination then give the rolls out to cointalk members. We'll post what we find so you won't miss anything!
Plug and chug. Variety detection is labor intensive and thus not a fun job. Until you find a goodie. Like golf. "I hate this game." "I hate this game." "I hate this game." "Nice shot." "I love this game."
I agree the cherrypicker's books are the best, but if you do not have the money to buy them you can always use these sites until you do. Cent: www.lincolncentresource.com Nickels: www.varietynickels.com and www.coinfacts.com for the rest. Another book that will help is the Red Book.
You're going to miss some good stuff no matter how much you learn about coins. Even if you saw a picture or had a good description of what's worthwhile, you might not recognize it the first time you see it. Really the best bet is always to invest a few dollars in the folders for the coins and put the choicest example you can find in the set. Look for high grade but even more, look for nice well struck examples because you'll use these coins as a reference set later. There are undiscovered and unreported varieties and it's very convenient to always have an example of what a coin is supposed to look like at hand. Do use the cherrypickers guide and some of the lists of pocket change finds from this site and others but odds are good it will take some time for you to get good at spotting most of the keepers. During this time it's a lot of fun building the collection and making a few finds. You'll probably be pretty surprised how difficult choice examples of many dates will prove.
A lot of people hold Cherrypickers' in high esteem. It's a excellent resource, BUT it's not comprehensive. Take a look at some of the specialty guides and you'll see that Cherrypickers' is missing a WHOLE lot of varieties. So, do I advocate buying all the specialty guides? No way. That would take a huge amount of money. What you'd end up with is LOTS of references, but NO coins (couldn't afford coins.) This is a strong argument for selecting only one or two series to collect. Then you can afford the books AND the coins.
I agree in principle but there are surprisingly few resources for modern coinage. These coins were simply ignored for decades and it's only been in recent years that books have started getting published. For instance, there is not a single comprehensive reference for clad quarters. Bowers tried one last year but he had very little information to go on so it's the only one that has even attempted it. There's a single book on clad dimes, two on nickels, and three on cents. There is an excellent work by Wiles for the half dollar but this coin hardly circulates and the book is limited to uncs and proofs. There are at least four good works on Ikes. There are two or three books on all the moderns. You can get most of the information you need on-line. Coneca's site is excellent. There are so many nuances to modern collecting that don't appear in the books. Most of the best quarter varieties are unlisted or unknown and this likely applies to most denominations. It's mostly a matter of looking. Some people will prefer to specialize for one reason or another but the field of circulating moderns and their proof counterparts is still a narrow enough field that everyone won't find it necessary.
Thanks for the suggestions. I do have both volumes of the Cherry Picker's Guides, but they seem very sparse in the coins from the past few decades which is mostly what I'm likely to find.
