The Copper Cent Thread
 

The price of copper is increasing. The news is that the mint may begin to replace the zinc/copper cent with steel. As of this post, one copper cent contains 2.54 cents of copper. APMEX is now selling rolls of copper cents (pre '83) for 3x face value. I think the time has come to seriously begin prospecting for copper cents in your change and at the bank, by buying rolls of cents to sort out all the coppers from the zinc and soon to be steel. This thread is for everyone to share their results in "copper cent prospecting".

I began about a month ago, and these are my results thus far:

$5 in pennies = 500 cents resulted in 114 coppers = 22.8% copper.
$5 in pennies = 89 coppers = 17.8% copper.
$10 in pennies = 217 coppers = 21.7% copper.

So far I'm getting about 20% or 1 in 5 pennies as copper. I'm sure over time this will decrease dramatically, as the word spreads about the future composition of the cent and the increasing copper prices.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

BTW... can we start calling it what it is - a "brass" cent? 95% copper alloyed with anything else (like zinc) is the highest quality standard of brass. It isn't real "copper" -- I learned that from my customers who were willing to pay me for "brass", but not for "copper".

When we were running here in Colorado we pulled out 22.5% brass. For a while we were selling the zinc cents for a profit also. I think that is what freaked out the mint.

I've still got two sorting machines for sale. They will do 50 coins PER SECOND. In a 40 hour week one machine will process 6,000,000 pennies. The trick is acquiring the raw stock and disposing of the zinc cents.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Compared with six months ago I'm seeing a lot fewer of them in the change I get.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I started my CRH career on cents till the bank cut ME off, then I graduated to silver and haven't looked back. Always have .24 when I dump, sometimes I get a copper from the teller but not often, I dumped twice today and got one each time woohoo LOL. Working on my second coffee can full now but its slow goin haha. HH Mark

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I hand sort. I am wanted to get a used handfed ryedale eventually...
Today I picked up $50.00 worth of unsearched pennies. I'll let you guys know what my rate is.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Couple days ago I found a penny in a parking lot.
It was a copper.
KA-CHING
Aruba here I come!:bull-buddy-icon:

But really, I do save them.
A massive wall may be built one brick at a time. :wink:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I went to the bank and got another $5 worth today, I can tell by the pennies at the ends of the rolls that there are coppers to be found. I'm not expecting to make a fortune finding copper cents versus all the zincs, but it's fun to do!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$5 in pennies today yeilded 117 coppers for 23.4%. One 1960 canadian cent and three wheat pennies all from the same roll, the oldest one 1920!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Are the wheat cents really worth much at all?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Wheats go for about 5 cents each.

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I use them plastic Folgers coffee cans- can't overload them ($31 FV) and they stack real nice. Mind you I'm just on my second can cause I quit sorting and just pull coppers from pocket change. HH Mark

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I use metal ammo boxes from the army surplus store. They cost about 5-6 bucks for the small ones.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Has anyone ever thought about hoarding nickels as well? The success rate is 100% and each one contains around 6.5 cents. Not as good of a profit compared to pennies, but I have been keeping all my nickels as well.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Question-

Do you think it's worthwhile to save the post-'82 pennies that are 95% zinc?

I'm struggling with the question of whether to keep the zinc pennies or to roll them up and return them to the bank. Any pennies that I returned would be used to purchase silver, so I'm leaning toward cashing them in.

The recent news that the House passed the bill to allow the mint to change the composition of pennies and nickels was the catalyst I needed to get my ass in gear, as far a building a stash of these coins before the public catches on. Although I doubt the general public has too much cash on hand to be sinking into stashes of copper and nickel. I don't think a bank will let you use a CC to charge the coins!

Any feedback on the zinc penny question is appreciated.:bull-buddy-icon:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sell them to whom?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Supposedly APMEX had rolls of pre-83 copper listed for 1.50$, but I don't see them on their site now.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Actually been saving wheaties for over thirty years, no great store, just the ones I've found in my change. Coppers since about three years ago. Again, no great store, just the change.

Nickels, same thing, about the last three years as they are also on the hit list. No sorting with them except for the war nickels.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Another $5 last night yeilded mixed results. Two rolls were brand new 2008 uncirculated, so nothing there, but there was one "jackpot" roll, with 8 wheat pennies and 6 mint state (beautiful red color) from the 60s. The majority of that roll was copper, so my total for all $5 was 87 coppers which = 17.4% copper, a bit lower than usual.

As far as the zinc pennies, I'm not too big a fan of the metal, so I'll be taking them back to the bank to buy silver. A large sack of zinc pennies doesn't do it for me the way a small stack of morgan or peace dollars does.

Also, I wouldn't sell the copper cents for at least a few years until the new steel cents are everywhere, because that's when the people will begin to see the value in the copper cents, and then I project you'll be able to sell all your coppers for 5-7 cents a piece. So keep all your coppers for now!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Another $5 yesterday yeilded 106 coppers, or 21.2%. One wheat penny, 1955. It's weird, I've been getting more wheat pennies than I would have ever thought from circulated rolls. I didn't think I'd be finding any, but there they are, almost every time I put down $5. It would be cool if I found an indian head cent, but I don't know if that will ever happen.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sorted $300-$400 in the past two weeks and have been averaging more than 25% from boxes and 30% in a couple.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Cool......my kind of thread. :rolleyes_m:

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i got about 8 bucks worth out of a box last week...maybe 6 wheats and 10 canada's

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I purchased eight boxes so far. I have only sorted two boxes, as I am busy fabricating a sorting machine, which takes time to create.
Average is 23.5% copper so far, with 4 wheats per box. Oldest I have found so far is 1918.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

sorted my first box ($25) which yield 28 wheats but only 13.5% copper and 4 canadians, fun nonetheless

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I always average right at 20% copper excluding the canadians and wheats. I don't think I've ever seen that many wheats though. I've found some very low date coins and some I have no clue what they are.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

yeah they were grouped in bunches probably coming from someones old change...5 rolls had about 90% of the wheats obtained

earliest date was a 1919

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm a nickel hoarder! I keep all my nickels from my pocket change and have been getting 3 to 4 rolls of nickels every week from the bank, when I cash my check. Maybe I'm just more aware these days, but it seems like I get fewer nickels back in change than I used to.

So far, I've not sorted my pennies, even with bifocals, reading the dates on pennies would be a real slow process for me. I've got a bunch of change that I'm going to turn into FRN's, then silver soon. I might give it a test run to see if I think it's worth my time.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$5 yesterday yeilded 128 coppers for a percentage of 25.6%. No wheat cents this time. At this point I have a pretty heavy sack of zinc pennies, which I plan on taking to the bank (a different branch than the one I've been getting my pennies from) to trade for green paper which I will then trade for silver halves at my local coin dealer. This money trading is sort of fun!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

You don't actually have to read the dates, just pull out the heavy ones. You can use a digital scale and save the coins that weigh 3.1 grams. You can also tape a thumbtack to the middle of a popsicle stick and stick a shiny zinc penny to one end. When you put a copper penny on the other end it will tip, and you save the coppers. After you have sorted out the coppers you can go ahead and look at the dates if you want to.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

How long did it take you to sort $25 worth of pennies and what method did you use?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$25 takes me right at 2 hours. I pour them out on a table in lots of $8.00 and sort into separate piles then roll.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Hey Saul,

I was wondering if you might be able to recommend a digital scale that it is sensitive enough to weigh the pennies? I don't need anything too fancy, so I'd be looking to spend as little as possible. Any idea what the price range is, and what type of store carries these scales?

Thanks in advance.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I sorted another $5 last night which yeilded 148 coppers which equals 29.6%, my highest percentage so far. I also got one wheat cent and three Canadian, all of which were pre-1982, but I don't know if the Canadian cents are copper or not.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I about crapped my pants the other day when I found a 1914-D wheat. I set it aside until finished sifting the pile. I checked the wheat cent value table and was elated to confirm that the 1914-D is valued at ~$130. I double checked the coin and discovered I had misread and it was actually dated 1944-D.

I occasionally turn up what appear to be old Mexican pennies. The back says something to the effect of "Uno Centavos" and the front depicts a long-haired woman who looks something like a man.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I got one at Ebay for $.01 and $12 shipping. It seems to work. Just type "digital gram scale" into the search box. I recommend Eveready E2Lithium batteries. They cost twice as much and last seven times as long.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Pre 82 Canadian are copper... in fact Canadian pennies through 1996 are 98% copper.

Here is a nice link for Canadian coin metal compositions, and years.
http://www.coinscan.com/technical/canasp.html

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Here is a table that I composed after testing sample groups of Canadian pennies and nickels (conductivity tests). I found that all available public information regarding Canadian coin alloys varied greatly (including the Standard Catalog of World Coins). In many years multiple alloys have been used.

(PS - This data was compiled from a sample group of 2,000 nickels and 2,500 pennies from the Toronto area.)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I agree that technically they are bronze, with 1.75% of the coin being Tin. by this logic should we call the US copper plated zinc penny..Brass??
If our US pre 82's were Pure copper core, with a 5% coating of Zinc, would they be Brass, or does it have to be blended to one alloy? Hmmmm.

