Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
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| Using a Magnet To Quickly Separate Coins. |
One convenient but often overlooked tool for the treasure hunter is the magnet. It can be used in many ways. One thing you can do with a magnet is quickly separate different kinds of coins.
Some coins will stick to a magnet - others won't. Steel pennies will stick to a magnet. Silver coins won't. You can use convenient facts like that.
One man discovered hundreds of thousands of dollars a valuable magnetic coins. Here is a bit of that story.
... in the first roll of 50 pennies Ed opened up, there were a couple with no logo. He opened another roll, and another. By the time he was done, he had turned up more than 500 no-logo coins.
And yet, the respected International Coin Certification Service – which doesn’t sell coins, just grades them – had only 290 on record until Ed’s find.
If you discover a 2006 magnetic, no P, no logo specimen in your penny jar, you might get $50 for it. But the real prize is for uncirculated coins – factory fresh, mint condition.
And on eBay, one of the uncirculated pennies recently sold for $500, uncertified. Ed’s are certified, and he’s going to sell them for $635...
Here is the link for the entire article.
There are times when a mint produces coins on the wrong type of planchet. And there are times when a magnet can be helpful in identifying those coins.
Did you know that most many Canadian coins are magnetic. I had a pile and wanted to find any that might be silver. After separating the non-magnetic copper pennies, I simply used a magnet to eliminate all of the magnetic coins, which were all but two. One was a penny that I overlooked and the other was a 1963 Canadian dime.
I recreated the process for the following video.
When I originally did this, I started with a much larger pile. It only took seconds to eliminate all but the silver dime and copper penny. I had no idea if there were any silver coins in the pile, but knew this was one quick way to tell.
Don't leave the coins in a big pile. Spread them out. Otherwise magnetic coins under non-magnetic coins may not get picked up, and non-magnetic coins on top of magnetic coins will get picked up and stuck between the magnetic coins and the magnet.
Now for the precautions. This is a strong magnet. It should not be used with valuable coins that can be damaged by scratches. You can use a less strong magnet with no sharp edges. You can cover the magnet with a cloth. It will still work. But if you have uncirculated or mint coins that might be valuable, this is not the right procedure. For miscellaneous coins that you aren't worried about, it is a much quicker method of scanning coins than going through and checking the date of each one.
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| Two Brown Applied Lip Blown Bottles From Late 1800s. |
These were probably beer or ale bottles. The bubbles in the glass show they are blown as opposed to machine made bottles, and the lips are applied. They probably both date to around 1880 or 1890.
The bottle on the left has I. C. CO. L. on the bottom.
I.G.CO.L indicates the Ihmsen Glass Company, Limited, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (c.1876-1900). Also listed as Ihmsen Window Glass Company. Pittsburgh directory listings show this company included the “Limited” in their name from 1876 to c.1896.
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Bottle on Left Above.
Applied Lip |
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Bottle on Right Above
Showing Applied Lip and Bubble Near Shoulder. |
Happy Independence Day.
Be Safe,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
