Gene, you said:

IMO, listing it as a "Manufacturer Sample Chip" is a very misleading term.
There is no doubt it was made by someone else from 2 chips.
I have several different examples of 2 sided coin inlays put together by someone.

IMO, it should be listed as a fake chip.

Please know that I did not list the chip on ChipGuide, and if I had, it would have been listed under the "Odds and Ends" category. Even if made by Bud Jones, it would not have been as a "sample" chip. Changing the location of the chip into one of the pre-labeled categories on ChipGuide is easy enough to do, but when posted by another Admin, a discussion does often takes place and a consensus is made as to what category. I am sure that this discussion will come up and I suspect that commentary to this thread will have a bearing.

Again, I have no way of knowing the circumstance of this chip, but just as it could be doctored from 2 different chips, it could also be a mistake (or floor sweeping) from the Bud Jones factory. As I said before, to figure it out, would more than likely require a destructive process, and even then, the real story may not be revealed.

When looking at the scan provided by Charles Davis of the Sahara chip, one can see how simple it would be to take 2 different chips, machine out the weld through one side of both of the chip's CICs and take the two remaining good sided CICs and re-weld or epoxy them together with the ring in place.

On the otherhand, it is simple to also imagine the Bud Jones factory area experiencing an errant CIC to get mixed in with a batch of other CICs and just become one of the many pieced together chips and welded. Or perhaps two random selected CICs were used to "test" the welding station.

I am not saying that either is the case, I'm just saying that either is possible.

Jim