Classy?

[BlacktopTravelr]

I like that one gram bar with the scorpion on it. Who sells that?

[jeffcoslacker]

I like that one gram bar with the scorpion on it. Who sells that?

That's silverage2013, the Chinese guy on ebay. They are currently $25/pack of 30 I think. I have like 8-10 of those packs, they have always weighed 31 grams so dead-on. If you order it today, you'll have it Wednesday. Free shipping.

[jeffcoslacker]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/30-X-1-Gram-999 ... 1438.l2649

He's got almost endless themes on these 1 gram bars, guns, skulls, animals, planes, etc...I bought a lot with aircraft...really nicely struck, kinda cool they can get that kinda detail and clean strike on something so small. They don't come flat like it shows in some listings, they come vacuum wrapped in a pile in a bag, so they don't rattle around and scratch each other up in transit.

Like we talked about before, I just liked them and figure in a SHTF scenario they'd be better barter fodder than larger pieces...

[jeffcoslacker]

[BlacktopTravelr]

Thanks, I bookmarked the ebay site. [emoji106]

[jeffcoslacker]

Wow! The first enhanced Freedom Girl just showed up....looks even better in person. I dunno if I can get a good pic but I'll try later. I didn't realize she was gonna come with a really nice presentation box and certificate too. That was a nice bonus [emoji106]

[jeffcoslacker]

Got the second Freedom Girl today...kind of weird how I ended up with two...I was bidding on one, and got sniped at the end of the auction, and I didn't want to miss out on one of them so I just bought one from the same guy at the buy it now price...then it seems the jacktard that edged me out bailed on paying, so they offered it to me at my auction bid. Oh what the hell. We probably won't see these again once they are gone.

Got two in regular silver coming later this week, and bought two in copper, like this:



Happy, happy, joy, joy. [emoji2]

[jeffcoslacker]

Finally able to get halfway decent shots of black/gold Freedom Girl. Hard to photograph, so much contrast and shiny.

[BlacktopTravelr]

You sure do buy a bunch of interesting stuff. I'd be happy to get just 1/2 of the stuff you buy. Keep posting of what you buy. [emoji106]

[jeffcoslacker]

Meh...it keeps me too broke to buy smack...so that's a good thing

[jeffcoslacker]

You sure do buy a bunch of interesting stuff. I'd be happy to get just 1/2 of the stuff you buy. Keep posting of what you buy. [emoji106]

I just bought a few more of these while still priced well. With silver going up he'll probably have to adjust his price before long.

There's nothing I really like there, except that it is good silver at a good price. Not pretty though. Unless you really like eagles I guess

[BlacktopTravelr]

Jeffco, those that you don't really like the looks of are the ones you buy in the hope the price goes up, way up.

[jeffcoslacker]

Jeffco, those that you don't really like the looks of are the ones you buy in the hope the price goes up, way up.

That's da plan... [emoji106]

[Fred]

I think ide like to collect this stuff I really like looking at them and maybe an investment but--- can you trust buying this stuff on Ebay

How do you guarantee your collecting proper stuff and buying proper gold. Im fearfull of bar gold too,--- strongly believing suggestions that a Kilo bar could quite easily have steel or lead inside.

I saw Pawn stars buy some on TV he drilled a hole straight through a big bar of gold to check it I mean he must have drilled out 5,000 dollars of gold. He even took it out of sight of the owner to the workshop. Im sorry I don't work like that.

Also are you buying face value or is decoration extra.

[jeffcoslacker]

I think ide like to collect this stuff I really like looking at them and maybe an investment but--- can you trust buying this stuff on Ebay

How do you guarantee your collecting proper stuff and buying proper gold. Im fearfull of bar gold too,--- strongly believing suggestions that a Kilo bar could quite easily have steel or lead inside.

I saw Pawn stars buy some on TV he drilled a hole straight through a big bar of gold to check it I mean he must have drilled out 5,000 dollars of gold. He even took it out of sight of the owner to the workshop. Im sorry I don't work like that.

Also are you buying face value or is decoration extra.

There is an element of faith buying from ebay but as I said you buy from dealers who have been around a while, have a lot of transactions and really high feedback scores, and you'll be fine.

And if it sounds too cheap, there's a reason.

I don't think any of it is a real good investment, but I think it would be pretty unlikely that it would lose anything long term too. Some premium over spot price is to be expected of course, but some of these specialized things get pretty pricey. The idea being that as they go out of production they get more valuable, if limited run and something people liked. For example there are many bars and coins produced in the 70's and 80's that are hard to find now because they have all either been scrapped when silver was high or hoarded by collectors, and they will go for $50-$80 (for a 1 oz piece) and more, depending on what they are. I don't care so much about that...I just buy certain things that appeal to me, if I can afford it. If they appreciate, wonderful.

If I were serious, I'd do like BTT and just buy as close to spot as possible and park it. Right now silver is around $18/oz, about $21 is as cheap as you're likely to find a bar or round (online anyway...an actual local coin store might beat that). Lotta ebay sellers have great sounding prices, but their shipping is high. I like places with free shipping, so the whole cost is readily apparent to me.

