The complete ‘First Generation’ series, all of them the very first year of issue!

 

This year the new ‘Second Generation’ $50 note entered circulation, and next year the $100 will be released, completing the changeover of all five banknotes from First Generation to Second Generation designs. With that, the First Generation notes will progressively be withdrawn from circulation – it’s already difficult to find any $5 or $10 notes with the First generation design and the $20 is becoming elusive too.

With this important transition almost complete, now is the time to acquire the First Generation series. We are pleased to offer the whole set – one of every design – and each note is the FIRST YEAR of issue. 

 

The set is comprised of eight notes: the Bicentennial $10 of 1988 - the first Polymer banknote in the world, the first $5 of 1992, the colour changed $5 of 1995, the first $10 of 1993, the first $20 of 1994, the first $50 of 1995, the first $100 of 1996, and the Federation Centenary $5 issued only in 2001. 

 

This set brings you right up to date with one of each design of the First Generation Polymer notes, including of course the two commemoratives, and even the colour changed $5. 

 

The notes in this set are all in Uncirculated, un-used condition, and are presented in an informative book with the history and technical specifications. 

Polymer banknotes – Australia leads the world.

In fact, the development of Polymer banknotes is one of our nation’s great success stories. It took the Reserve Bank of Australia and the CSIRO over 20 years to develop the technology involving material science, the development of new inks, learning how to apply optically-variable devices (OVDs) to plastic and even building a secret printing plant in Port Melbourne. 

 

The path to their introduction as currency came in 1982 when the Governor of the Reserve Bank agreed to take part in a ‘blind test’ of paper vs polymer: the Governor couldn’t tell the difference, and so authorised a test note to enter circulation. That note is the now famous $10 Bicentennial issue, released in 1988. It was a great success and Australia began the move to replacing paper with polymer.  

Polymer banknote technology has gone down in history as one of Australia’s greatest inventions and exports and is a point of national pride. Today, they are used in more than 50 different countries, many of them manufactured here in Australia. 

 

The notes in this set are all in crisp as-new condition, and presented in an informative book with the history and technical specifications.