Both in 1998 and 1999 I spent quite some time in India. At some point I did some volunteer work in an ashram as a cashier for the Western canteen (there were many foreingers). In those days obtaining enough change was always an issue. At some point, a bunch of newly struck 1998 coins came out of a bag, straight from the bank, with many of them covered with some oil stripes. It was quite easy to remove the oil from these coins. I kept the two most oily cases I could find for my collection. They are not properly hendecagonal, which is normal for Hyderabad coinage. The bottom one in the image also has been struck poorly, the bottom of the 2 is quite vague, as well as the Lakshadweep and the Nicobar Islands. The stars are from Hyderabad mint, which is in the same state as the ashram. N#5474
Until recently I had never seen any other oil stripe cases. I was looking for a coin with 13 scallops and found the Narbonne 25 centimes shown below. On one side it also has these black lines, that I assumed would be machine oil stripes as well. When it arrived about a week ago from France, I tried gently to remove a little oil with some cloth. The cloth became black a little, so I assume it is genuine 103 year old machine oil. As the wreath looks different, the coat of arms is a bit tilted and the triangle is positioned lower compared to the one on the Numista page, maybe I should show this coin in the comments as a variety. N#8924
Does anyone else have (a) coin(s) with such oil stripes? If so, then please show it/them! It would also be nice to know how these stripes can get on coins in the production process as well. I assume this only happens in old minting machines that have some oil leakage.