New £1 Coin

[bibblebub]

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/mar/19/a-sounder-pound-new-1-coin-unveiled

Good idea or bad idea? Or is it April 1st already?

[Gromit]

Apparently 4 in every 100 £1 coins are counterfeit, which adds up to a lot of money.

It is a good idea therefore to make the coins harder to make and cut down on forgeries.

The flat perimeter stops them rolling down a grid if you happen to drop them. Old people can pretend they are thupenny bits. And poundlannd will have to change all their signage.

[youngmafbog]

And should be easier for the blind Gromit.

So all in all a good thing.

[boxtops]

On the radio this morning the Royal Mint were talking about having to consult with key stakeholders, a major one being the people who run gaming and slot machines, and shopping trolleys. If the new coin is still the same diameter as the current coin (overall), I can't see why they wouldn't still fit. He said it would cost millions of pounds if all slots had to be upgraded, one reason why they are not planning this until 2017 so there is plenty of consultation time.

Same prog said that £45m-worth of counterfeit pounds are currently in circulation, which is why we need something new.

[Gromit]

Ymb,

The current £1, along with all our coinage and notes, are very easily identified by blind people already. They were cleverly designed that way. The flattened edge new £1 coin will probably be around the same weight and size, so the flattened edges will aid blind people in differentiating between the old and the new one.

[ludwig]

// Seems like a waste of money //

They can pay for it by just minting more of them.

Got to be a good thing.

[carolegif]

It is probably only worth the same as the old threepenny bit!

[vulcan42]

As emmie says they could issue tokens for parking meters and by using the current £1 coin as the token save many millions.

[Canary42]

Lovely - we can play those "domino" set ups we used to enjoy with the old threepenny bits.

[LazyGun]

Looks quite groovy to me, with its flashy bi-metallic plumage and angular lines.

[Old_Geezer]

Maybe it's a naive thought but I think the only thing that stops coin forgery is to ensure the cost of the materials match the face value of the coin. Still it's a nice blast from the past to see the old thruppence shape once again. Because of inflation it's probably an apt shape to choose for a £ all these years later.

[sunny-dave]

I think they look great - but the pedant in me says they actually have FOURTEEN sides ...

[Old_Geezer]

Unless you mean inside and outside, the other two are faces :-p

[heathfield]

"The new coin will feature the Queen's image on one side..." (Daily Telegraph).
Now there's a novel idea!

Even better..."The Queen's effigy will be on the "heads" side,..." (Dundee Courier).

[Old_Geezer]

Will she be showing her tail on the other 'side' ?

[jackthehat]

The last time I had a coin that shape, I bought a bag of Walkers Smoky Bacon Crisps and 2 Mojos. The week before, I had been able to buy 4 Mojos but, in my first brush with inflation, the Crisps had been increased to 2½d from their former 2d.

I could probably purchase about the same amount today.....:o(

[jno]

in my youth you could cruise to Margate for the day, have a slap-up steak meal on the prom, spend the night with Lily Langtry and still have a farthing change from your thruppenny bit...

But mathematically speaking a coin with however many edges will have to be bigger, at iits widest, than a circular coin, won't it?

[Old_Geezer]

How so jno ?

Was the thruppeny bit larger at its widest point than the half crown ?

[jno]

I just meant that if you have an even number of straight sides then some bits will be wider than other bits. So if the maximum width is the same as the current coin, then there will be a minimum width that's less. I don't know how this will work with coin slots. Presumably the missing weight can be made up by using heavier metal? (They could have the Queen on one side, Uriah Heep on the other.)

[Old_Geezer]

Oh it will vary. On the 50p did they not set the curves to claim the width remained steady all the way around ? Maybe they can consider that again, although I'm unsure why they'd need to. I'm sure the thruppenny shape rolls fine enough.

[heathfield]

Not necessarily, Jno. The 50p coin has a constant diameter, whichever two points you measure it at. There's a three-sided example here, but it also applies to the 50p. It won't work with the new £1 coin though, since it has flat, not curved, edges.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curve_of_constant_width