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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
 Posted - 07/08/2008 : 00:27:41
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This is a long write-up on a recent experience. Maybe some of you can explain this one. My penny runs at banks usually yield 20% - 30% copper. Some runs are exceptional on wheat penny yields and some are ~10% Canadian (no joke). My latest run had the Brink rolls in shrink wrap plastic yield nearly all zinc in a $25 box. The catch was there was maybe one copper penny per a roll with a few having 2 or 3, but the majority had one copper. I think one roll may have had a Canadian penny. The sigh of mild relief was while on the last four rolls, a 1951 wheatie came out of one. What kind of machine sort or scenario had 49 zinc pennies and 1 copper portioned per a roll? Maybe it was a huge zinc dump sitting in the hopper mixed with roughly 2% copper pennies? The 50 rolls were not much of a statistical pool, but most of the coppers were mid 70's with a 60's and maybe an '81 or '82 a few times. I was kind of upset a little and hope this is not a sign of things to come. Unfortunately, I did not mark the box that zincs came from as I had about $200 in unsorted rolls gathered in their boxes in the corner. Never thought that I could get skunked on plastic wrapped rolls in this area. I think I may know which bank it may have come from. If this happens again and it is one of my weekly regular bank penny pick-ups, I'll have to stop using that bank. Just not worth it at that point taking a chance on it happening a third time.
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HoardCopperByTheTon
Administrator
USA
6807 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 00:34:19
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You found my dump bank!!! 
This sort of thing has happened to many of us Jerry. I once got an entire shipment of 24 boxes of those zinc duds. This was a week after I had gotten an 8 box shipment of duds from a different bank 50 miles away. I actually made the mistake of cancelling my regular 8 box weekly shipments at the other bank. A few weeks later everything was back to normal. The few coppers you found were probably the result of some regular rolls getting mixed in the hopper with the big zinc dump. This is a good reason to weigh your boxes with a good scale. You can weed out the duds without even breaking the seal. |
If your percentages are low.. just sort more. If your percentages are high.. just sort more.
Now selling Copper pennies. 1.6x plus shipping. Limited amounts available. |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 01:04:44
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quote:
This sort of thing has happened to many of us Jerry.
Yeah, beginner's luck, lol. I have been doing the penny thing now for only about 2 months. The only other time I got skunked with such a sting was a bank branch nearby that I got a few machine wrapped rolls of brand new 2007 or 2008 pennies. I saw them as skunks as the teller handed them to me but I did not want to be picky as I was not a member of the bank and was trying to adhere to a simple etiquette. I was kind of upset at first but a few dollars of pennies is not hard to dump. (In retrospect, after reading posts here and seeing some of the nuances to coin collecting, I should of just set those sealed rolls of ~BU pennies aside as they would probably fetch a few dollars each some years down the road.) It is possible someone upstream of me ran a huge zinc dump. This will be interesting though. If I get another skunk or two from more bank nodes or my percentages of copper dramatically drop, I think I could see it as bureaucratic copper harvesting being ramped up. I may have to switch to nickels at that point. I still kick myself some over Kennedy half-dollar roll I thought I got skunked on when I first started this coin sorting thing. I dumped them all at a bank after finding no pre-'65 coins. I only learned lately that 40%silver Kennedy halves were minted 1965 to 1970. I think I may have let a few of those guys pass by my sort of the roll. The beauty of Kennedy halves is you can sort them in no time. The rub is you need to have plenty of cash on hand even if you find a good supply of them as a few rolls need not yield one 40% silver coin. |
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jadedragon
Administrator
Canada
3788 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 01:17:10
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| Then there is the day you find hand rolled and dated 100% copper from the 40s and 50s, or an entire roll of the 200th Anniversery of Nickel coins. |
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” – George Bernard Shaw.
Why Copper Bullion ~~~ Interview with Silver Bullion Producer Market Harmony
Passive Income blog |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 01:38:11
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I've gotten the 100% copper CWRs but with all 1960s and 1970s inside. I'd love to find any pre-1960 CWR nickels. I think you are talking about the 1951 one actually, right?
I've gotten a few 1955 with minor double die artifact. These particular ones actually crop up often compared to any other wheat of rarity/circulation (-ie- I get many 1944, 1945, 1956, 1957, etc. wheats for example, but seldom the teens and maybe some 1939 and 1929). One day soon I will have to histogram my wheats just for an idea of the distribution they may form. I am assuming that many of the dates I have not found are in a collection somewhere or just have not had their number come up yet in the coin search numbers game. Part of the fun of all of this is the unknown factor of whether you will find a key date by serendipitous luck being at a bank or change counter. |
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jadedragon
Administrator
Canada
3788 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 02:07:10
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| I'm talking about 40's and 50's Canadian copper pennies of course. Yes the 1951 Nickel and at about a buck a coin getting nearly a roll of them was very sweet. Also got some sorted kings in nickels in the same batch - 9 rolls in one block of pure old nickels. Sweet stuff. |
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” – George Bernard Shaw.
