New Quiz - What do we call the horizontal lines on the face?

CORRECT! That is a scrape on the face - PMD. If you blow up the image you will see flashes of bright light at places where the scratches hit the light. Planchet flaws are dull. Their recessed area does not reflect light the way scratches or mint luster does.

Last question: "If we file a die, it will put thin grooves into the die face. What would that look like on a struck coin? Raised or incuse? Why can't die polish be struck out?

 

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File marks will be incused on the die and raised on the coin. Same with polish marks, they are incused in the die, the metal will flow to the recesses. JMHO

 

Raised on the coin. Polishing lines are also incuse on the die so will appear as raised on the struck surface/
EDIT Danomite beat me to it

 

@Insider, I really enjoy your posts. It makes a person think. Unfortunately, I seem to break my golden rule on your posts.... All coins are innocent until proven guilty. These are a great exercise in diagnostics.

 

would roller marks look any different? How so?

 

@Insider explained the color difference between planchet flaws which would include roller marks and PMD like the scrape on this Morgan. Severe roller marks typically extend through both the devices and fields (see photo below).

 

The die polish lines would get wider as the die wears, they won't go away.

 

Usually die file marks are in the field of the coin, and not on the devices, since on a die the field is higher than the devices, which are sunk below the surface.

 

Over the life of the die, the repeated striking of coins tends to wear away at the die. This tends to smooth out sharp details. On an early die state coin with die polish, the polish will be crisp and sharp (as will all other details). A late die state coin starts to look mushy. The die polish, as a fine detail, will actually be worn off the die and no longer appear on later die states. Compare the detail pictures here: the top one is an early die state with lots of die polish, the bottom one is a later die state and shows almost no die polish:

 

I was thinking the width of the scrape on the Morgan was way too thin to be a counting wheel or roller. It is what... maybe 2mm across? Unlike Lehigh’s coin which is fairly wide across.

 

I have been told that all these lines on the face are caused by dissolute living.

 

You did not answer my question. Previously, a member guessed that die polish can be struck out. Why is this not true?

EDIT: @physics-fan3.14 posted a case where they do disappear. That is different than when they are on a normal (not worn) die. The reason die polish cannot be worn off a coin is because it is on the die to begin with. I hope this is clear. I better mention that die polish can also be removed by circulation so all the bases are covered.

 

It's a Morgan, that's good enough for me, I'll take it in any shape. It does appear to be a bit abused though. Thanks for posting it.

 

I thought those lines were from cleaning the coin. Sold several Morgans because I thought they had been cleaned. Thanks for the clear picture and explanation.

 

Some lines can be from cleaning.

Here's the best way to tell the difference: take a look at the top picture I posted. Notice how the lines run "under" the clapper? You don't see any of the lines on the clapper itself - because these are die polish lines. They are on the face of the die, which is the highest part of the die (and don't *usually* extend onto the devices. There are exceptions to every rule, of course).

If these were lines from cleaning, they would run "over" the clapper. That's because the lines from cleaning are done after the strike - now the raised devices are the highest point of the coin. Compare the above pictures to this one, where the lines run over the top of the letters - this is from cleaning:

 

Thanks again.

 

Hello Insider,

Another great question.

As Lehigh 96 pointed out, the darker marks are luster grazes or frost breaks. The contrast with the lighter surrounding areas is a light phenomenon, such as can be seen on a cameo proof, for example. They are simply the absence of luster.

As for the more complicated "scuff" marks, they are certainly not random and are too symmetric to have been made by anything other than a machine or someone using a tool, such as a file. They are too deep and curved to be album-slide marks.

I don’t think a machine is responsible for this however, because if you look closely at the marks you can see that they were caused by two distinct strokes that begin and end at different points. A coin-counting machine wouldn’t do that.

Did these marks occur in the mint, or afterward? Which basically boils down to the question of whether they are incused or raised.

Frankly, they look raised to me, although it’s not always easy to distinguish between incuse and raised just judging by reflection. Moreover, there are also little bumps within the scuff marks that also reflect the light in the same way as the lines.

So I believe we are dealing with tooling marks. There was something in the die which someone tried to remove with a file. And if you look under the scuff/file marks, you can see traces of raised areas and bumps that normally shouldn’t be on Miss Liberty’s chin. Perhaps due to a rusted die.

To get back to your initial question, I don’t know what these horizontal lines are called.

Contrarian

 

The marks on the face are from a bad scrape after the coin was made. When a coin is scraped as this, the scratches go into the coin but the sides of the scratches are made by displaced metal which can make parts of the scrape look raised. That's why you should always rotate the coin in the light. Then raised and incused lines.

 

The scrape still looks like a wheel mark to me. Here is a Jefferson with a wheel mark.

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I call the mark on the nickel a "scrape." I'm not interested in what caused it BUT on your coin the location and curvature "suggests" it may be a wheel. The problem is wheel marks are usually much finer and closer together. I think the coin was twisted while on a rough surface - a scrape.