Personally i refer to all pre 82 coins as copper and post as zinc, it keeps it simple for most. Good data by the way....Thanks.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

When I was selling to foundries I was corrected by them - they said that the 1982 and earlier cents were technically "brass". 95% copper content is the highest grade brass. Anything with a higher copper content is considered "pure" copper.

If I remember correctly, only the older wheat cents contained a significant amount of tin. I believe zinc became a more dominant alloy later before the entire cent was made from a copper plated zinc planchet.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

"I have way, way too many copper pennies! ...... only about 2.5 tons."

:rofl:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

i should have clarified, Canadian pennies 1.75% tin.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

So if you mixed in say 10% canadian "bronze" pennies, you could have gotten the "pure" price? Also what is the low end of brass, one could mix zincolns (someday) with "brass" pennies, and still make the "brass" grade but on the low end. I like this Ratio thing.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm not sure why you are being so antagonistic. We negotiated the sale of our product on the assumption that it would have a 95% copper content and 5% zinc content. In our first contract we got paid for both metals at 82% of LME close according to this ratio (even though a significant portion of the zinc was evaporated in the smelting process).

My only point is that 95% copper content was called "brass" at the foundry, and I was told it was the highest grade of "brass".

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

My intent is not to be antagonistic, and i'm sorry if thats how I came across. I'm merely bouncing ideas off you to understand the scrap process better. It seems all to often that the metals brokers are quite willing to screw people over, so if one can fight back a bit with "ratios" that fall into the window called "brass"
It sounds like you negotiated for specific content, and it appears you were dealing directly with a foundry, as compared to a scrap broker. I know too that you were operating on a different scale than most.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Bought 6 bucks worth of pennies at the wells fargo branch in the store today...

pulled a 1912 S in what looks to be probably vf condition... about 20 bucks?? SWEET!

:applause_:applause_

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Is it possible to sort the copper pennies out simply by color? I notice the pre 82 pennies are much darker than the newer ones.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Not reliable enough, IMO. There are some copper pennies that look new, and there are some zinc pennies that look old. Although you are correct that a majority of the coins are distinguishable due to their coloring, it is the 10-15% of the coins that are colored anomalously that makes the method impractical.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

This penny thing has me intrigued. Once you accumulate all of these coins what is your method of cashing them in. Are you using them exclusively as a future store of wealth in hopes of one day being able to melt them or is it more of a hobby? What is the long term strategy on these?

Thanks
Jeff

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

My strategy is to simply accumulate as much as I comfortably can in terms of storage and effort expended. I don't necessarily have an end-game in mind other than to watch the cookie crumble and be better positioned than the guy holding no copper.

All I can say is your local bank is handing out copper slugs at under half the metal's current value.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Better than free checking!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I agree. I just know many search Kennedy halves to cash them in for Gold once they have enough. I was just curious if the mentality is the same. I can not afford to shop the gold coins so I was looking for a fun way to protect myself without large cash reserves.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Also without me searching, which coins are the desirable? Obviously the wheat pennies but is there a target date on the pennies I should be looking for?

Thanks

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Prior to 1982.

(The 1982's were a mix; I wouldn't bother with them.)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The mentality is the same, however it is to a much lower degree. In 1965 when they pulled the silver out of circulation and started making clad coins, a dime (the lowest silver denomination at the time) actually held some purchasing power, which is why one silver dime today might make a useful bartering item in the future. A modern copper cent in reality does not hold any purchasing power by itself; only in large amounts of copper coins would it ever. You will not be successful in bartering copper cents, as it would take so many of them to get anything in return. However, if copper continues to rise in price, and you can get one for a measly $.01, then collect them and hold on to them until you can find a way to take a profit.

At least, that's what I'm doing. In reality, I don't know what to do with my growing jar of copper cents, all I know is that they're worth more than face value, so I keep them.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

All it took was for me to see people actually paying 2.50 plus shipping for a 100 rolled pre-'82 pennies on eBay for me to take it seriously.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

apmex.com sells pre-1982 LMCs as copper bullion.

http://www.apmex.com/Category/378/Ce..._the_Roll.aspx

Today they are selling a $50 face value bag for $129.99, no numismatic value just copper bullion value.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$1.50 = 150 copper pennies per pound. Current copper is $3.60/lb....thus 360/150 = 2.4X Face on a spot basis.

90% Junk silver......0.715 ozt / $1FV.....thus, each $0.10FV = 0.0715ozt....using $17/ozt.....0.0715 x $17 = $1.20.....so a dime is worth 12X Face on a spot basis.

($0.10 x 12X) / ($0.01 x 2.4X) = 50....so the spot value ratio between 90% junk and "copper" pennies is:

50 Copper Pennies : 1 Silver Dime . This is the fair exchange rate between silver and copper.....so, you do not have to have too many pennies to make reasonable change for silver.

1 Penny Roll = 1 Thin dime.

Copper may outperform silver going forward....it is getting very expensive to mine and refine copper...and it is in record demand as the third world modernizes....you may one day see 10 copper pennies worth 1 silver dime.....just like the old days!

"Barter World Money Math"

1 ozt gold = 50 ozt silver
1 ozt silver = 14 silver dimes
1 silver dime = 50 copper cents

I predict the future will be:

1 ozt gold = 25 ozt silver
1 ozt silver = 14 silver dimes
1 silver dime = 20 copper pennies

A dime will buy about what a $1 buys today...and a copper penny will be about like a nickle.

A copper penny is 1/10 of a troy ounce...for a reason!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Some fuzzy math here. First, pre-83 pennies are not copper, they are brass 95/5. To sell as scrap copper, it needs to be 99% or better. So pennies are not worth 2.4xFace, I don't know what scrap yards are paying for scrap brass, but more than $2.50/lb would surprise me greatly.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Whatever dude!

Not too much fuzzy math.....we don't even factor in the 10% copper in 90% junk either....we are just talking ballpark comparisons....I think i even used "copper" in a few places in the calculations. We were not taking scrap values in any of the calcs...we were using spot values ignoring 5% zinc in the penny and ignoring 10% copper in the silver dimes....

Scrap metal dealer is not the correct price for the 95/5 "copper" anyway...sell directly to end user like caster of brass metal products....can get roughly 85% to 90% of spot....I've done it with .999 fine Canadian Nickle.

If you were going to scrap the 95/5 pennies...you could add a little copper to get to #1 grade copper....or you could add a shload of zinc pennies to bring the average down to the minimums for #2 copper. When the day comes that pennies can be scrapped...they will have their own class and scrap value.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I got a little bit of a surprise last week as I was sorting some pennies. I got $5 worth of pennies from my local bank. These pennies were all in shrink- wrapped plastic rolls, which I presume to be from a commercial bank of some sort. Well I sorted the first roll, and to my consternation, there was not a single copper cent! So I assured myself that this was just a statistical fluke, and that the next roll would be laden with copper. No such luck. Another skunk. So I went through the entire $5, and it was nothing but zinc.

So I wanted to enlist the opinions of the veteran penny sorters on GIM about the significance of my experience. First, does anyone know which type of operation uses the shrink wrapping for rolling their pennies? I assume it's a commercial operation. And if so, does this mean that some banks are now starting to sort out the copper from the zinc? If this is the case, then we better start hoarding with a lot more zeal, because the gig may soon be up. The only other thing I can think of is that maybe some of the coin sorting machines that the banks have in their branches for customers to use end up with the plastic wrapping. That way, a single customer could have accounted for the copper picking, as opposed to a financial institution.

I really hope to get some feedback on this post, because it's potentially huge news if the banks are starting to sort out the copper.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm definitely no expert, but I will say without doubt that your 10 rolls were sorted. I have gone thru only 40 to 50 rolls and have never come up empty in any of the rolls. I think finding only 2 copper pennies in a roll was the worst I did. I didn't keep track, but I would guess that I averaged about 7 or 8 copper pennies per roll.

I have seen that shrink wrapping you mentioned before, but that was a few years back and I am not sure where they come from.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The shrink wrap is likely wrapped by Brinks....they use the plastic.

The banks are not sorting.

You got the results of someones zinc dump....when we hoard copper pennies...the zincs must be returned...it is not uncommon for someone to dump several hundred dollars in zinc at a time.....those make their way back to the coin wrapping company....you get all zinc.

This is uncommon, but happens.

I've hoarder over 5 tons of copper pennies....and dumped over 12 tons of zinc. I've dumped as much as $800 in zinc at a time at one bank.

This copper hoarding game will not last....if you want in...better do it fast.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

A) I mark my rolls so I cannot mistake the "good" for the "bad" (thank you, Gersham).
B) I have never hit a 100% zinc roll. I have often been surprised at the volume of wheat and/or general pre '82 coppers. By inference, I have never met one of my own rolls.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thanks for the feedback to my post. Ruprick, your explanation seems to be spot on, and given your experience sorting, I think we all must defer to your expertise!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

So where are you guys dumping the zinc pennies? There is a coin machine in my local grocery store but they charge 8 9/10 cents per each dollar. Seemed like a strange charge but unless it is free it's not worth it. I do not know of a free machine around. Do you guys know which national banks offer these or if there is a place that offers this service?

Thanks,
Jeff

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

OK, I wanted to post an update regarding my experience with shrink-wrapped plastic rolled pennies from Brinks. In an effort to tap into a different batch of pennies, I went to a completely different bank and got $5 worth of pennies that were shrink wrapped. The result- 6 measly coppers!

