Keeling Cocos Island 2004 Coin Help Please

Yes, sadly, these were not officially authorized coins; The Cocos-Keeling Islands are an Australian territory, and no Australian territory currently has permission to strike it's own coinage. These coins were made by the Roger Williams mint, an American private mint - the same company also seems to have made the 2008 "Galapagos Islands" coins, which are similarly unofficial.


According to NumisMaster (a site run by Krause Publications, the company that produces both the "normal" and "unusual" books) KMX# 13 is made of cupronickel-plated brass, while KMX# 13a is made of solid cupronickel.

Short of getting a sharp object and scratching the coin to see what colour the underlying metal is, I'm not sure how you'd clearly tell them apart. And no, I wouldn't recommend trying that. The only other thing I could suggest is the weight: the two alloys should have different densities. KMX# 13 is listed as weighing 7.52 grams, but the weight for 13a is unlisted. So if you've got a two or three-point balance, weigh it - if it weighs something different to 7.52 grams, it's probably KMX# 13a.

I know this topic hasn't been updated for a long time and I wonder whether the OP did get around to weighing his example?
The suggestion by Sap to weigh the coin is spot on.

My example of what I believe to be X#13a comes in at 7.65g.

Records obtained by me from the Roger Williams mint indicate that there were 3 mintings, 2 in 2004 and 1 the following year.
It has been speculated elsewhere that the 2005 minting was used to produce the "Official" packs, and this makes sense as all those Pack tokens are heavier than the ones in the packs produced in Europe by enterprising souls.