Liam84

Welcome to TSF 👍🏻

That's pretty daft if that's how it works. They'd be better off issuing a token ID to each queuing customer requested by a button press (presumably you're already logged in) which, when your turn is next, fires off an email with a link for you to click and complete the purchase within a set amount of time. You could still keep the random order policy if required. All the different browsers, ways of connecting to the internet, hardware etc means any one hiccup and you're out of the queue? Harsh. I couldn't be doing with any of that, but people often suffer for their passions I guess!

You may expect that a large entity like the Royal Mint would only use the best, most skilled web development contractor available. As is often the case with government contracts it is who you know as opposed to the reputation you've built because of what you know. It was probably some fresh from uni cut and pasters that are related to someone within the Mint that got the job. What they need from their website would not be an overly difficult thing to achieve so long as you know what you're doing... And if I'm wrong and it was a pro outfit then maybe they should take a long hard look at their team...

'Cheap' cotton gloves can drop fibres which isn't an issue for most stuff but it is for proof coins etc. I use latex/nitrile gloves if handling fresh silver or shiny new gold, purely as it's a savings mechanism so may as well be as fresh as possible if/when it is eventually moved on by myself or a descendant. I am less fussy these days with things like sovereigns and other circulated coins. Whether wearing gloves or not I only use fingertips on the edge of the coin and never grip the faces. The exception here is obviously worn stuff that fondling will have no negative effect on. I quite like to flick silver with my thumb (a la the heads or tails game) to listen to the noise it makes as it's struck. I am quite odd though. If you don't do this I recommend it, works especially well with large coins such as crowns or dollars. I have an old peace dollar that is as smooth as glass and it makes the most wonderful 'pulled from a movie sound effect library' PING as it's sent skyward...can't do that with gloves on!

Just putting away some recently purchased currency silver into my coin books so had a gander whilst there and was reminded of the design on the 1937 coronation crown:

Apart from how glorious those Maples look all piled up in their pure gold glory I can see the logic in getting into sovereigns, especially if you're effectively 'starting again' after a sell off. It's one of the only ways to get fractional gold at low premiums (for regular bullion at least) and they are super liquid. It's a funny time for gold on the forum at the moment, some stuff seems to hang about longer than you'd expect, but I reckon if you came under the dealers by a couple of percent they'd go pretty quickly. Dealers are in the ~14% range so there's scope for a happy trade for you and a potential buyer. Some folk play the flipping game and may take batches at a % or two under the singles price to make a drink on the back end. Lots of options 😁

I really hope they shrink her head. That effigy is too big in my opinion. Have her in a jubilee crown and make it a shoulders up design instead of the decapitated look JC gave her...

For any new members not familiar with old silver currency; If you bought this lot not only is it less than silver spot price for the intrinsic metal, if you sat down with a coin database website open and sorted through them all you will probably find that a lot of these are worth more than scrap value. Scrap normally entails rubbed smooth coins, or coins with holes/other damage. From what can be seen in the photos these look like there are good collectible condition coins here.

This is what I was going to look through...do you have plans to put that up again or are you waiting for the project to be completed? I appreciate it must be a pain to upload but it was rather good. If you did publish again it would be advantageous if it was hosted on your own domain so as not to be at the mercy of image hosting sites 👀

I'm going to have (another) trawl through @LawrenceChard's available data set, mostly for fun but also to go over the early QEII coins. I've got a few that are quite pleasing to the eye and look very different to the modern copper only examples; I had assumed there was a little silver in the Gillick's and thought I had read as such on Mr. Chard's published data...my memory is a little hotwired these days so it could just be me...

Cool thread OP, nice to see an annoying situation turn happy (I had the same issue with mice, all I found was the previous resident's lost toys and a few pennies). This advice above is golden. It also helps to store your stuff at a separate, never discussed location just in case. Preferably with automated large-calibre machine gun turrets and a sassy AI controlling the lock.

1/4 oz gold from a mint's key line (Maples, Britannias etc) tend to carry quite a reasonable premium so selling them then buying the sovereigns would no doubt leave you quids-in if you're after bullion sovereigns.

Would this be originally made to be used as a wedding gift or similar? I seem to remember something similar coming up on the forum a little while back, but it may just be a stuck cog in my noggin... *Ignore me, I'm talking nonsense...I was thinking of this which is entirely different: https://www.thesilverforum.com/topic/43539-help-with-1987-gold-britannia/?tab=comments#comment-471956

Welcome to the forum 👍🏻

"Junk Silver" is a term we seem to have inherited from our American cousins. Traditionally they use the term to describe used silver currency coins that are common or too worn to be of any significant numismatic interest, but there is a significant difference between the UK and the US in this regard...They had silver coinage up until 1964, .900 fineness apart from the last year where they issued .400. The last year we had .925 was 1919 and the last year we had .500 was 1946. I don't know mintage figures off hand but as the American population is larger than ours by some margin I imagine the number of circulated coins still available is vast in comparison to the UK's. American "junk" often trades for the price of silver spot in it's home country (at least it did before current 'affairs') whereas it usually commands a modest premium over here. UK silver currency is a mixed bag and cost will vary hugely dependant on the coins, the seller and the direction of the wind at the time of buying...There have been some excellent bulk deals available on UK coinage on the forum recently, worth keeping your eyes balls on the trade section!