Please POST your suspicious or COUNTERFEIT 8 R's for discussion.

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I would have stuck to fair use guidelines, but after reviewing the list, the majority of the points aren't useful without detailed examination of the edge.

Here's a link to a great post and set of diagrams on how the edge design was applied to genuine issues.

 

@longshot's 1776 is a little too light by weight, has seams along the rims that shows evidence that it was edged after the surface strike (or cast) and has squared off circles in the edge design.

 

@GDJMSP's 1740 has mismatched letters and several appear reworked. On genuine dies the letters were set from the same punch. On this example, the "M"s in particular, including the mintmark, show too much variation.

 

@kevin McGonigal's 1774 completely lacks denticals! The most troubling thing I see with the 1735 is the appearance of the bottom denticals on the shield side -- looks like distortion to the metal perhaps due to edging applied after the surface strike/cast.

 

I was going to mention the castles are completely different. I've never seen one with a tower missing either.

The Gurney book is a must have for collectors of this series. He posts as SwamperBob.

 

Thanks, I greatly appreciate your help. I bought it in a sealed Postal Commemorative Society folder, which I hoped gave it a measure of credibility.


More discussion welcome!

 

As far as visual indicators go, the shield has two distinctive scratches. Perhaps you spotted those same scratches on one or more other examples. Although a bit mushy in places, the coin appears to have the correct design for the year.

Here's mine for comparison.

 

GDJMSP, posted: "I can see where that could be used as an indicator but I've seen quite a few examples where there were variations in the same letters on the same coin. So it doesn't seem like it would be a definitive indicator.

Matching punch styles of the letters and numerals was one of the best ways to detect a counterfeit back in the day as the usual counterfeits back then that were copied from a genuine coin (with matching punches) were crude by today's standards. Now that counterfeit technology has been able to produce excellent fakes that easily duplicate details of style - this doesn't seem like it would be a definitive indicator anymore.



GDJMSP, posted: "It's pretty much normal for the castles to have missing towers, and or corners of the tower bases, on various denominations. They get cut off by the center shield."

Usually, less so on any 8 Reales as I recall. Additionally, AFAIK the castles were put into the die with the same punch also.

A problem we have is that these coins were not a specialty of most TPGS authenticators. Lots of contemporary C/F's are on the market too. I feel that a day of reckoning is in our future as more of these coins are analyzed for their metals and trace elements.

At the moment, the old standby of matching defects on fake coins still works.

 

Unless the transfer dies were worn or copied from a worn example and the forger felt that certain areas need to be reworked. Genuine dies could be repunched using the genuine punches. Lacking genuine punches the forger might rework a die by hand.

 

If Reproduction was this easily gained what stopped the forger from pocketing the real dies and giving them to a guy to strike coins from a different press? I would like to think this happened but at the same time, I wouldn't want to lose both hands at the wrist, These were some pretty Balsy characters that counterfeited money back in the day.

 

IMO, your coin is a decent example that would fool many folks without a balance. At this point in time, the weights for many of these and all more modern DECEPTIVE C/F are within tolerance. The fakes I posted above are not as deceptive as your coin appears. The weights are off for all of them and their edges are very crude. Nevertheless, if you don't know what a genuine coin looks like...

I'll be posting magnified images soon.

 

The Postal Commemorative folder states 90% silver.

I don't believe the Spanish Colonial 8 reales were ever 90% silver. They were originally struck at the old Brazilian standard of 91.66% and then the Spanish crown downgraded that by secret edict to 90.27%. From there it went to 87.5% some time in the early 19th century.

 

That is, if it is genuine, an unusually nice example conditionwise for a Postal Commemorative Society encapsulated 8 reales. It is a very early, desirable date as well - 1776 dated 8 reales are not especially scarce, but it is a popular date with collectors for obvious, patriotic reasons.

It seems to me I've seen the PCS 8 reales that were fake, or at least questionable, on eBay, but I have nothing specific to share (so I don't mean to be unduly alarming). Over the years I have gotten a few 8 reales that the Washington Mint harshly cleaned and packaged in a similar way ("America's First Silver Dollar"). These were sold via magazine ads starting back in the 1980s (for $75.00 back then, which was quite high). The harsh cleaning (polishing, actually) turns off a lot of collectors, but if I can find them cheap on eBay, I'll go for it - they make good pocket pieces and many of them have interesting chopmarks (which I collect). Here is an 1809 with the typical Washington Mint polishing job:



If I were you, I'd break it out of the capsule and weigh it and examine the edge. There is nothing from the photo you provided that screams fake to me. I don't think the Postal Commemorative Society "slab" adds much if any value to any coin (I could be wrong - so please check with others! I don't collect slabs!)

If you want to see a definitely fake 1776 8 reales, see the Wikipedia page for "Spanish Dollar" - if you click the photo, the caption says it is a fake. They style is all wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_dollar

 

Here's one I just acquired. I'll have to follow up with my own photos and measurements after I receive it.

 

Your coin reminded me of a wall display I see in one of my favorite Brick and mortars. This pillar has some amazing counter punches. I might have to make a deal with him.