So, I am always trying to learn new things and I realized today that I have never confirmed how a doubled die is created. I assume it has to do with the die itself moving during production. As I understand it..the process is Master Hub -> Working Hub -> Die -> Coin. So, my assumption is that when the die is being made, the unimprinted die is pressed against the working hub more than once. If it was to rotate at all in this process you would get a doubling result on the die...which would then be imprinted on any coin that was struck by that die. I would also imagine (in theory)...that the working hub could suffer the same result if it had slipped when it was created from the Master Hub (is this possible)? Am I missing anything here?
My understanding is that the die is softened (annealed) with heat before making the impression. When the impression isn't sufficient, the die is reheated and another impression made. If the die isn't realigned exactly, there can be a rotation between the hub and the die...causing the doubling effect.
That’s the general process for doubled working dies and working hubs in the double squeeze + method (pre 1996). The single squeeze process is another thing.
Toward the end of the turn of the century, I don't recall precisely when, the Mint moved to single-squeeze hubbings to produce the dies, on the theory the images would be "cleaner." By that, I mean, "not doubled." It made sense. Squeeze it just once, how can it miss the mark? There's no mark to hit. What they forgot about is the slipping and sliding and twisting and tilting and turning and skidding and hopping and shaking and rocking and rolling, basically, the new single-squeeze technology was amenable to. That left secondary images, which were all collectively lumped with the preexisting term, "doubled die." Preliminary to that, in the double-squeeze era, there were two hubbings. The dies were reheated, then re-squeezed. That was necessary to achieve the requisite depth and definition into the die so it could be imparted to the coins later struck out by the die. When the two hubbings or squeezes were off from one another, that's when the "doubled dies" happened. And that's about it.
Mainly rotational. The distance of separation greatest towards the edge. Notice the degree of separation difference between the inward Y and the outward L. Jim
It can be rotated, off-set, or pivoted. Rotated is a special case of a pivoted doubled die where the axis around which the die is pivoted is the center axis. This is the case in the 1955 and 1972 die 1 double dies. But the pivot point can actually be anywhere, even off the edge of the die. On the 1995 DDO cent the pivot point is close to the 5 in the date. With a pivoted doubled ide the further you get from the pivot point the greater the separation in the doubling. That is why there is almost no doubling on the date be significant doubling on LIBERTY and IN GOD. For an example of an off-set doubled die look at the 1983 DDR cent where the die was off-set toward 6:00 with no rotation. Many Shield Nickel DDO are off-set doubled dies. It is also possible for the die to be both off-set AND pivoted although I can't come up with an example off the top of my head. There are also examples of doubled dies that aren't rotated, pivoted or off-set. Distorted hub doubling: In this case the die has been hubbed with a hub that has hubbed a lot of dies between the first and second hubbings and the hub has worn and spread out some. Modified hub doubling: similar to the last but two different hubs are used, one worn, one new. Design hub doubling: In this case once again two different hubs are used but with different designs, examples are the 43/2 nickel or the 42/1 dimes.
You had me going there for a minute, lol. I was referencing the single-hubbings with those terms, not the double-hubbings. The 1955 is a real, honest, double-hubbing, no hops, skips or jumps about it.
Lol...when you said, "Toward the end of the turn of the century", I just assumed you were talking about 1899 to 1900.
