Mercury Gold Dime - Who Got Full Split Bands?

I believe it was purposeful because it's struck in soft 24kt gold and if the bust was to close to the rim it would likely merge with it or distort.

 

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As Green says if it's not on the die it's not going to end up on the coin.

http://news.coinupdate.com/2016-w-gold-winged-liberty-dime-u-s-mint-exclusive/

 

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG

 

Although this sounds like a BS answer from the mint (i.e. current technology won't allow the finer detail needed for full bands), it would appear from their answer that full bands do not exist.

Let's face it, the current non-numismatist staff at the mint didn't even realize that FSB's mattered and they blew another design. Yet, they give us a PC answer to deflect blame from themselves. Business as usual.

It will be interesting to see the coins in hand.

 

It sounds they didn't or were incapable of hand tooling the fine details.

 

I don't buy that either. Modern tech produces plenty of detail finer than required for full bands, so I don't believe they would have to be hand tooled.

 

Maybe issue 1000 handstruck, Specimen Proof, FSB, $5000 ea.

 

And also their answer of why is the diameter smaller... "To save money"

Stupid paper pushers making all the decisions!

 

I got mine yesterday and while I haven't looked at them under the dino light yet, there is definitely no FSB on the ones I got.

Looks like the bottom bands are defined much better but also different from the original design with smaller bands. The middle and top are pretty much just blobs.

 

That's inaccurate and unfair. The diameter of the coin is dictated by the size of a 1/10 oz blank, and how thin you can make them in order to come close to the size of a dime while still retaining integrity of the design post-strike.

This was not a paper pushers decision and you classifying it as one just shows how misdirected people's anger about these coins can get.

 

They decided that they already had blanks on hand of different dimensions and just used those. What I was getting at is that they knew this would be momentous and decided to cut corners instead of truly creating a great product. Shame on them and their paper pushers!

 

I disagree. They had a mandate to make the coins, but the mandate requires the coins to be struck on 1/10, 1/4, and 1/2 oz .9999 gold blanks.

Striking these coins the same diameter as the actual silver versions is nearly impossible.

If you want to be angry, blame the people that required the coins to be struck on blanks that were too small to accomplish what the Mint promised to the public, or be angry at the Mint for hyping something that was physically impossible to produce, but lay the blame where it belongs.

 

who gave the mandate? congress?

 

There is no mandate or law that was passed for these coins specifically. Pretty sure the treasury used a sort of loophole or made a very broad interpretation of the existing legislation that authorized the fractional gold Buffalo's in 2008 to mint these coins. That legislation allowed changing of the design of the coin series after a one year period. Pretty sure they used the same legislation to mint the gold Kennedy's also so it seems very broad interpretation and minting of gold coins is here to stay.

 

There was no mandate, they made the decision to offer it as a special product. A silver version would have required legislation which is why they only did the golds.

 

Help me out here. When you say "...a copy of the design", do you mean they engraved a new master die, and didn't start with the original master die? When the BEP was reprinting old large size US currency, they took the original master die and made new working dies, so the reprint was virtually identical to a circulating note. They were uniface on card stock, of course, and usually there was no plate number, and sometimes the die had some damage - hey, they were 100 years old or so - or was incomplete, but it started with the ORIGINAL master die from the 1800's or early 1900's.

 

The gold design was never considered to be a copy of the Winged Liberty dime. There is only some of the detail of the original coinage.

 

In the May 16 edition of Coin World magazine Mint spokesperson Michael White stated the the lack of full split bands was due to the evolution of production technology. ("No Split Bands", page 36, Coin World, May 16).

In 1916 fine details , like the full split band had to be added to the die by hand. This type of detail isnt going in to the die / hub making process any longer. Add to it that the diameter of this coin is small and you won't see full split bands on this coin.

 

That's the biggest bunch of BS I've heard in a long time . So they are saying is they didn't want to take the time to add them . No wonder Lincoln looks like a cartoon on the newer coins . Our newer technology is regressing ? Only when they don't give a dang about us collectors and the size difference shouldn't matter one bit as it's still close in size . What ever happened to pride in ones work ? Our mint sure doesn't show it , or they think we're suckers .

 

That would show their true colors , the almighty dollar rules .