So, being very discouraged, I decided to visit yet another local bank, to tap into yet another batch. Got $5 worth, and the result is even worse this time- a mere 3 coppers!

These are 3 completely different banks, yet it appears to be consistent that the coins I'm getting from Brinks have an abnormally low count of coppers. What is going on here? I can understand an occasional batch that yields low counts, but this seems to go far beyond any statistical aberration. It seems to me that the copper is being sorted out by someone on a large scale. Ruprick stated that Brinks was not sorting their pennies, and the fact that a few coppers were found seems to support this. But someone is doing some large scale sorting around here.

So my conclusion is that the copper is starting to dry up at an accelerated pace. I'm pretty new to this sorting thing, but I generally expect to find 20%-30% copper when I sort. The numbers I've been seeing lately make it not even worth the effort to sort, IMO.

So is this just a regional anomaly for my area, or is this a sign of things to come?

Again, I would appreciate feedback on this issue from Ruprick and any of the other penny-sorting veterans on the site.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I got a call on July 3rd from the coin manager at the Denver Brinks location. He said, "I've got $80,000 in COPPER pennies sitting on the dock, and I was wondering if you wanted to buy them."

Short version: Brinks has upgraded their equipment nationally and has started to sort out all the copper pennies from the coins which they process on behalf of Coinstar. Coinstar sees a future market to resell these for a profit while at the same time cutting back on the amount of coins that they have to deposit with the bank (and therefore incur banking fees).

After a couple weeks of phone calls I ended up speaking for some time with the Chief Counsel at the US Mint. Basically, the ban on melting/export is still firmly in place. Despite rumors that Jackson Metals in Ohio was purchasing these coins from Coinstar and melting them under "special permit" from the US Mint, I was assured that all applications for special permit have been declined. The mint's chief attorney told me that the ban on melting/export/"treating" would continue until the following two conditions were met:

1. The US Congress grants approval for the mint to make cents and nickels out of an alloy of their choosing (They favor a bill introduced in the Senate recently by Wayne Allard -- #1986 if I remember correctly).

2. They MUST be able to make a penny for less than $0.01. Even if they switch alloys they are not convinced - given the current inflationary environment - that another alloy would bring the cost to under $0.01.

If both of these conditions were met they would lift the ban as soon as they were producing the new alloyed coins.

I probably shouldn't be sharing so many trade secrets, but as far as I can tell it is game over for my company, Pincher Processing, because Brinks, by upgrading their equipment, just cut me out of the chain.

BTW... coinstar is currently sorting out 3,000,000 copper cents PER DAY (5 days/week) in conjunction with Brinks nationally.

One more thing: The reason they wanted to sell me that $80,000 stack of copper cents is because their (Coinstar's) inventory is getting too large while waiting for the ban to be lifted. They wanted me to tie up capital in the waiting game. Coinstar does not "deposit" the copper cents, but they are held by Brinks as "inventory" on their balance sheet.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Coinstar won't charge a percentage as long as you take payment on one of their approved "shopping cards". Whether or not this makes sense depends on where you shop.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I know wells fargo does it for free, but my old dump spot, bank of the west, just discontinued theirs. I'm not a member at either btw, so I don't think you should run into non-member fees

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

It looks like time is short for copper cent hoarding! Honestly, I didn't think it would happen so fast! I bank at Wells fargo, and I usually net a good 25-30% copper from the rolls I get from them, plus they have machines in some of the brances which count your coins for free, so I can dump the zincs back in.

By the way, I chanced upon two rolls of nothing but zinc, but they were brand new 2008 cents, uncirculated.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

still getting a decent 16-18% in my area as of yesterday

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I should add that Brinks has been doing this with silver coins for some time. They have just retooled to cull copper at this point. If I understand correctly, Brinks as a company "buys" any silver coins they sort at face value then smelts them as an added profit. (Brinks is merely a custodian of all the coins they process -- they do not own the coins.)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Wow, if this is true it's the biggest news to date for hoarders, me being one of them. I've debated buying a Ryedale sorter as I thought there would still be plenty of time. Guess not. Im running about 28% here in the Detroit area.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm not the sort to yank chains. I spent most of 2006 sorting out 100 tons/month from the same coins Brinks is now sorting in Denver.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thankfully, C.H String and Sons services banks in my area. I don't know if the coin servicer is by region or by bank. I do know the 3 different banks I have seen the factory rolls they were CHS&S.

FYI, I did a rough calculation using some info on the internets and concluded that there should be roughly 168 Billion Copper Cents out there in some shape or another.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Assuming that is a true number, if I was running all ten of my stations for 5 days a week 8 hours a day I could sort out 13,500,000 brass cents per week. This would mean that it would take my facility 12,500 weeks (240 years) to sort them out (assuming that the zinc cents are not reintroduced into circulation and also assuming that people have not lost/thrown away any cents). Also, those 168B brass cents would total 550k tons of copper.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

http://www.mountainviewcoins.com/min...coln-cents.php

I dumped that into a spreadsheet and removed entries 1982-2005 then summed the column and got 167,205,xxx. I rounded up that number because 1982 was mixed in copper and zinc lots and there were enough pennies made in 1982 to believe 800 million were coppers.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Pennies don't stay in circulation very long. I have a feeling that the amount in circulation is probably 1/2 or fewer than the mintage numbers -- just a hunch.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I agree. I intentionally worded my statement to avoid any confusion that the number was representative of actively circulating pennies. I'd say a few billion lie at the bottoms of lakes, oceans, sinkholes, etc. Several billion have been forever destroyed as well, I'm sure.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I know at least 150,000,000 have been. :D

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

SLV,

Thanks for confirming my suspicions regarding Brinks' sorting of copper pennies. This is a major development in the copper hoarding game, a development which I didn't think we'd see quite this soon. I know I'm going to increase my efforts to get 'em while you still can, at this point.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I have a feeling (after speaking to other industry insiders I'm not at liberty to disclose) that Brinks jumped the gun on this one because they were eager to charge Coinstar another fee. Coinstar right now is trying to limit the amount of capital they have tied up in "inventory", so we might see them smack brinks down and halt the culling process. Just a hunch. I think there is still a window of opportunity for hoarders.

BTW... I still have 2 high-speed sorting machines for sale. When I say high speed I mean 50 coins/second.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

SLV

Thanks for the "update". I'll have to start taking more of my zinc "dumps" to the coinstar machines. I'ts limited to how much I can do, as I refuse to pay 9% for dumping. I have used their affiliation program with Circuit City and Amazon, to get free counting, but even then you only need so many gift cards.
Note to hoarders, avoid brinks boxes, get the coins before they go to the "fed". Buy customer wrapped rolls, or buy loose coins from redemption machines in bank/credit union lobbies.

Ryedale

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Does anyone know which type of institution turns out the machine-rolled pennies that come in paper wrappers? These rolls have been yielding 'normal' results for me, as of late, in contrast to the plastic shrink-wrapped rolls.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

CWI Coin Wrap INC. http://coinwrap.com/



Coin Wrap, Inc. was founded in 1979 by our family that has been involved in sales and services of coin handling equipment for over 65 years. Our many years of experience led us to believe we could devise and operate a cost-effective coin wrapping operation of any size expressly for customers like you.
Our first operation started in 1979 and was located in Wilmington, Delaware, handling Brooks Armored Car Service Inc.'s needs. One good idea led to another and in the years since we have grown to operate thirty-five offices nationwide wrapping over 400 million rolls of coins per year.
We currently employ a 150+ member service team, with East and West Coast Operation Managers, along with Regional District Managers who visit all sites on a bi-weekly basis. Upon request, we will send you a list of customers which you may contact for references.




Look for a CWI number on your boxes and it's probably from one of the Regional centers. I just purchased a $25 box in Marquette MI and it came from CWI #39 , gal a the bank said they were from Wisconsin. Normal ~30% yield of non-zinc coins.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Most local banks don't mind selling $50.00 bags off their counting machines as long as they don't use cotton bags. Talk to the branch manager and he/she will probably even give you a call when they have a full one. It will save them on a processing fee. However, most banks get only 1-2 bags/week.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thanks for the response to my question, Ryedale.

BTW, has Brinks been buying any of your sorters?:bull-buddy-icon:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Normally I will get $5 a week in pennies just to sort during the week to weed out all the coppers, but the past few weeks have been quite slim...

$5 two weeks ago yeilded 72 coppers for a total of 14.4%, and $5 last week yeilded only 48 coppers for a total of 9.6%!!! These are by far the worst two weeks I've encountered, I wonder if it's all the big players starting to remove large quantities of the coppers, or if it's just a fluke. I'll be getting another $5 today and we'll see what happens then.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Could you not sort with a magnet, or can you only do that here in the UK?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Works in Canada to a degree, but then you have to still sort the zincs from the brass. Doesn't work in the USA.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sorry this response is so late... haven't checked this thread in a while.

