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Message:: [QUOTE="GDJMSP, post: 1915074, member: 112"]But that is only in the highest grades. Once you get to 67 that all changes. And there are other criteria involved besides contact marks. Coins are graded based on all criteria, not just one or two of them. But it is possible for just one or two to limit the grade. As a grader you have to understand this and be able to discern when it applies and when it does not. That's a large part of the reason so many people have such a hard time telling one grade from another, because they don't understand it. The ANA book is in my opinion the best place to start, but it is only a start. Once you have studied and learned what is in the book you then have to study thousands and thousands of coins to learn how to properly apply the principles you learned from the book. And using a coin or two graded and slabbed by the TPGs doesn't help, in fact it hurts you. What you need to do is look at hundreds of a given coin, all graded the same grade by the same TPG, and compare them to each other. You will see what appear to be huge differences in the coins even though all of them are graded exactly the same. Only then can you begin to grasp and understand the principles that you learned from the ANA book. Only then will it make sense. Only then will you finally be learning how to grade accurately and correctly.[/QUOTE]