VOCABULARY TERM: PLANCHET

Blank vs. Planchet is demonstrated in these photos. Not all blanks are planchets but all planchets are made from blanks. Center is a half dollar blank (Type I) and right a half dollar planchet after it is upset with a raised rim and perfectly round, ready to be fed into a high-speed coining press (Type II). Clad edges shown on left. Photos courtesy Fred Weinberg.

Planchet. . A round metal disk (or other shape) made from a blank for striking into a coin or medal. While the term BLANK is widely used in the metalworking field, planchet is only used for coins and medals to be struck in coining presses. A planchet is the end product of blanking where metal of the proper composition, weight, and thickness is made into a blank which is prepared by treatment of the edge for use in a coining press..

The blanking process, formerly called cutting and  cutting-out (particularly in England), leaves a BURR on the exit side of the blank. The piece must be DEBURRED. This, plus additional preparatory steps, occur by UPSETTING in an UPSETTING MILL (British terms “rimming” and “rimmer”) which thickens the edge, makes the piece perfectly round, in addition to deburring. Since this step WORK HARDENS the blank, it must be ANNEALED (or softened), then RIDDLED (to eliminate imperfect blanks) and METAL CLEANED (to remove all surface contaminants). At this stage the planchet is ready to be fed into the press. All of these steps are required to create perfect blanks for automatic feeding into coining presses (if not they would cause mis-strikes and could jam the press). See BLANK, BLANKED, BLANKING.

A blank planchet is a blank before it is upset (while the two words are similar they are not redundant). Collectors call this stage a type one, and after it is upset, type two (illustrated above). A better terminology for these two stages would be "blank" for type one, and "press ready planchet" for type two. Current usage, however, “press ready” is understood for a planchet.
CLASS 06.2

Wayne Homren, Editor

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