Expert: Ronald Fern - 1/25/2010

Question
I have a 2000 Maryland quarter the front side is the standard silver color, but on the flip side it is gold colored. It is also appears to be divided along the ridges the same way. Is there anything you could tell me about this quarter and if it would be worth anything more than .25 cents. Thank you for your time.

Adam

Answer
Hi Adam:

Thanks for your question.

It is hard to give you a precise answer without a photo or actually examining the coin. It sounds like you may have a planchet that was split either before or after the strike. State quarter errors are very collectible. The error is likely the result of the blank not properly being bonded during the making of the clad planchet material.

The planchet material is explosive bonded together to form the sandwich type blank with the outer clad and center copper pieces. If the planchet material is not properly cleaned, it may not bond completely. The planchet may come apart along the bonded surfaces areas either during the planchet making phase (split before struck), or after the coin was struck (split after striking). In both cases, the coin should be thinner than a normal quarter and weigh less. A split before striking planchet error will have a smoother surface on both sides of the coin, where a split after strike will have a rough surface on the side where the clad shell split away.

The value of your error would depend on several things. The condition, and wether it was split before or after striking. Your piece would likely have an value of $150 to $250 to an interested error collector, with the higher value going to a split before striking error along with the higher grade coin.

You may want to check eBay listings in the error category under US coins from time to time to see if coins like yours are listed and what they are going for. You may also want to check out these links on error coin values:
http://www.coinsite.com/html/USErrorPrices.asp
http://www.minterrornews.com/priceguide.html

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Thank You and Good Luck in your collecting.