1849 California Gold Piece... 6k... Actual gold counterfit or token?

So, this was in a collection I inherited last year and I threw it in my black cabinet as at first glance I thought fake although I'm not too familiar with cali gold. Well, a buddy recently bought a $600 pm tester (it has a pen that squirts a small amount of an inert fluid on the metal and the pen reads a signal and the machine tells you the karat if it's real) and let me barrow it to play around with. Turns out my cali gold piece tests at 6k-7k yellow gold. So, I still think it's a fake correct?

Or is it a contemporary counterfit?

Or, since no denomination, I think I remember a thread about cali gold tokens made of real gold if memory serves so if it is, is this a token that's cataloged?

Anyway, curious what you guys think. Especially the cali gold or cali gold token experts (if we have any here) Thanks

 

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Real California Gold always has a denomination on it . Also if it has a Bear on it it's a fake or copy to be sold to the tourist trade . Your piece was made for the tourist trade also at a time when they still had some gold . The last pieces were just plated . It does have some worth but nothing like compared to the ones that actually circulated as coins in the area .

 

Ok so it is one of those tokens made of real gold. Any idea of value guys? I'm guessing $50 or less? And any idea of when it was produced?

 

I really don't know the cost . there's a good page on these but I'm having a problem finding it . Hopefully someone else will and your worth seems about right .

 

The tester was likely just thrown off by the gold plating. It's clear from pics that this token is gilded/plated.

 

Here's one site , not the one I wanted though ,
https://images.search.yahoo.com/yhs...=yhs-mozilla-001&hspart=mozilla&hsimp=yhs-001

 

Here's a decent history of Fractional gold pieces .
http://coinsite.com/us-fractional-gold-coins/

 

Yeah, that look is what made me dismiss it initially. That tester has been spot on but I haven't tried anything plated yet

 

Guess you could try it on some known gold plate . Then as I understand it all goldplate isn't created equal . Some might have a thin wash of 10K while others might have a nice deep plate of .010+ inches of plate .