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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;-jeffB, post: 2142985, member: 27832&quot;]So, if it was a refiner doing this, I assume they trust their machine not to be thrown off by the composition of a surface layer? (In other words, if a &quot;coin&quot; had 2g of .999 sliver clad around a 3g copper core, the machine would report 40% silver, not 99.9% silver or something intermediate?)</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;m just more than a bit spooked by the &quot;unusual ring&quot; observation. Maybe .5% aluminum in the alloy makes a big difference, but it seems odd. At this point, if I had multiple examples of the fake, I&#039;d be <i>very</i> tempted to grind off one face and see what&#039;s revealed.</p><p><br /></p><p>Of course, if they <i>do</i> have a way to produce 40% silver coins that fool refiners and their X-ray scanners, this would open new avenues for fraud. I&#039;d expect, though, that the refiners would catch on pretty quickly when their X-ray-scanned input assays at 40%.</p><p><br /></p><p>Yet another edited-in afterthought: the &quot;thrown off by surface composition&quot; idea would be easy to check. Hand them a 40% Kennedy or Ike, and see whether it scans as 40% silver (the bulk composition), 80% silver (the surface composition), or something intermediate (indicating that the machine weights surface composition more than interior composition).[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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