Base Metal Counterfeit Australian 1927 Florin


australia-1927-2s-counterfeit

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A 1927 Coat of arms florin with signs of what could be destructive testing used to authenticate the coin. The coin itself weighs just 8.6 grams (a florin should weigh 11.3 grams) and is clearly a base metal counterfeit with remnants of some sort of silvering. It displays the typical rough and porous surfaces associated with a cast item. Interestingly there’s a square hole in the obverse of the coin that tapers to a point and just penetrates the reverse of the coin.

The shape of the indentation suggests the counterfeit may have been subjected to some sort of indentation hardness testing such as a Vickers Hardness test. The Vickers Hardness test uses a diamond shaped indentation tool applied to a test subject at a known force and then measures the depth of the indentation to determine hardness. Another possible explanation is that the hole was a simply penetration test to determine if there is a base metal under the silver surface, similar to test chops applied to silver coins in Asia from the 15th century to the 20th centuries

Coin Information

Reference Number:C041702
Country:Australia
Denomination:2s
Year:1927