Why Copper Bullion ~~~ Interview with Silver Bullion Producer Market Harmony
Passive Income blog |
Edited by - jadedragon on 07/08/2008 02:10:54 |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 02:18:15
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| I still get jazzed when i find a pre-' 81 Canadian nickel in my Jefferson roll sorts. I really got jazzed when I found a 1954 one. Then I discovered it was chrome-plated steel and kept my thrill to the idea that it was a 1954 coin and OK. |
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knibloe
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1066 Posts |
Posted - 07/08/2008 : 21:53:55
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| I got a brinks box that was similar a while back. It had about one copper per roll. However, amlost all of the coppers were wheats. Some were older from the 30's |
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jadedragon
Administrator
Canada
3788 Posts |
Posted - 07/09/2008 : 00:50:09
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quote:
Originally posted by JerrySpringer
I still get jazzed when i find a pre-' 81 Canadian nickel in my Jefferson roll sorts. I really got jazzed when I found a 1954 one. Then I discovered it was chrome-plated steel and kept my thrill to the idea that it was a 1954 coin and OK.
The chrome plated steel ones are very rare in circulation. They were made to save nickel for the Korean war effort.
I maybe have a total couple rolls from thousands of Canadian Nickels sorted. I dumped over $1200 in 2000+ steel nickels in one dump just recently to give you an idea of # of coins sorted to get those few war nickels. So congrats - its a great find! Worth more then a common date .999 nickel is worth for sure. |
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” – George Bernard Shaw.
Why Copper Bullion ~~~ Interview with Silver Bullion Producer Market Harmony
Passive Income blog |
Edited by - jadedragon on 07/09/2008 00:50:50 |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/09/2008 : 09:53:29
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quote:
The chrome plated steel ones are very rare in circulation. They were made to save nickel for the Korean war effort.
I was pleased to see that I had the 1954 nickel in all its steel and chrome brilliance. It is only OK because there is a little tarnish/corrosion on it. I am thinking to ramp up my nickel sorting more now because they are easier to deal with overall but require more money per a coin, so there is a little trade-off. I like finding the Canadian ones too.
I think I may know which bank is the skunk now. My penny pick-up yesterday yielded the dreaded result I did not want. Another skunk, 100% zinc so far from the 10 rolls I sampled.I do not want to even sort more of them right now and just leave for last. I need to start marking pennies with some colored permanent marker to see if I get my dumps backwashed to me. It may be karma. I dumped $200 in rolled zincs at a branch of the same bank about 3 miles away. When presenting the 8 boxes of pennies, the teller said they would have to put them in a bag. My guess was they meant they would have to open each roll and dump the pennies out each one. Talk about rolling a boulder up a hill. My luck would have me getting back my dump as a payback. LOL. I dumped on a Thursday and the following Tuesday is when I got the skunk. No way they could put those pennies into the counting/wrapping facility and get them to another branch in less than 3 business days. I can just imagine a teller seeing me on the road riding my bike one day and cutting me off. |
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Copper Catcher
Administrator
USA
2092 Posts |
Posted - 07/09/2008 : 18:36:57
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| I too have run into the all zinc Brinks boxes. I steer clear and use another bank that does not use Brinks as a carrier. I also have re-checked later but still all zinc. I did luck out today and got $50 in customer rolled coins that had a bunch of copper. I also picked up a well circulated $100 red seal note I think it was 1966. Not sure if it worth more than $100 or not. Don't really want to tie up $100 either. Anyone interested? |
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PennehChaos.
Penny Collector Member
USA
269 Posts |
Posted - 07/10/2008 : 09:43:04
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i've gotten a bunch of those... the all-mixed-zincs are more common than the one-copper-per-roll boxes, but less frustrating... i weigh out the rolls individually, and if i've got a lot of free time and not a lot of pennies, i'll go through the single-copper rolls.
Even more annoying is that i've been getting quite a few Brinks boxes lately that will be all zinc AND short a few cents. They are not on my favorite people list right now. |
Considering Verizon Business service? Perhaps you'd like to consider a nice drain cleaner enema instead? |
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JerrySpringer
Penny Hoarding Member
669 Posts |
Posted - 07/16/2008 : 17:30:54
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| Told the skunk bank today I wanted to switch to nickels. I could see the "What the f...?" look in the teller's face. Watch, they give me rolls of BU 2008's. Perhaps there will be no silver war nickels in their boxes, but I won't be skunked again. Today I got my third zinc box from the bank. Weird part is another branch of same bank I have a regular penny pick up with produces a nice yield of copper and wheat pennies. Both branches utilize the same plastic wrapped rolls I thought but it looks like someone has made a major zinc dump/ bureaucratic copper separation. |
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Bizarre skunk penny run
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