Found a cool little B-I-E die break. Too bad it’s not really valuable. Is there anything special about certain bies that make them more collectible? Or are they all pretty much the same in terms of rareness?
Pretty much the same in my book. One of those "comes with the territory" of coin making. http://cuds-on-coins.com/lincoln-cent-bies/
Neat. They are the same issue. Worn Die IDB's.. Internal Die Breaks. Worth whatever a collector is willing to pay for it. Thanks for sharing!
In terms of collectibility, I would rate all BIE's on the same level as the Spitting Eagle and the Pissing Minuteman.
Neat! Thanks for sharing, do you roll-hunt or search thru random loose change most of the time? Roll-hunting is one of my absolute favorite things to do...
Going through my 1957's now, came across a few of the 57 and 57D BIE's. Also an IDB filling the bottom loop of the "B" in LIBERTY. Good find.
Always nice to find but I rate them all the same. Some dates may be more rare but I don’t think that matters. Nice looking but common error.
Both, mostly random change. I ordered a few “unsearched” rolls and bags online but they’re kinda hard for me to really trust. I haven’t found anywhere locally to buy from yet. If anyone knows any good spots or dealers in Hawaii let me know.
I get all of my rolls from local banks!! Most will cooperate if you are nice!! Candy at Christmas helps too!!!
I put BIEs aside for many years, then a couple years ago started getting more interested in them. Now I'm an avid collector. They don't get much respect today, but did in the past and there were a few reference books showing line drawings to identify the types, stages, etc. Last few years the COC website has been listing them with photographs so they are easier to identify, and attributing newer coins minted since the last published references. I've done some photographs of many of my own examples. You can see many of them here, but they seem very slow to load for some reason: http://www.macrocoins.com/bies-in-high-res.html Here is a high resolution image of a 1955-S BIE B603: https://easyzoom.com/image/125304/album/0/4?mode=manage And here's 1954-S BIE B624: https://easyzoom.com/image/124774/album/0/4?mode=manage And finally, here's the 1955-S RPM #4 with BIE B650. This one is the "king of BIEs" and is so big it has the nickname "sausage BIE": https://easyzoom.com/image/124047/album/0/4?mode=manage
Interesting how the extra material in all of the examples so far, between the B and the E are always up against the E and not touching the B. Why is that? I would think it would be located in somewhat of a random spot between the two letters. Here's the date on mine. Also in other documented 1954S pennies, there is a "tooth" on the mouth of the 5. This must also be the "trademark" of the "BIE" 1954S Penny. The examples I've seen online also have this specific "tooth".
There are 4 known BIEs for 1954-S. Yours is classified by Cohen as BIE B624. See it here: http://www.macrocoins.com/1954s-bies.html It's relatively common but as with all BIEs, RPMs, Doubled Dies, etc, each type comes from just one die, so they are all (individually) limited in minted quantity by the life of one die. It turns out two different BIEs from 1954-S both have a similar break on the "5", which is why that pickup point is so common. Still, there are others from 1954-S that don't have the chip/break in the "5" so many BIEs out there don't have it. The left edge of the E is a high stress point for the die, and hence there is a tendency for the die to first crack along that edge, and eventually chip out, forming a BIE. I'm not sure anyone has ever figured out why the die breaks most often between the B and the E, versus the L and I, I and B, E and R, etc. Indeed there are examples of breaks between all these letters, but the BIE is most common.
These were very collectible during the '60s & '70s. People used to collect these by date and mint mark. Usually from around the mid-50s. I don't know what was going on, but the hub/dies caused some issues. Seemed to clear up with Memorials.