There's different ways of finding out for sure what you bought. Some are non-destructive but costly (I'm told) like XRF...uses a focused x-ray beam to excite the metal and make it give up a signature that tells exactly what it actually is...

When I started buying, some of the first stuff I bought from silverage2013 (the Chinese seller) was those 1 gram bars in sets of 30. The idea being that since there was 30 pieces and individually not worth much, I could destroy one out of the first pack and see if he is on the level about what he sells. Actually not destroy, but deface permanently. It's still silver...

Silver reacts to bleach with a vengeance. Dipped my sacrificial piece into it and it flashed to black instantly. That means it's at least 90% pure or better, lesser alloys will blue or brown but the deep black and quickness it turned seems to indicate it is likely .999 or very close to it. I'm comfortable with that.

When I read his stats, he has like 98.5% out of thousands of transactions...looking at the negative I saw first that several of them were people that for whatever reason were unfairly piling on multiple complaints about a single transaction, which skews the numbers...there was like 5-6 people/transactions accounting for dozens of negative feedback ratings...he attributes them to a competitor trying to keep his score down, and I have to agree that is likely. The Chinese play dirty like that. Then if you disregard those, there are several others that made unfounded accusations that the silver was fake or sub-par, to which he responded by telling them to have it tested by XRF and if it was not what he claimed he would refund it AND pay for the testing...which of course nobody took him up on. The remaining were just things out of his control, lost/stolen in the mail, etc...people that thought he should replace it for some odd reason...

[jeffcoslacker]

I'm really disappointed that I can't get any feedback on that mystery item I spoke of a while back...tried twice now and no response to requests for additional info...but...while I had considered just throwing the dice and ordering it anyway, I just got to thinking the seller could very well be someone affected by one of the recent weather events, and may not be able to communicate or manage their items for sale. In which case if I were to buy it, most likely nothing would happen, except I'd be out the money in the short-term..so I'll just wait a couple of weeks on that and see what happens...

[BlacktopTravelr]

I might, I say might, buy some silver with the money I get tomorrow. That 30 pack of gram silver sounds kind of nice. I could even go the gold route for a few grams and see how that feels to own real gold. [space]

[jeffcoslacker]

I might, I say might, buy some silver with the money I get tomorrow. That 30 pack of gram silver sounds kind of nice. I could even go the gold route for a few grams and see how that feels to own real gold. [space]

If you go gold I'd at least get like a 5 gram piece...the price they charge for a gram is pretty rough, on the cheap end maybe $50 and that would work out to be several hundred dollars an ounce too high...but at least the premium drops the larger the piece. Still, buying gold in any form less than an ounce is just for the satisfaction of having it, gold would have to really jump (as it sometimes does) to break even or come out ahead...

Plus I've seen a one gram gold piece before...it's disappointing. You almost have to leave it carded because loose it's like a flake of foil almost...it is not substantial at all. Feel like you could just wad it up or it could blow away...the silver grams obviously weigh same, but have some rigidity to them. A 1 gram gold bar is only 0.40 mm (.016 in.) thick, so not gonna have any strength being a very soft metal to begin with.

I don't have a metric caliper but my inch dial caliper says these 1 gram silver bars are about .030 in (0.76 mm), so twice as thick almost.

What I've read says that 10 gram gold bar is about as low as you can go and still get any idea of the weight of gold when handling it.

[jeffcoslacker]

I think ide like to collect this stuff I really like looking at them and maybe an investment but--- can you trust buying this stuff on Ebay

How do you guarantee your collecting proper stuff and buying proper gold. Im fearfull of bar gold too,--- strongly believing suggestions that a Kilo bar could quite easily have steel or lead inside.

I saw Pawn stars buy some on TV he drilled a hole straight through a big bar of gold to check it I mean he must have drilled out 5,000 dollars of gold. He even took it out of sight of the owner to the workshop. Im sorry I don't work like that.

Also are you buying face value or is decoration extra.

I was thinking about that show you talked about...if it was a pretty good sized brick as long as he has it documented on video I suppose they can just re-melt the shavings and pour it back in, documenting that process too. Then you actually have something to show a potential buyer so they don't have to worry about it.

BTW Tungsten is the best stand-in for gold as far as weight goes...anything else will screw it up, as far as being dimensionally incorrect for the stated weight.

Tungsten is within like .02% the same mass as gold, IIRC. But tungsten is pretty pricey...not like gold, but enough to put off all but the most serious forger doing large pieces...and those usually get scrutinized pretty hard, so can't see it being very common.

[jeffcoslacker]

Got the first two of five of the Sunshine Mint Eagles today.

I'd like to have that decoder lens but I'm not paying $18 for it or whatever they want...unless I plan to buy a lot of their stuff going forward...

Like I said pretty sure that is simply a polarized lens that makes a laser etched watermark pop when viewed through it. The Chinese should have no problem counterfeiting that if they decide to. Rat bastards.

I'm nearing two pounds silver now. Woohoo!