1994 Brazilian 5 Centavos Coin Defect?!

[blumeless]

I have a 5 centavos coin from Brazil, and I think there was a retained die break error/cud error above the r in "Brasil" as circled in picture 2. I think there is another error at the top of the coin, it looks like the border has been smushed.

Does anyone have an idea of what the value of this coin could be? I haven't been able to find another coin of its type with errors like this on the internet.

[Figleaf]

Welcome to WoC. I hope you will spend many happy hours here.

The edge of your coin is the victim of a damaged die: two very small pieces of metal settled on the edge of the die. BTW, it looks like something similar happened between 3 and 4 o'clock on the same side. This sort of damage happens when the die is not washed often or carefully enough, as it is not unusual that minute pieces of metal occur in the press, often as a consequence of bad quality coin flans, partly disintegrating during the minting process.

As for the R, it is not clear to me if the extra "stroke" is en relief (extra metal) or incuse (not enough metal) and how it has affected the letter.

In general, there are collectors of errors. In addition, there are people who want some representative errors to show what can go wrong during the minting process. However, there is no organised or regular demand for them, so there is no "value". It is just a question of whether you can find an interested party and even if you can, they may not be willing to pay much over the going price of a regular coin, since they are normally looking for something more spectacular.

Peter

[blumeless]

Hello Peter,

Thank you for your detailed response! The stroke on the R was high relief.

It's pretty cool what can come out of a damaged die and how many different things can go wrong during the minting process!

[Figleaf]

Yes, Murphy's law applies fully to minting. It ought to be possible to do quality control by machine, but I suspect it is too slow for coin presses.

The field of error collecting is infested with "home made" errors and fraudulent errors made by crooked mint employees, which makes it a minefield for beginning collectors. Therefore, it is unlikely to gain popularity soon.

Peter