Brinks has not bought my sorters. They are not buying any commercial equipment. They engineer and build their own equipment. The sorters I've seen are well over 10' tall and make a terrible racket, but they are fast.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

so lets say i have 100 of pre 82 pennys and melt them down what would i get for the block of copper at the scrap yard, about $2.50 per 100 ? if this is right do i have to melt them to get the scrap yard to take them ?

so pre 82 pennys are copper and whats the deal with bronzes what years are they and what are they worth if i have 100 of them ?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

82s are brass and even some 83s (they changed over mid-year). They aren't pure copper (even as pure as electrical wiring - it is only 95/5). You can expect to be offered 60-80% of the spot price here: www.kitcometals.com. I haven't shopped local prices lately, but I'd expect @ $1.10 per pound -- less than the face value of the cents (147 coins/pound).

BTW... it isn't that easy to melt brass cents. Not only is the temperature hard to reach with garage tools, but the process itself is very toxic and dangerous.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just to clarify....the 1982's are both 95/5 copper and the 97.5% zinc variety. In 1983 it switched over to zinc completely. So anything 1981 and before is good, but you need to check the 1982's (I use a digital scale 3.0-3.1 grams is copper, 2.5 grams is zinc). Hope this helps.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Yeah, I was hoping <SLV> would amend his post to reflect the correct dates, he was a year off.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sorry... I am corrected -- mid year change in 1982: http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint...ion=fun_facts2

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

so if your a scrap yard hound its not worth it yet. at what price point will the copper be worth more then a cent ?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I have a brick of pre-82's, but that's it. Sorting was fun. I found quite a few wheat pennies, too.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

It is today at $0.0103

http://www.coinflation.com/

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sure. Try to find someone to pay you plum price. You'll be hard pressed to get more than 80%. When I was delivering 22 tons/week we were only getting 82.5% of nearest LME contract.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Anybody else here still hoarding copper pennies ?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Still hoarding here.....but less than before.....at one time i was putting away about $1000/mo......now just a few hundred/mo.....but I have a postition at 6.5 tons right now.

It is the only "safe" cash I have.....figure the metal makes it inflation proof (once you can melt them...) and the face value makes them deflation proof.

Last year i did not lose one red cent on my hoarded cents!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

" I didn't lose 1 red cent".

I bet a lot of people wish they could say that about their mutual funds, ira's and 401k's.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

In case of a burglary I doubt you have to worry about thieves making off with a few ton barrels of pennies, either.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Right.....better bring a fork truck.....55 gal oil drum = 2000 lbs = $3000 Face Value.

That said, 7 tons = 7 drums.....does not demand that much storage space.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I tried to pick up $100 in pennies from my local bank, and they wanted a 24% "service fee"!

You can keep them, for that price. :452:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

That is insane... unless you don't hold an account there. The bank I have an account at lets me have as many pennies as I ask for although they have had to put me on hold until they got as many in as I was looking to get. They were weirded out at first but got over it and even held a few boxes at the teller desk so they wouldn't have to make a trip to the vault everytime I came in. I haven't sorted in a while though, I've found more productive uses for the time. The dump bank I used rarely questioned the dumps (I roll them before dumping) but upon the few times I was quizzed I just said I had come into possession of a very large amount of pennies and was occasionally rolling them up to get cash which was much lighter. It isn't lying and they are happy with the story.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I still hit the bank for $5 in cents every now and then - my daughter likes to play with them as I sort em out.

I might mention - back when copper was soaring - it looked like suddenly and without warning lots of copper cents were being removed by large players. If you ever think you would like copper cents when the price of copper goes back up, now is your chance. Get them now before the price of copper raises permanently above what it costs for minting the coins.

Always hoard copper pennies...
 

The copper penny is the 1 coin to hoard. You may also consider the nickle coin but only after you've a ton of pennies.:bear_w00t:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Yes the noble copper cent has a lot of potential.

Not only do you have the potential up-tick in the price of copper, but you also have the potential numismatic value.

In a $50 face value bag of cents, you have 5000 potential lottery tickets !

Any one could be a big winner.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

There's an easier way to tell...

Flip a penny in the air. If it is copper, it will ring with a nice "tiinnggg." If it's not, it will just be a dull sound.

So, 1 ton = 1 drum? So, how much would that cost, face value-wise, vs be worth, melt-value wise???

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

1 ton = $2,925.91 (plumb - not accounting for wear)
1 pound = $1.47 ($1.463 if plumb)

I'm not sure about 55 gallons = 1 ton. We used collapsable material bins lined with nylon bags to move our product. I think the bins were about 40"x42" interior dimensions and we would fill them about 18" deep to get a ton of brass cents. That would be @ 17.5 cubic feet, and that converts to 130 gallons.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Yep that way works too if your hearing is sharp. Mine isnt the greatest so I would rather not rely on sound. Especially considering some coins have gunk or dirt all over them so that could change the way it sounds upon landing. My method is easy, and it's 100% reliable and valid.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

APMEX does buy CU Pennies. In bags of 5000..
I called.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

What's their current buy price? I have seen these listed on their website from time to time but dont recall what their buy/sell prices were.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Ok found their sell prices:

5000-count bag 1959-82 $109.99
5000-count bag 1909-1958 $239.99

No buy prices listed....

http://www.apmex.com/Category/638/Cents_By_the_Bag.aspx

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

If I remember correctly it was $75 per 5000 count CU penny Bag.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

ok so i how have $78.66 pennies from 1981 and older but i'm really sick of this 1 penny at a time looking at each date... is there a trick that is faster or easier ? any help would be great.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Keyword Ryedale. Hope you're ready to spend around $600 for convenience.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

www.ryedalecoin.com

Current lowest cost model looks to be $499 delivered. Sometimes there are sales....

I've got an extra machine with very low miles (nearly new) that I may sell/trade....for $350........PM me if interested. I bought it as a spare.....but never needed it......they are pretty durable.....I have one machine that has processed over 4.2 million coins = $42,000 to date.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I am getting close to filling up a five gallon water bottle with copper pennies. Does anyone have an idea of the face value in pennies that fits into a five gallon container? I'm guessing that it must be over a hundred buck's worth. Thanks for any help you can offer on this question.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

About $250 ......my 3.5 - 4.0 gal pails hold about $200.

It takes about $1.50 in pennies to make a pound.

Just put it on the scale and multiply pounds indicated by $1.50 for total dollars in the jug.....less the jug weight....

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

If it's a glass water bottle, be careful the bottom doesn't fall out. I've heard that's fairly common.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I don't doubt Ruprick but that is hard to believe. A box of pennies is $25 so we're talking only 10 boxes to fill a 5gal jug? Seems like it should more than that. I'm envisioning them stacked 3 deep and 3 high with one top of the pile and that fitting inside the dimensions of a jug all rolled and standing on end, seems they would really go smaller when laying flat on one another. Hmph.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thanks for the input, Ruprick. I was just looking for an approximation, so knowing that it's around $250 is good enough for me. Nice to know the the $1.50/lb. figure, but I don't own a scale.

And note to AGcollector- it's a plastic bottle!

Sorted $10 today and got 27% coppers. It also yielded one dime and and a 1941 King George Canadian cent.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

It is deceptive....the rolls/boxes are very dense.....once the coins are loose....you can only get about $20 back in a $25 box.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I still grab $10 every time I hit the bank - I've been averaging just over 20% for coppers. I've got about a dozen large cloth bags from the mint waiting to be filled up with coppers and put away - have filled about 7 so far.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just out of curiosity what kind of hoarding does one have to do to constitute buying a Ryedale Apprentice?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I wonder that too...I'm not sure on the price of that piece of equipment, but I would imagine it runs around $400. I guess from a business standpoint, you would have to sort and then sell quite a few copper cents to get to the break even point. At one time last year, people were selling $50 copper cents for about $85-$90, so you would have had to have sold about $500 face to break even on the Ryedale. That's not too bad I guess. I prefer to handsort though since I am a collector and a hoarder, so I look for varieties and wheat cents.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Machine costs $499. Right now it takes a little more coins to pay off the machine. But when copper pennies were selling for 3-4 cents each you could pay for a machine withing ten hours of running!! LOOK AHEAD TO THE FUTURE!!
Hoard now while you can

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Good point...I guess the cheap/frugal side of me came out in my post, but you're right it could pay itself off quickly with a little work. :36_3_12:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm a copper cent hoarder.

But I have to confess that I haven't done much sorting.

I prefer to pay somebody else to do all that by buying copper cents on ebay.
I get them delivered to my door already sorted.

It just seems like too much time,trouble and gas expense getting cents from the bank, sorting (either by hand or machine), then returning all the zincs to the bank.

Of course I miss all the fun and profit of finding old customer rolls containing 100% wheats !

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

2cents how much are you paying for copper cents?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

i dont sort as much with copper being in the toilet...i toss the coppers into a bucket but i havent did a box in almost a year...i imagine you could get the coppers really cheap on ebay right now.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

DO NOT try to move the glass jug filled with pennies, usually it results in a huge mess. I've heard of many people grabbing the bottle by the neck, picking up (with great effort) and the bottom of the bottle stays on the floor while the sides/top break off.
Depends on the thickness of the glass, but at least beware of this potential.
Good luck

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I've posted this before but I will post again. I use 660-count sportscard storage boxes that I get for around 35 cents each at the local sportscard store (you can buy on EBay too of course). They hold 2000 copper cents easily, they stack nicely, and are sturdy. I've stacked them 4 or 5 high on the floor without any of them collapsing or getting crushed. I'm not sure how high they would go since I am not a big time hoarder like others. :bear_tongue:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

It's a plastic jug, but thanks for the concern. I think it should hold up pretty well to be being moved around, although I've got to be careful not to drop it on my toes!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just make sure the plastic doesnt become brittle from the weight or heat or many other things

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I haven't been buying a lot lately.

