Batch Marks (was die letters) on IoM decimal coins

[paisepagal]

What are those two  marks to the top right of the 50 ?

[<k>]

What are those two  marks to the top right of the 50 ?

A mintmark. The Pobjoy Mint issues coins with different mintmarks, such as AA, AB, etc., in an attempt to make them more collectable.

[andyg]

A mintmark. The Pobjoy Mint issues coins with different mintmarks, such as AA, AB, etc., in an attempt to make them more collectable.

Pobjoy claim they are for security reasons - however they won't release details about what exactly due to the aforementioned "Security"

[andyg]

Income security.

Some Victorian coins had die numbers. The invention didn't catch on until Pobjoy. Still, it's interesting for collectors to compare mintage and different die letters, to get an impression of the life cycle of a modern die.

If we knew more about die longevity, coins could become an instrument for estimating money supply in the distant past. That would open up new avenues to understand historical events.

Peter

There is a problem - we know that there are more than one die with the same letters!



A _A on the left coin, AA on the right - so two different dies....

edit - I should add that both are dated 1995....

[Gerhard Schön]

Pobjoy claim they are for security reasons, however they won't release details.

These are not die letters but the production batch code. Uncirculated base metal coins get "AA", "AB", "AC", etc. Base metal proof will be "BB", "BC", etc. Platinum proof gets "B", gold proof has "C", while "D" and "E" are for silver proof, and "F" means silver BU, so one can easily distinguish the different materials and finishes even if their colour is similar and the gross weight is the same.

[andyg]

Thanks Gerhard,

One of the forum members Spabreda compiled this list of known types -
http://www.spabreda.nl/IOMcoins.html
That information would clear up a lot of the mysteries we had.
I wonder if the codes are sometimes not used strictly as above - the Christmas 50p 2001 to 2004 for example have B codes but are not base metal proofs....

[Gerhard Schön]

I wonder if the codes are sometimes not used strictly as above - the Christmas 50p 2001 to 2004 for example have B codes but are not base metal proofs.

You are surely referring to the "BA" code which I have not included above on purpose. This was introduced in 1988 for circulation quality base metal coins produced for collectors. There are many more codes with special meanings such as "CC", "CD", "CE", as well as "DD", "DE", and finally "CB". Note that the bullion sovereigns, angels and nobles use their own "A", "B", "C", "D", "E", "X" series.

[andyg]

They have 'BB' - some of the later Christmas 50p have no codes.
Any chance of a full list of what they all mean?

[Gerhard Schön]

The "BB" in fact should be base metal Proof (Diamond Finish).

[andyg]

here is a suspect 'BB' from 2000.
"diamond finish" are issued in packs to best of my knowledge, usually the self contained Christmas cards - this just doesn't look good enough - and I don't think there are versions with AA, AB etc.

[Gerhard Schön]

The above coin is special in another way as well. To the left of the numeral 50, you can read "PMM" which combines the mintmark "PM" with the year date "MM" as the roman numerals of 2000.

[FosseWay]

I have proof examples of the halfpenny, penny, 2p, 5p, 10p and 20p from 1984 that were rather randomly in with an unrelated order of something else (i.e. they're loose coins and I don't have the rest of the set). Anyway, the 20p has the batch mark BB, which conforms to Gerhard Schön's explanation above. On the other hand, the rest don't have any batch mark. Why not?

[SandyGuyUK]

Hi all -

Following on from FosseWay's comment, I can't answer that but I have a 1982 proof set of the circulation coins from the IoM with a countermark for the birth of Prince William.  What's most interesting about them is that the 5 pound coin in the set does not have the normally obligatory "PM" mintmark below the queen's head.  They all have the die mark/batch mark letters on though.

Ian

[WayneF]

here is a suspect 'BB' from 2000.
"diamond finish" are issued in packs to best of my knowledge, usually the self contained Christmas cards - this just doesn't look good enough - and I don't think there are versions with AA, AB etc.

Hi, I know it's been a while since this thread was active but I'm hoping someone can answer - I recently got 2 x Isle of Man Christmas 50p from 2000. The pictures online have BB but the received coins have no batch marks on them. Apologies for the poor photo:


I've checked on various websites and cannot find any mention of these coins minted without a batch mark - has anyone else seen this before?

[SpaBreda]

Hello Wayne,

I have never seen any other than the BB version.
I have an BA version on my list, but never seen one before.
http://www.spabreda.nl/IOMcoins.html

One without any mark is new to me ...

But there are many surprises with these "batch"marks 

Paul.