Doubled Dies the Norm?

Just curious as to what should be made of the growing glut of doubled
die state quarter varieties, and now involving some of the 2005 Jefferson
nickels as well. To me it conjures up images of planchets rattling around
out of control in the coin presses. I thought it was supposed to be unusual
with the current minting process for a doubled die to occur. But three
dozen different doubled die tree and rock varieties on one state quarter??
It seems like every new issue of the weekly coin papers contains photos of
the latest DD variations uncovered since the previous issue.
This makes me wonder if many people will actually attempt to collect all
of these "varieties", and if they will diminish the value and interest in
the original(?) two controversial Wisconsin quarter errors. It will be
interesting to see how the future Red Books treat these things. If they are
all included one day, they will likely require three or four additional
pages just to show the photos.

Bruce

"Bruce Remick" wrote in message
...
Just curious as to what should be made of the growing glut of doubled
die state quarter varieties, and now involving some of the 2005 Jefferson
nickels as well. To me it conjures up images of planchets rattling around
out of control in the coin presses. I thought it was supposed to be
unusual
with the current minting process for a doubled die to occur. But three
dozen different doubled die tree and rock varieties on one state quarter??
It seems like every new issue of the weekly coin papers contains photos of
the latest DD variations uncovered since the previous issue.
This makes me wonder if many people will actually attempt to collect
all
of these "varieties", and if they will diminish the value and interest in
the original(?) two controversial Wisconsin quarter errors. It will be
interesting to see how the future Red Books treat these things. If they
are
all included one day, they will likely require three or four additional
pages just to show the photos.

Bruce


There was an interesting article somewhere-might have been Numismatic News-
that I read about these. It said that the main hubbing machine at Philly was
getting old so that the master dies were loose. There's some springs that
hold it in place and those were wearing out. Something like that--I'm going
on memory here ;-)
Those dies are conical so when they get pressed in to make a working die it
would move just enough so that it would not line up perfectly, the high
spots in the center would leave an impression and then the dies would
kind-of snap back into the proper position. So all of these doubled dies are
all called tilted hub doubling.
I can't remeber which coin it was but someone has also found some with some
extra-leafs just almost exactly looking like the Wisc. 'leafs'. You have to
wonder if those also might be a product of a worn out machine part?
They've been finding those doubled dies on proofs and satins which would
explain why it would be something to do with the master hubbing step.