Sweden 1981 5 Ore clarification.

The 1981 Swedish 5 Ore coins was produced in both brass (KM# 849a) and bronze (KM# 849) however the individual 1981 Numista entry for KM 849a states "copper coin". If the planchet was copper rather than brass or bronze, surely this should be a new variety. Would appreciate the input of others.

https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces6861.html

Thanks

Numista is wrong. 1981 KM# 849a is brass.

The coins don't look like brass though. Does anyone have a yellowish one?

There must be a Scandinavian member here with a specific Swedish catalogue. Specific catalogues are always more reliable than Krause. And we take a lot of data from Krause, so if Krause is wrong, Numista is often wrong too. So hopefully one of our Scandinavian friends reads this post and help us out.

Here's a 1981 Swedish Mint Set with a KM# 849 5 ore coin. Note the composition listed as 95Cu/4Sn/1Zn. Bronze


Here's a 1982 Swedish Mint Set with a KM# 849a 5 ore coin. Note the composition listed as 95Cu/5Zn. Brass


So the Numista coin pages for KM# 849 and 849a show the correct materials. Just doesn't seem likely to me that they would mint 34,911,257 copper ones between the bronze and brass ones.

Also, Krause doesn't say it's copper so the Numista information didn't come from Krause.

Just to clarify somewhat:

95% Cu / 5% Zn is considered a "brass" alloy although it contains much less Zn than what is considered "yellow brass" with ~30% Zn. It is also called a "red brass" for its reddish color. It is the same alloy used to make US pennies from 1944 to 1946 and again from 1962 to 1982. We typically say these US pennies are made from copper.

So while the composition on the Numista page is technically correct (brass) it doesn't convey that these coins are more "coppery" in appearance than other brass coins. The 1981 year line calling these coins "copper coins" is misleading and should be changed to say "Brass coin, see also KM#849" or even better "see also KM#849" to avoid any confusion.

Thanks for the information! Maybe it would be a good idea to put the percentages in the material description so it isn't as confusing.
I thought there was a higher cutoff point we're brass is called brass.

Cita: "Idolenz"​Thanks for the information! Maybe it would be a good idea to put the percentages in the material description so it isn't as confusing.
​I thought there was a higher cutoff point we're brass is called brass.

​Agree. I'll submit CRs for both the brass and bronze coins adding the exact compositions.

5% Zn is the lowest I've ever seen called brass. It's also known as Gilding metal with Zn content of 5% to 11%.

Thanks for the replies folks and the correction. It was similar to the confusion for the S Korea 1970 10 Won. Both issues were brass but the original had a composition known as Commercial Bronze even though there was no Tin. The numista entry was shown as Bronze. I ended up getting the catalogue changed to show the actual compositions and removed the bronze description.

These changes have now been validated.