Expert: PAPAJACK - 3/16/2007

Question
Hello, my name is Kirk, I was sifting through some coins  just for the fun of it and I found a dime with no E on the back where it should say one dime. I took it to the local dealer and he said it was a grease stamp (AKA) filled die. I thought the coin would be worth at least 20 bucks but he told me it was only worth about 2 dollars. Is this really all the coin is worth? And how common are filled die coins? I wouldn't sell it if it were worth 1000 dollars i love stuff like this but now I am looking through all of the coins I receive to find errors. Well thank you for the time have a good day.

Answer
Hello Kirk,    

No coin can be exactly valued without being seen. For the most common cause of missing letters on coins get a magnifier and light source. Examine the coin around the missing feature. Tilting it in all directions.

Are there scratch marks, or is the surface different?
Is there a ghost of the missing item or scaring where it should be?
Is the rest of the coin properly struck?

Missing letters are usually caused by a filled die error. These coins sell at no premium except as a novelty.
Grease and debris commonly get caught in the recesses of the dies as they produce coins. When the dies close on the blank the portion of the die filled with this debris won’t let the metal flow into it.
These coins are common with weak or altogether missing features. The price you may get for them over the face value depends on what an error collector may want to pay for the particular coin with a particular defect.
Error collecting is a branch outside of coins collecting. There is no fixed pricing on these error coins published and each one would have to be seen to be evaluated.

I hope this information is helpful.

Feel free to ask another question about US Coins.

Good Luck

PapaJack