But I think you can get sorted copper Lincoln memorials delivered to your door for between 1.5 to 2 cents each including shipping on ebay.

I think you can get BU AU Linc mem cents, sometimes rolled by year, for about the same amount if you watch bay auctions a lot.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

If I had a 100 face bag of sorted CU Pennies where would I sell it?
I know APMEX buys, but I think they want to buy more to make it worthwhile.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

ebay seems to be the only gig.....right now copper is too low....and ebay fees are too high....hoard now = sell in the future.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

There are plenty of buyers if you know where to look. I sold $500 face of copper for $650 this past weekend to one of my local dealers. He knows I hoard copper and wanted to start investing in copper himself. Also if you vist realcent.forumco.com there are plenty of buyers there. Also im sure apmex would be more than willing to buy just $100 worth of pennies

But like ruprick said now is the time to hoard instead of sell. So buy a ryedale and start sorting! You will have a lot more than $100 face for sure. Its very addicting!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I have a question. Is it generally better to roll your sorted pennies, or is it ok to just leave them in a container? Say your intent is to eventually sell them when copper prices go up. Could I sell by the pound?

I'm mostly doing this in my downtime from half searching, and thinking about buying a ryedale. I've pulled $25 or so from various banks, and went through $200 so far. Seems like the copper counts in my area are already around 15%, which seems to be under the average that others have reported.
I gotta get moving.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I don't roll my coppers, there's plenty of time for that later, if I choose to do so.

And yes 15% sounds extremely low. Perhaps your percentage will go up after you've sorted more. Otherwise I'd guess there are probably several other hoarders in your area. My average is around 25%.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

i keep them in this jar
http://cgi.ebay.com/Perfect-Solution...3A1|240%3A1318

and it keeps a current count.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Some people sell them by the pound, and some sell them by face value....it just depends on your buyer. I find it easier to store them by face value since I know exactly how much I have, to the penny.

15% is definitely low so either you have others doing it in your area, or your small batch was just bad luck. Dont get discouraged...my box yields sometimes vary as much as 10% from one bxo to the next.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Since the weight can vary slightly from coin to coin (especially with Canadian cents which were minted in several different weights), I prefer to buy and sell by the pound. That way there is no guessing as to how much copper is actually changing hands.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

thanks for the input guys :)

For now, while I'm small time, I'll probably just reroll them and put them back into the $25bank boxes. Compact storage, easy to ship.

Then I need to decide if I'm going to up the volume... the g/f's already going nuts with the stuff I already have in the living room: the thousands of halves bundled & rolled, the huge bucket of zinc pennies, etc. She'll probably freak if she comes home and sees me feeding pennies into a ryedale. lol

The CWR produce a lot better counts for me. The bank rolls are terrible. Generally have only 5-10 coppers per roll. Guess more testing is needed.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Where is the break-even point for scrap copper vs.face value for pennies? The last time I had to buy #1 copper ( 4/1/09), my buy price was $2.00lb.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just did this on another forum. Using Coinflation's numbers, the copper content in US pennies is worth one cent when spot is $1.54/pound. This doesn't include the value of the 5% zinc.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The one thing I've learned about piles of coins and my significant other is, "out of sight, out of mind". There might be a big pile of pennies in the closet but as long as she doesn't see it, I don't get flak :)

Though 15% is low, your sample size ($200) is rather small. If you go through larger quantities, it should go up.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I've been lucky the last couple times I've grabbed $10 in pennies from the bank.
81% and 84% copper,it sure saves time on re rolling the zinc's.

Note: I'm in Canada and our ratios are higher then the states



The worst I've done is 35% copper.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Nice ratios! You should be grabbing more than $10 at a time!!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Found my oldest wheat penny so far the other day, a 1918 in pretty decent condition.

And today I had the pleasure of a single roll that was 100% coppers. I'm going back to that bank to see if they have any more!:ok:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

This may sound like a dumb suggestion, but I did this myself:bear_tongue: I'd find 10 copper pennies in a 50 cent roll and think of it as 10%, when it was really 20%.

I usually range 20 - 30% a roll (10 -15 copper pennies)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Naw, unfortunately mine really is ~ 15%. The average so far is easily under 10 per roll. The worst rolls have only 3-5 in them.

Thought about it, and I'll probably keep sorting pennies on the side, and not scale up "production" unless my half dollar box source runs dry. Especially since my return is only 60% of what everyone else is getting (15%/25%).

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Picked up $ 8 worth of pennies from the bank

I finally got my 1st George V Canadian cent today
a 1929 original Canadian small cent.

also got three Wheaties in the bunch and a 2 Eurocent and a Barbados cent.

Todays ratio = 62%

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Today I pulled a 1920 Canadian penny out of a roll. It's a king on the front, and the back is a different design from the maple leaf that's been used for years. Pretty cool. Not in fantastic condition, but not horrendous either. That's what I find enjoyable about sorting pennies- you never know what will turn up in a roll.:smile:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

You guys with HIGH percentages really need to get a Ryedale! You could make a lott money fast!

Also the guys with the lower percentages should but a Ryedale too, would save a lot of time!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

If I had high percentages like that, I probably would. I considered it, but as it stands right now, it kinda doesn't make sense for me to spend that much on a ryedale. I could convert $125 face of 40% halves, which took me 2.5 months to find into cash. But would it really make sense to drop $500 for it? ($350 or whatever if I could find it used)

Damn, I just got 2 boxes of $25 pennies. I'm looking through the peepholes, and it looks like the entire things are 2006-D BU pennies. lol

Looks like this thing is worth some money. $78 shipping included on ebay. 3x face, which is worth more than if it was solid copper. It will easily be $50/box after shipping & all fees. 100% return on investment. Maybe I should go back to the bank.

http://cgi.ebay.com/SEALED-BOX-50-BU...QQcmdZViewItem

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Bleh, so I ended up pulling the trigger on an used ryedale apprentice. Someone was selling it for $300 on ebay - $30 MS cashback = $270 investment.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

If you get a Ryedale, start stocking up on the bricks on pennies, because you'll fly through them! They're fast machines, and well built. And don't forget to keep the machine clean. I've seen a couple Ryedales, and the ones that were working flawlessly after having sorted thousands of dollars in pennies were the ones that were cared for and treated well. I think there's some kind of special lubricant you're supposed to apply every once in a while. Best read the owner's manual.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The lubricant is called Dri-Slide also known as Bike Aid (same product) Its best to apply some every 75-100K sorted

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Current rate for copper pennies is 1.5 cents each. So to make $500 you would have to sell $1000 face. Lets say you average 25% copper. You have to sort 400,000 pennies (which really isnt a lot) You can sort 18,000 an hour. Total time to pay for your machine 22hours! Now what were you saying about 2.5 months:tongue_ma:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

2.5 months, but that's only including the 40% halves, which I consider to be "junk". It's far easier to hawk off halves on someone. $1000 in 40% halves is probably worht $4000 and weighs 50 lbs. But $1000 in pennies is worth $1500 and weighs what, 650lbs? I've averaged roughly 60 toz of silver per month for the past few months, at an average of 10-20 silvers total per box, some of the better boxes pay out more. April looks like more of the same. I'm at 30 toz of silver so far.

Pennies is something I'm doing now along with halves, as it makes sense to ask for a box or two as I'm searching for halves. Also, I have 8 bank branches that I have membership within 1/2 mile of where I work. So it's not costing me extra to drive around out of my way to accumulate boxes of pennies. And as I mentioned earlier, my rate of finds is nowhere near 25%. I'd be happy to average 10 coppers per roll. So as long as halves keep paying out, it makes sense to do pennies as an "added value". If the halves run dry, then I'm better off going all out on pennies.

But yeah, it'll be good when I accumulate a good amount of copper pennies. Copper prices is at $2/lb right now, and I can only imagine how much they will go for on ebay or other bullion vendors if copper goes higher or the US gov removes the ban on melting.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$1000 face in 40% halves is worth $2000-$2500! Not sure how you come up with your $4000 number.


HAHA yeah copper pennies weigh a lot more. $1500 actually weighs more like 960lbs


10-20 silver halves per box everytime???? Thats like 7-10times the average of MANY people on many forums.....


Yes, its going to be amazing to watch copper prices soar in the coming years. I hope they redo the penny and let the melt ban expire in 2010, since its up for reconsideration than

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

4x face = the price it's been going for on eprey. Might be lower now that the POS dropped into the 12s. Havent kept up with it recently, although I know the price of 90% went down from 12-13x face to around 10x - 11x.

If I use eprey prices, should probably use them for pennies as well. I think those can be sold for 1.8x-2x, which is higher than your figure, although there's not many sellers right now.

If I was getting only 1 per box or whatever, my enthusiasm for halves would quickly fade I imagine. But these boxes have been surprisingly consistent in their payoffs. For coppers, I'm going to have to work 60% harder for the same amount as some of you guys. Win some, lose some.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$0.50 X 4 (4 times face) = $2.00

Ill sell you all the copper pennies you want for 1.8 times face!

