So The Beach Hunts Start Again

[schoolofhardNox]

Beach hunt # 29. This happened over a week ago, but I was too busy (lazy?) to post it. 🙄 Not much to say about this one. Very late start – car issues (x2) Got to the beach late and left early hoping the car would start. So, a very uneventful hunt. I was going to hop beaches, but I stayed put. I didn’t want to get stranded 2 hours from home. Not much of a low tide, so I hunted the top for a while. Better luck next time! 😄

[Rick N. MI]

Nice to get out. Lots of stuff. Got silver. You know the gold is coming.

[schoolofhardNox]

Beach hunt # 30 had some surprises in store for me. After last week’s disastrous hunt, I figured the super low tide would deliver some goods. The car seems to be starting fine, so I decided to take the chance and go back to the last beach. I was originally going to hop 2 beaches, but the first beach didn’t want that. So, since low tide would not be for about 5 hours, I figured I’d use the GPX and hunt the upper areas hoping for a silver, but would be happy just digging a lot of deeper clad. Well it didn’t take that long before I found a silver dime, and then another, and more after that. I guess it was going to be a good day after all. Lots of copper cents showed up and then a silver quarter. Funny I thought it read low conductor but was happy to see that grayish silver look. I glanced at the date, and it looked like 1974. I scratched the side, but no sign of copper, just a very shiny silver reeded edge. Perplexed I thought it must be a 1944 and I just misread it. Continuing on until low tide, I decided to swap to the Manticore. I expected to see a more torn up lower beach, but instead it looked very sanded in. Bummed out, I saw a small section of rocks exposed in the usual area. Another detectorist joined me and we covered that patch back and forth for about 2 hours. I did get a silver dime out of it, but not much more. That area is constantly hit when the rocks show up, so I’m lucky to find any silver there. Driving home, all I could think about was that ’74 quarter. Could it be a mistake silver planchet dropped in when minting????  Finally I made it home, unpacked and looked over the quarter under a magnifier.. That edge looks silver, not clad. The color is definitely the gray color of silver. Out comes the E Trac and the scale. Scale weighs the quarter at 6.9 grams. That’s way more than a normal silver which is 6.25 grams, and a clad which is 5.67 grams. What does the E Trac say ??? (it never lies) regular silver quarter reads 11-46, this quarter reads 12-16. It’s counterfeit. I can’t believe someone would counterfeit a silver quarter. It must have just enough lead in it to make it worthwhile, but not too much so that it makes a thud when dropped on a table. It still has somewhat of a nice ring to it. No gold, but still a great beach day and a lot of fun.

[Rick N. MI]

Great hunt. Nice silver. Quarter is weird. I like the old toy truck.

[GB_Amateur]

2 hours ago, schoolofhardNox said:

Scale weighs the quarter at 6.9 grams. That’s way more than a normal silver which is 6.25 grams, and a clad which is 5.67 grams. What does the E Trac say ??? (it never lies) regular silver quarter reads 11-46, this quarter reads 12-16. It’s counterfeit. I can’t believe someone would counterfeit a silver quarter. It must have just enough lead in it to make it worthwhile, but not too much so that it makes a thud when dropped on a table. It still has somewhat of a nice ring to it. No gold, but still a great beach day and a lot of fun.

Something doesn't *sound* right.  😏  6.9/6.25 = 1.1.  If coin silver has a specific gravity (s.g.) of 10.3 then multiplying by 1.1 results in an s.g. of 11.3 which is the s.g. of *pure* lead.

If the fake is larger in some dimension (e.g. thickness) than the standard coin, then the s.g. might be lower as my conversion calculation assumes all dimensions are identical.  Another possibility, assuming it's a lead alloy:  what is the density of that alloy?  In theory it's possible it could have the same as or even higher s.g. than lead.  The obvious lead alloys are solders and they have a lower s.g. than pure lead.  Bullets have antimony in the alloy, I think, but I don't know the resulting s.g.  There are untold possibilities.

Maybe it's just an experimental piece -- someone playing around rather than trying to make money off of this.  I'm also trying to think of a gambling game where it would be an advantage to have a heavier quarter than standard, but off hand I'm not aware of one.

A nice hunt, regardless of this head scratcher.

[F350Platinum]

Another nice hunt in the books for you!

You're really doing a service to the beach getting all that junk out of there, and it's nice to get paid in silver 😀

[schoolofhardNox]

3 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

Something doesn't *sound* right.  😏  6.9/6.25 = 1.1.  If coin silver has a specific gravity (s.g.) of 10.3 then multiplying by 1.1 results in an s.g. of 11.3 which is the s.g. of *pure* lead.

If the fake is larger in some dimension (e.g. thickness) than the standard coin, then the s.g. might be lower as my conversion calculation assumes all dimensions are identical.  Another possibility, assuming it's a lead alloy:  what is the density of that alloy?  In theory it's possible it could have the same as or even higher s.g. than lead.  The obvious lead alloys are solders and they have a lower s.g. than pure lead.  Bullets have antimony in the alloy, I think, but I don't know the resulting s.g.  There are untold possibilities.

Maybe it's just an experimental piece -- someone playing around rather than trying to make money off of this.  I'm also trying to think of a gambling game where it would be an advantage to have a heavier quarter than standard, but off hand I'm not aware of one.

A nice hunt, regardless of this head scratcher.

Yep it's weird. It's the same size as a regular quarter. It's tarnished to look just like most silvers we find on a beach. I agree it's for "can I do it" purposes and not monetary reasons. Very well made. Whatever the composition, lead will likely be one of the components. Someone tried to get the weight similar enough to not make it noticeably different from a regular silver. It may just have a tiny amount of silver, some lead and who knows what other combination of metals. I'm just wondering if it was struck or cast? I had a friend who struck his own copies of colonial coins (replicas) in his back yard. He traced and engraved the dies, touched them up a bit and used a screw press to make his coins. So there are people out there that just want to test their talent out a bit. I'll take that coin over all the silvers for the day!

[TampaBayBrad]

Enjoying your write ups and pics. Thanks for posting these....

[rvpopeye]

A counterfeit clad quarter , a very rare find  !  

Possibly a forum first ?

I give it two thumbs up !👍👍

Your detective work gets three 👍👍👍

[CPT_GhostLight]

Another fine haul, SohN, congrats on all the copper and silver and wanna-be silver!

I'd take that quarter to a coin dealer or jeweler with an XRF machine to read the metal contents of the coin. And to a coin dealer, it could actually be worth a fair amount of money.