Definition

• Counterbrockage.  A striking error with an unusual sequence of events. It is testimony to the fact that when one thing goes wrong several things will (Peter's Principle). Here is the sequence in a coinage press:  (1) a struck coin does not eject, but sticks to one of the dies (called capping or cupping), (2) a struck coin lies loose on the feed plate, (3) a blank is fed into position and enters the collar, (4) the loose struck coin comes on top of the blank in position, (5) the press continues its strike cycle, (6) all three items receive the blow and become brockage (this includes the capped coin, say, on the upper die, the struck coin in the center, and the blank on the bottom).
  The capped die piece becomes extremely flattened, takes the image from the struck center coin (by brockage), but this spreads out uniformly with the flattened center design of the center coin. The lower pieces are ejected.
  The next blank then enters into coining position and is struck by the capped die –
  this piece becomes the counterbrockage! It is slightly basin shaped with full positive design on one side with distorted flattened center design (from the capped die) on the other side.
  If we wrote this as fiction, no one would believe it. Since it is a characteristic of one type of striking anomaly, it is a peculiar fact of coinage technology.  See brockage.

  excerpted with permission from

  An Encyclopedia of Coin and Medal Technology

  For Artists, Makers, Collectors and Curators

  COMPILED AND WRITTEN BY D. WAYNE JOHNSON

  Roger W. Burdette, Editor

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