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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kaparthy, post: 1105560, member: 57463&quot;]Dies are made in a process.&nbsp; The working die is made from a master die.&nbsp; But to transfer the master to the working die, you need an intermediate step, a &quot;hub.&quot;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>The hub might be touched up by hand, leaving telltales that numismatists can identify with lenses, microscopes, etc.&nbsp; So, the hubs become diagonistics, identifiiers.</p><p><br /></p><p>Actually, the working dies could also be finished by hand - Mint marks added, at the very least.&nbsp; So, they have diagnostics. </p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>There is more to it than this and the procedure was different in 1787, 1837, 1857 and 1897, and 1997.&nbsp; For just one thing, the Mint mark used to be added to the die by hand.&nbsp; Now, they are part of the hub.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Also, used to be that to tranfer the image the hub had to be pressed several times and softened by heat (annealed) in between.&nbsp; Being a hair off would create a &quot;doubled die&quot; error.&nbsp; Now, with industrial tech, it is a one-squeeze process.</p><p><br /></p><p>We can go on all day...&nbsp; If you want to know, there are books about this.</p><p>And the current series of Whitman Books, such as on Gold Dollars, always includes a section on the minting process.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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