Well if your getting 10-20 per box and thats consitant. Than I would find a good dump bank and than go through as many boxes as you could a day. No where have I ever heard of half dollar boxes being that consitant. Not here or the other 2 forums I belong to. What part of the country are you from?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Ebay tends to have great prices for sellers, but maybe not so great after fees/shipping. There's one seller who leaves the wheats he finds in his $25 bags. He pulled $65-71 shipped on recent auctions. Auction#300305968277 My goal is to accumulate a decent hoard, then get a feel for making some $25 listings/bags on ebay. That way, if copper pops by a lot, I'll be ready to sell.

I'd rather not say where I'm from. I posted some of my prospecting finds from boxes in the other thread over the past couple weeks.

The interesting thing is that as I was pulling boxes, the main vault teller has told my bank branches that they ran out or have to delay shipment of the halves a few times already. My theory is that they're pulling boxes from another vault and periodically running out & restocking. So I really can't pull these boxes as fast as I would like to. The "excess" orders either got delayed or cancelled. Based upon conversation with a branch manager, that bank doesn't really provide branch banking business in my state anymore (maybe just provides vault service & handles business clients). So I've been getting all these older boxes that have been collecting dust for years, and that have a lot of silvers in them.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$1000 face 40% should be around $4000; maybe you were thinking of 1000 40% halves as being worth $2000?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Melt value of $1000 face in 40% halves is $3774 at the moment.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thats what I ment. In his orignal post he said $1000 in halves is worth 4k. I am just used to talking in face value so I guess thats why I put that.

Yes $1000 face is worth around 4k

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Milestone reached for me- I finally topped off my 5 gallon container of coppers! Not bad for a hand sorter.

Today I pulled a 1910 wheatie out of a roll. That is my oldest one yet.

I think I might be coming down with a slight case of copper fever!:biggrin:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Well I went to the bank today to make a deposit and asked for more rolls of pennies. I guess this was the last straw for one of the tellers and she asked me what in the world I was doing with them.

I explained I was pulling out all the copper ones. She muttered under her breath, "And that's why they are making them out of different materials now." I told her that is precisely why I was stocking up on them now. Then I said, "It's kind of sad that the metal content is worth more than the coin itself." I got laughed at by another teller who overheard the conversation and some other customer who was listening. It didn't bother me that much. I have fun doing it.

I pulled out a lot more wheat pennies than usual today. One was as old as 1919. I freaked out a little bit because I thought it was a 1909 wheat penny. Still pretty good numbers about 35% copper in each roll and one that was 50/50. Still pretty confused on the 82's. I drop them on the floor and if I hear a piiiiiiiiinggggggg I toss them in the copper pile. If it goes dunk, dunk, thud I put them back in the zinc pile.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Great!

What is the weight again of a full 5 gallon bucket of Coppers?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The Godfather laid out a roadmap that you can rough some math on:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

AND THANKS RUPRICK!

I knew you had it broken down somewhere to an EXACT science!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I must confess to buying a couple boxes of pennies over the weekend. One box had 5 wheaties the other 4, coppers still running around 20% here. Don't know how long I will continue, but likely I will buy a box here and there till I fill a few more coffee cans. Definately not the most fun CRH, and certainly seemed a waste of time dumping but its all part of the game. HH all, Mark

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

By my estimations (I don't own a scale) the full weight is around 200 lbs. with about $300 face value.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just recently started separating copper cents from the rest. Canadian pennies have a higher %(98%) and were produced longer (till '96). So over the last 3 weeks of checking my change, I am averaging over 50% copper. I took out a couple of rolls last week when I got my change rolls for parking, and the ratio was closer to 60% copper. The main variable is that over the years the Canadian mint has used different weights of pennies, while keeping the same % content copper. This means that each roll has to be weighed to determine the weight of copper.

Haven't really seen many nickel nickels.

Just more metals to put away.:coolbeer:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

You Canadians sure drop off a lot of your nickels in the states. I have found a whole bunch in our till at work. All of them have been pre 1981. I am in Northern Minnesota so I guess I find a little more up here. I am now actively putting aside all of my Canadian currency into seperate bags. I have no idea why but I think some day a couple hundred in Canadian might go a long way.

People at work think I am absolutely insane. I was giving them a lecture the other day about a 1964 Canadian nickel.

I said, "This is worth 4 cents U.S., 5 cents Canadian, and almost 6 cents in metal content." Another guy at work asked, "Errr what's that mean?" To which I replied, "It means hold on to it, it has a lot of upside potential."

I am also saving all of the copper pennies and dumping in all of my unwanted zincs into the till.

I wonder what Canadians say when they find U.S. money? It's worth about 25% more than your own isn't it?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Quite a few (including myself) just keep it until we head south for a trip. With the majority of our population being withing a couple of hundred kilometeres of the US/Canadian border, this tends to happen on a regular basis.:coolbeer:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I've been averaging 1 wheatie per $10 of pennies up here in Canada.

I'm pretty sure that I now have Copper fever,you spend $10 and you get 1000 chances at finding old or rare coins.
Time to go get more pennies. :)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

This is weird but I got 3 wheaties in the past 3 days ALL in transaction change.

1 a day! Last one this AM!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Picked up $10 worth today.

One roll was a bank roll of 1980 pennies,you got to love it when the roll says 50 cents COPPERS.:biggrin:

One of the other rolls is an uncirculated roll of 1964's in the original Canada Bank of Commerce paper.:5_1_120:

I think I need to find out if my bank has any old rolls of pennies hiding in the vault.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Its funny , but I'm starting to receive more and more old pennies and change in general at the conveniance stores. My theory is that coin collections are starting to get raided for beer and cig money.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

So my 1st 10 rolls of pennies turned out to be 100% coppers. :biggrin:

Must of been from someones penny collection?

1 roll BU 1961
1 roll BU 1962
1 roll BU 1963
1 roll BU 1964
1 1/2 rolls BU 1966
1 roll BU 1967 (my birth year)
1 roll BU 1968
1 roll BU 1969
1 roll BU 1980

and one of the 1966 rolls had 17 1958 D wheaties in it along with two of the oldest(1920) Canadian small cents

The other $5 bunch yielded 50% coppers with one 1942 wheatie.

Definitely going back to the bank tomorrow.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

^

Probably someone's old collection. I've gotten $25 like that before. 9/10 were coppers, no wheats. Tons of AU/BUs.

With the bad economy, A LOT of older coins are reentering circulation. People need money to survive. Your chances of getting silver/copper are higher now that it was before. of course ymmv.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Picked up $5 yesterday,four of the rolls said U S on the side.

Total of 17 Zincolns out of the 4 rolls with 61 wheaties.

Got my 1st 2 1909 VSB's, one of them seems to be a coin press error.

To bad they didn't have an S under the date.

Also got an uncirculated roll of 1967's 1968's and 1974.

and my 4th George V penny a 1932 :)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

YOU GOT 61 WHEATIES! out of 5 rolls?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

You're lucky bro. I'm over $2k searched since last month or so. No 1909.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Not sure if it has been mentioned since I havent read through all 5 pages of this thread but here's a thought. Since people are willing to pay 1 cent for pre-1982 US coppers, what about paying 1 cent for 1996 and earlier Canadian copper cents? They have a higher copper percentage (98%) than US copper cents. Two of my local dealers will sell them at face value and let you cherrypick through them.

I have done that for pre-1982 Canadian nickels too. They are 0.999 pure nickel (versus cupronickel like US cents) and can be had for face value as well so these can be a good buy for those that are using them as hedges against inflation or expect the value of metals to go way up.

Oh and there is no ban on melting Canadian cents and nickels here in the US either.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

These are Canadian coins. Bright ones are the return, dark are 98% keepers.

Canada surrenders the booty nicely

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Out of 4 rolls.:biggrin:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Now this seems like a fun hobby! I've been living over in the UK for the past 3 years but we're headed home for good in August so I think I might try to start playing the find the copper penny game when we get back. I went and grabbed our tiny bag of US coinage from our last trip home (maybe $4 worth of change) and found about 25 pennies inside. Out of those 25 pennies, to my surprise, 7 of them were pre-82s! Additionally I found a silver nickel in the bag too.

This seems like it could be addictive.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

You GIM'ers got me going on this prospecting!!! My first ever box of pennies yielded:
10 wheaties
6 Canadian coppers
~30% US coppers

This seems a bit low compared to others who have posted, but is this pretty typical?

HH

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

$25 box

9 dimes
10 canadians
8 wheaties

roughly 30% cu with some hand rolled rolls yielding in excess of 50%

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

My last $25 box yielded me 78 George the sixths and 8 George the fifths.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Plus considering the current exchange rate, converting us dollars into Candian coins makes good cents. :wink:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just for the record:

150 US Coppers per pound = $1.50/lb

Roughly (due to 5 weight variants over the years) it takes 164 Canadian cents to make a pound = $1.64CND/lb.

