2001 Transatlantic Radio Centenary £2 coin.

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The modern circulating coin (1997–present)

The circulating British two pound (£2) coin went into production in 1997. It was the first bi-metallic coin to be produced for circulation in Britain since the tin farthing with a copper plug produced in 1692, and is the highest denomination coin in common circulation. The coin consists of an outer gold-coloured nickel-brass ring made from 76% copper, 20% zinc, and 4% nickel, and an inner silver-coloured cupro-nickel disc made from 75% copper, 25% nickel. The coin weighs 12.00 grams and is 28.40 millimetres in diameter.

The design itself was first trialled in 1994 when the Royal Mint produced a short run of demonstration pieces to the new bi-metal standard. These pieces were not for circulation and were simply intended to test the manufacturing process. The coin was technically similar to the version which eventually entered circulation with the Maklouf effigy of Queen Elizabeth II on the obverse and the image of a sailing ship similar to that previously used on the reverse of the pre-decimal halfpenny piece. The inscription on the reverse read ROYAL MINT TRIAL 1994 with an edge inscription based on the one pound coin which read DECUS ET TUTAMEN ANNO REGNI XLVI, meaning \"An ornament and a safeguard – in the 46th year of her reign\". The 1994 pieces were never legal tender but were eventually released for sale as part of a presentation set in 1998. At the same time in 1994 the Royal Mint produced a mono-metallic trial two-pound coin, with the same ship reverse and inscription, but otherwise similar to the earlier commemorative coins. These were never issued in presentation sets, and so are much scarcer than the bi-metallic version.

Because of technical difficulties, the 1997-dated coins, which bear the effigy of Queen Elizabeth II by Raphael Maklouf, were not released to circulation until June 1998 (the same time as the 1998-dated coins). 1998 and later dated coins bear the effigy of the Queen by Ian Rank-Broadley. The Maklouf-effigy coins bear the inscription ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA F D on the obverse; the Rank-Broadley coins bear the inscription ELIZABETH II DEI GRA REG FID DEF.

The reverse of the regular-issue coin, designed by Bruce Rushin, bears a concentric design symbolically representing technological development from the Iron Age, through the Industrial Revolution and the Electronic Age to the Internet, with the inscription TWO POUNDS above the design and the date below. It is worth noting that the design depicts nineteen interlocking cogs; due to this odd number, the mechanism could not actually turn outside a Möbius strip. The coin has the edge inscription STANDING ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS taken from a letter by Sir Isaac Newton to Robert Hooke, in which he describes how his work was built on the knowledge of those that had gone before him. \"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.\"