$2 on 5 Cent Planchet Error
Do you see what I see? The eagle eyed collector will see parts of the design of the two dollar coin struck on, what, a five cent planchet? That’s correct, this coin is a $2 coin, it’s been through the $2 minting press but it’s a planchet intended for a 5 cent piece, made of cupro-nickel. The extreme weakness of strike is in fact a result of the 5 cent planchet being so small in the press striking $2 coins.
A $2 coin weighs 6.6 grams, has a diameter of 20.5 millimeters and a thickness of 2.8 millimeters. This planchet however, was intended to be a 5c which weighs 2.83 grams, has a diameter of 19.41 millimeters and a thickness of just 1.3 millimeters. It’s the thickness of the 5 cent blank, less than half a $2 blank should be that has resulted in such a weak strike. The diameter is also just a little smaller so this wrong planchet had no trouble dropping into the production press.
It’s probable that a stray blank just ended up in the wrong barrel of blanks when the Royal Australian Mint was striking $2 somewhere between 1999 and 2015. The coin shows the Ian Rank-Broadley portrait of the Queen used from 1999 and this coin was found in 2015.
If you’re not seeing it yet watch the GIF’s below and it becomes much clearer and we can see how such a coin could easily be sold as a blank planchet. Do you have a blank coin in your collection that has been struck? If it has the value of that coin might just have increased by 1,000%!