Excahange needs to be 1.00 USD = 1.10 CND to make it as economical to CND as US. It is about 1USD = 1.15CND these days.....over the past 3 years the range has been 1 = 1 to 1 = 1.35 .....was sweet hoarding CND at 1.35 exchange rate.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

The stuff dreams are made of! I've had some impressive results before from some customer-wrapped rolls, but I had my best-ever score from a batch of plastic-wrapped (Brinks) pennies. I went through $5 and my results were as follows:

'59-'82 Coppers- 408
Wheat- 11
Canadian Coppers- 12
1947 Canadian King- 1

Total keepers out of 500 pennies- 433!

If only every sort yielded such percentages!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

So guys... what are the best copper pennies that I have a chance to find while I sort?

I sorted 10 rolls tonight and found 3 wheat pennies and 102 regular coppers. Relatively speaking, that is a good night of sorting for me. I pulled this info about valuable pennies off the internet: 1969s double-die, 1970s double-die, 1972 double-die, 1995 double-die.

I think these are rare, but I might-as-well keep my eyes open since I'm sorting them anyways... So, what do you say? What are the pennies that you look for as you pull out the copper? Please let me know.

Thanks, Jake

:5_1_120:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I found a 1998 and a 2000 with a wide space between the A and M on the back. I know the 1999s with the spaces are worth a lot. Are these two worth anything?

I just past the $40 dollar mark in copper-- my wife thinks I'm nuts. I go through about 8 dollars in pennies a week. I know it's nothing compared to Ruprick but it's something...

BTW, I know the 98 and 00 are zincs but I ran into them looking for copper.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Here's a site that provides a guide for varities, including yours:

http://lincolncentresource.com/priceguide.html

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Pretty much alot of the stuff on here: http://lincolncentresource.com/Top50.html

Of course I pull out the wheats no matter what, coppers, the occasional Indian Head, foreign coins, and the occasional counterstamped coin (regular penny with some kind of design that looks like it was engraved or stamped on the coin - most of the ones I find are either of states or of John F Kennedy for those Kennedy-Lincoln coincidence cards)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I've been searching rolls of pennies the last couple weeks and I thought I'd post my percentages.

$130 in CWR

2660 Cu
20.46%

28 wheats
0.22%

$55 Plastic Wrapped Bank Rolls

974 Cu
17.71%

14 wheats
0.25%

Total Cu Percentage: 19.87%

Seems a little low compared to other reports I've read. Not complaining, I can live with close to 20%.

What kind of numbers have others been seeing lately?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

My last $25 box yielded me 85% Cu. Took me 5 minutes to re roll the Zincs.

My copper stash now weighs more than I do.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I struck a vein of wheat gold!

I suspected the box was destined to be a good one when the teller told me that I was 'lucky' to be getting the box because she had the foresight to ask the head teller for an extra box of pennies before the head teller left for the day. By the weight of the box, I could also tell that it contained plenty of CU. I still haven't finished the box, ($5 left), but so far it has yielded an astonishing 284 wheat pennies. Many are in quite good condition, and there are plenty of earlier dates as well (teens and twenties). Also among the prize were several '43 steel cents that were in excellent condition.

It's 'veins' like this that keep me motivated to continue mining copper from the US money supply!:10_1_20::bull-smile:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Finished sorting the last $5 from the box and it yielded another 66 wheats and one more steel '43 cent. Total number of wheaties for the box- 350!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Raoul Duke: "What kind of numbers have others been seeing lately?"

My Cu percentage is holding tight at about 32% with 11-12 Wheaties per box. No JACKPOT boxes yet, as all 30 or so boxes I've gotten have been pretty much the same.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

28% in S.E. Michigan

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

58% in Western Canada

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Drool is running down my chin! I don't keep an overall count, but I tabulate the percentages from each sorting session. I'd have to say that I've been averaging close to 30% lately. Prior to the last few months, I'd say 25% was my average sort. So it looks like there's more copper coming into the penny supply than before.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thanks for all the responses. My percentages in southern cal are clearly low in comparison. I guess I'll have to double my efforts!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Don't forget that us Canadians had copper cents in circulation up to 1996 as opposed to American coppers being discontinued part way through 1982.

Hence the higher Cu %age.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Rough estimate, how many Lbs. of Cu do you think you got?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I think I'm pretty close to the 400 lb. mark. One-fifth my way toward a ton!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Is this you??

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Well I'm a quarter Scottish, so I guess that could be me!:biggrin:

No such problems with loose pennies all over the place. One five gallon water jug and and a bunch of half-gallon juice bottles contain my copper quite well at this point. And believe me, my stash is paltry compared to many around here. Ask Ruprick about his stash sometime!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

greetings GIMers,

So I have been sorting an old stash of pennies the last few days. So far Ive filled a 1 gallon container with clad + a little extra and a 32oz container about 3/4 up with Cu, as well as about 50 wheats....

anyway heres my question: I found about 20 Cu pennies that are "proof-like" in appearance, meaning they are very shiny with no blemishes (one as early as '59)....are these pennies worth any extra to collectors?

Also, im sure this has been asked before but here goes....Now we are all hoarding these Copper pennies but to what end? Since its illegal to melt US currency are we waiting for the pennies to be discontinued or a new currency or what?

thanks guys happy searching!!!!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

To answer your first question - no those extra shiny cents aren't worth anything to collectors. The redbook says a 1959 in MS-63 condition is worth $0.20. Unless you're going to spend money to slab those coins to verify their superb condition, it's just one cent. To answer your second question - doesn't matter that you can't melt them down, you can still sell them when the times comes for a premium above their face value depending on what copper is trading at.

For the record, my current copper yields are currently around 22-25%, with two or three wheats per box.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I use numismedia.com to get more up to date numismatic pricing. For the coins he was asking about, he can find them here broken down by grade (assuming he has some knowledge of coin grading).

http://numismedia.com/fmv/pricesms/l...icesfull.shtml

He might be able to sell them for a very small premium individually, but he might be better off trying to fill the blue Whitman books with BU cents and then sell the collection that way.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I picked up a box of pennies today and managed to get a 1919 D Wheatie in good condition.Ten more bucks to sort tomorrow.

I could sell it and pick up two more rolls of pennies from the bank.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'm curious what you guys think about an idea I am now very seriously tossing around as an addon to my existing scrap gold/silver/plat business:

1) Buy a Ryedale
2) Sort $5000 face in pennies per week
3) Sell the coppers on eBay, forums, etc.

Assuming roughly 20% copper, and that I can clear 95% of the copper value when I sell (?) this seems like an easy $800-1000 per week.

Am I missing something here?


I went into BofA today and asked about ordering $5000 face in pennies. One of the tellers kind of laughed, but they said they would order them if I wanted. The logistics would be a nightmare, but as long as there is no fee, it's free money.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Yes, this assumption is false:

I can buy sorted cents all day long for about 30% under the melt value. I am able to resell higher because I then classify them based on quality, package them uniquely, and market them. But I am not moving very large volumes.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I'd suggest that your projection is overly enthusiastic and is likely off by about three orders of magnitude. Also, your definition of easy and my definition are drastically different.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Guys, thanks for helping me sort this out.

(ok, that was really lame, I just had to say it)

:565:

I was looking on eBay, and it seems like all anyone is selling there are wheats. No simple bulk rolls of 1909-1981s. So I couldn't gauge price there.

There are on outlets where you can sell them for close to melt? (CoinHunter, what about the forum you mentioned? Do they usually go for close to melt there?)

It's sad, considering that unrefined gold and silver - even highly impure 10K gold - rarely ever go for < 100% melt on eBay... often more.

If I could hire some bodybuilders to haul the coins to and from the bank, it would be a piece of cake!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

There are tons (literally) of copper pennies on eBay. Try this search:

http://coins.shop.ebay.com/i.html?_n...&_osacat=39482

eBay prices are typically the highest out there.

You can check out my website to see how I sell them (www.coppercave.com).

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Not very encouraging.

:(

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just keeping up with all the auctions and fees and dumbasses you'd inevitably encounter would make it not worthwhile for the piddling returns.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Well, scratch that idea.

I was for some reason under the impression that there were lots of willing buyers lining up somewhere to buy it between 90%-100% melt.

:bawling:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Now is a good time to hoard them, not necessarily a good time to sell. Get them at face value. When copper hits $5+ a pound, or when the melt ban is lifted, or when percentages in circulation fall to 5%-10%, I expect the prices to jump.

On the other hand, my copper sales have been the highest over the past month than ever before. Pennies only account for a small portion of that though.

You can sell them in bulk, even in the current market, and make a 20% - 25% return, but it is a lot of work. It's a limited market, but it's growing.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Pulled my first "Indian Head" cent this weekend, a very nice looking 1904. This particular box also had 16 Wheaties, but a below-average 29% copper keeper rate, but I'm not complaining, that Indian made my day.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Way to go finding the IH

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Been getting over 5lbs of copper per bank rolled box around here. There's typically a Canadian (1935-90) or a wheatie in every other roll. I've found some dimes, euro's and even Swedish and Denmark coins in them. Also came up with a very corroded but visably date 1890 Indian head as well as a 43 steel the other day.

Here's a shot of what came out of the last bank rolled box i did. That jar had about 50 (95%) pennies in it before opening the new box.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Good advice, Nate. Question for all who sort, from what you're seeing, what is your average percentage for pre-82? I wonder when the overall percentage will fall below 10%?

I wouldn't think it would take more than a few sorters in a given area to make the percentages really low!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

lol, yeah. My friend and I have cornered the market here in town lol

We get about 30% +

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

31.2% keeper rate here including 12.4 Wheats per box. I think it will be a looooong time until we see only 10% coppers in circulation. Keep in mind there were tens or hundreds of millions of these minted every year for a century now.

You would think that, but I doubt it IMHO. The big-time hoarders with the Rydales and the small army of hand-sorters (like me) is probably a small dent in the massive number of cents in circulation or sitting in coin vaults. This is definately NOT a get-rich-quick scheme. Most of us probably do it more so as a hobby and for the occasional cool find like an Indian Head or semi-key date Wheat.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Here are 2 of my better finds so far:
Left: 1904 IH, probably grades as a G-4, worth about 2 FRN's
Right: 1909-VDB Wheat, probably grades as a VF-20, worth about 16 FRN's
:ok:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Wow, both really nice finds.
It's amazing what a little find like that can do for morale!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Wow, finding a 1909-VDB in circulation has got to be rare!!!

On a bright note for myself, I was at the bank today and decided to pick up two rolls of cents to sort later, and one was a SOLID roll of wheat cents! All 50 in a hand wrapped and marked roll, solid wheats! Woo hoo! :23_30_104:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

That's a rarity!

I thought I did good when two of my rolls were all coppers.

How many rolls did you pick up a that time?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I've only once received a solid roll of Wheatie's,it had two 1909 VDB's in it.

My last $25 box yielded me one lonely 1946 Wheatback.

and wouldn't you know it,it showed up in the last roll in the box.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Funny story, I wasn't planning on getting any, but the line at the bank was long and I thought to myself it might be fun to grab a few rolls to search later that night. I got two rolls of nickels and two rolls of cents. Like I mentioned above one roll of cents was solid wheats, and BOTH of the nickel rolls were also hand wrapped and all of them were pre 65 nickels, which doesn't mean much because their metal composition is the same, but I managed to fill some holes in my Jefferson nickel folders. I'm going back to the bank on Monday, to grab some more and this time I'm going to grab some dimes and quarters too.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

At the bank today - no luck with the dimes and quarters, but got three more rolls of solid wheats and three rolls of all coppers from the 60's and 70's. I guess I found someone's stash of old wheats and coppers that they simply turned it for a few bucks. I'll take em!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Very cool! One in many thousands of chances of that happening.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Got a 1943 steel US wheat penny in my change last night at a Canadian store. It's amazing what you find when you're actually looking at the change you receive.

:beer:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

So true. I had a '41 nickel in my pocket change yesterday. Surprising that it has been circulating for so long! (Looked like it, also.)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Has anyone done a large penny sort recently? It seems like for a long time the yield on copper pennies was consistently in the 20-25% range. At some point there should be a noticeable decline, but I haven't seen much evidence of it.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I haven't seen any evidence of declining copper percentages either, but I've only been hand sorting about $100.00 per week for the past 7 months or so.

I get most cents in boxes where I live, the Cu rate is consistently right around 32%. Where I work (in a different state), a bit lower, 28-29% from $50 bags and a very occasional box (banks and tellers are much stingier here). In the end it all averages to 31% keepers.

IMHO, the decline will never be noticable unless you are keeping stats over the long haul for many years. If eventually the Cu rate gets low enough that it's no longer worth the effort, by then we'll all have a nice hoard anyway.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Last box I sorted was about average for a $25 box of pennies in Canada 42% Cu

1 - 1943 steel wheatie + 5 other wheats
4 - George VI's

and my 1st 2009 LP's 3 LP3's :)

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Still 28% here in S.E. Michigan....been that way for 3 years.....seems hoarding is a drop in the ocean.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

OK, I ran a little model. This post is not for the math-phobic.

I started with penny production in 1945, post World War 2. (The assumption here is that pennies minted prior to 1945 make up a tiny fraction of current circulation.) I accumulated copper pennies, taking into account an annual attrition rate of 2%. By 1981, there were 130 billion pennies in circulation, all copper.

Then I added half the 1982 production as copper, half zinc.

Starting in 1983, I introduced only Zinc new pennies, and continued attrition to both types by 2% annually.

Then, I assumed some type of low level copper penny hoarding starting in 1990. For copper, I increased the attrition to 2.1%, and increased it by 0.1% for each subsequent year, while maintaining the zinc attrition rate at 2%.

This method yields a copper ratio of 23.2% in 2009, which I think is a reasonable estimate. Then I used the method to extrapolate the ratio out for another 30 years of slowly increasing copper hoarding. Using all these assumptions, the copper yield should drop to about 10% in about 15 years. Here's how the ratio changes every five years using this projection:

Yrear..Copper....Zinc
1980... 100%.....0%
1985... 74%.....16%
1990... 56%.....44%
1995... 43%.....57%
2000... 33%.....67%
2005... 27%.....73%
2010... 22%.....78%
2015... 18%.....82%
2020... 14%.....86%
2025... 10%.....90%
2030..... 7%....93%
2035..... 5%....95%
2040..... 3%....97%

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I was just taking a look at copper's meteoric fall and rise over the last two years. It went from $4 to $1.30 (-68%) in just 6 months, from June to December 2008. Since then, it is back up to $3.47, which is a 167% rise in a little over a year.

I noticed on coinflation.com that zinc pennies have the 3rd highest metal to face ratio, after copper pennies and nickels. That got me thinking about the copper-zinc price ratio. Here are the peaks and valleys in the ratio over the last 5 years:

Date $Cu $Zn Ratio
Jan05 1.45 0.55 2.6
Apr06 3.95 1.70 2.3
Nov06 3.05 2.05 1.5
Feb07 2.45 1.40 1.8
May07 3.35 1.80 1.9
Aug07 3.35 1.40 2.4
Dec07 2.95 1.05 2.8
Jun08 4.05 0.85 4.8
Jan09 1.30 0.50 2.6
Jan10 3.47 1.21 2.9

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I hand sorted $10 worth of pennies last night and netted 17% Cu pennies. I only found two wheaties but two of the rolls contained a dime so I'm not complaining :).

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Anybody hoarding unsorted cents, i.e. copper and zinc ?

Is there any news on whether the cent will be discontinued and taken out of circulation ?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I don't know if I'll ever save unsorted cents, maybe a few boxes as novelties once they formally announce a change. As for news on discontinuing or changing the composition of the cent, there's talk that it might be a part of the 2011 budget, but no formal announcement yet.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Found my second Indian Head. It's not a looker, but has some purple/blue tonning and real character. I'm calling it a neat "specimen".

Pulled it out of a box that had 30+ 2009 Pennies!

That makes this penny 112 Years Older than the others in the same box!

Fun stuff!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Nice snag! I've been sorting LC's for over 30 years and have yet to find an IH in the wild. Send some of that luck my way please.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Wow, no kidding!

Yes, I'll spare you a little luck. ;) Funny thing is that I found it while on the phone with a good friend whom I got into sorting....he's addicted now. I swear anytime I call him and am sorting good luck comes my way either while on the phone or shortly thereafter. He now has over $600 FV worth of copper pennies since starting less than a year ago! That's by hand at a grandpa's pace too. He has found 2 IH as well since then also and get's quite a bit of pleasure out of it. It's also great for his PTSD and anger problems.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Just finished another box by hand.

Netted a bag of Cu bigger than a baseball, 2 wheaties and 34 - 09 Lincoln series pennies.

It's fun pulling those 09's out to make up for a smaller average of Cu.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I think I'm going to order a box also.

Nice to hear about the 09s- I want to get some more .

Wow that is a low yield of Wheaties. I usually pull 2at least 2 in 5 rolls

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

I know, it's not like it was up north. But I know the 09's aren't being found like they are here. That makes me feel a little better! lol

Edit: Hey just noticed it was actually 3 whole wheaties I found!!! :OP

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Here's what the results from one box look like.

A few pounds of Cu plus some 09's

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Any LP4's?

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Only 1-2 per box so far, none in this last one.

Getting a few more boxes soon.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Currently sorting through a box of pennies...

Only averaging 1 Cu penny per roll!

My last boxes 4 boxes from the same bank yielded 25-30% as have the $5's worth I've grabbed off and on from various other banks in the area.

This is crazy! At least I'm pulling some 09 series pennies, about 14 so far.

Just had to vent and let someone know!

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Hey Newmisty,

What's the deal with the 09 pennies? Should I be keeping them? I figured they would be pretty common after a while. Am I missing something?

Thanks, Jake

:bulride:

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Well, the way I see it is as follows.

These 09's aren't getting any newer and won't be found in circulation any better than right now so why not plan ahead and pull them out now while they are in the best shape of their lives.

Many I pull are at least AU so why not just throw em in a bag and have something that is already in demand to hang onto for the future. Personally I am pulling the ones that aren't in great shape out as well and sticking those in another bag. There's plenty of room for them and I don't see them loosing any value beyond what they already are.

I've pulled several rolls (au) worth out already while hunting for Cu. Doesn't take any extra time and makes the prospecting process feel more worthwhile and meaningful too.

Re: The Copper Cent Thread
 

Thanks Newmisty. I see where you're coming from.

By the way, copper hit something like $3.50 today. Nice!

:clap2: