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deleted
146 Posts |
 Posted - 11/30/2006 : 22:10:17
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Poll Question:
A while back on this forum, I proposed hoarding zinc and copper pennies in case zinc went up as well, and because WTSHTF, batteries made with zinc are probably more in demand than the electrical and electronic applications of copper.
Sure enough, zinc did go up and now *all* pennies are worth more than their face value. Now there is a reason to hoard both copper and zinc.
The question is, which ones do you hoard?
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"The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens." -John Maynard Keynes
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pencilvanian
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2209 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 15:33:27
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| I am hoarding both types of pennies since they both are worth at least their face value, and because I am too lazy to take the zinc to the bank. |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 16:27:22
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Same here, I hoard the zincers too. Zinc is on the move even more so than copper right now. When this site started I suggested hoarding the zincers too. I was into zinc before zinc was cool. 
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If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 21:13:47
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Since pennies are not making a profit for the Treasury, it is safe to assume that pennies days are numbered.
If and when the penny is no longer produced, the metal / numistmatic value will be decoupled from the legal tender value.
I cannot predict the future price of copper or zinc or the future ratio of the two metals, but I can say a couple of things that I am confident of.
1. The legal tender value of a penny will hold down the metal value until the penny is no longer produced.
2. Once legal tender value is decoupled, the metal value will become common knowledge.
3. Pennies are a good buy right now.
4. Pennies will almost certainly gain in value.
5. It will be VERY inconvenient to distinguish between pre 1982s and post 1982s.
Therefore, so long as copper and zinc are in ratios in the single digits, ie less than 10:1, I predict that these pennies will be treated as similar.
Therefore, I see little reason to sort them and send back the zincs. I prefer to purchase and hold both.
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 22:44:27
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Atheist,
You got me thinking. When the scrap dealers start to buy the pennies they will be buying in huge bulk. It makes sense to me they will have machines that will sort out the zinc from the copper. I have to wonder if it really makes all that much sense to sort huge amounts of pennies now? Just getting them should be the priority now.
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If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 23:17:20
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I went to the biggest scrap yard in the entire San Francisco bay area (4 million + inhabitants). THis place was HUGE. He didn't have any means of separating pennies other than having human beings look at the date on each individual coin.
He could of course weigh the lot and accept or reject the lot based on the weight, but I can do that much math, too.
He has a machine that can tell you what each individual piece is, but he can't separate out large lots.
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 12/02/2006 : 23:23:27
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Yes, weight in relationship to volume would be an easy way. I was thinking though that with all the tons of pennies out there someone will come up with an industrial machine that will sort them.
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If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
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n/a
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/03/2006 : 00:01:42
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Necessity is the mother of invention.
You foresee the need. Are you an engineer?
I imagine that the pennies could be dropped off a converyor belt into a vertical "chimney" the chimney could be hit from the side by a blower. The lighter zinc pennies could be blown to the far side while the heavier copper pennies would tend to fall more straight down.
I can imagine it, but building it and fine tuning it into a real working machine is much more difficult.
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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Cerulean
Penny Hoarding Member
USA
993 Posts |
Posted - 12/04/2006 : 07:45:40
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quote:
Originally posted by Atheist
Necessity is the mother of invention.
You foresee the need. Are you an engineer?
I imagine that the pennies could be dropped off a converyor belt into a vertical "chimney" the chimney could be hit from the side by a blower. The lighter zinc pennies could be blown to the far side while the heavier copper pennies would tend to fall more straight down.
I can imagine it, but building it and fine tuning it into a real working machine is much more difficult.
Not quite. You've got the right idea by separating by weight-related physics, but the blower isn't the best approach. Consider if the pennies are hit by the blower edgewise versus directly on the face of the coin. Geometry has more influence than mass.
My idea has been to use a ramp on which the coin is rolled edgewise from rest. The ramp terminates and leaves the coin in freefall. The time to the ground is the same, since each weight of coin will project the same windage area. But the heavier coin will travel a different distance from the base of the ramp than the lighter one. With a sufficiently large apparatus, one could position two bins to catch each weight of penny. I suspect such a ramp would need to be several feet tall to be effective. |
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Metalophile
Penny Collector Member
USA
320 Posts |
Posted - 12/04/2006 : 10:40:23
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Here are a couple of crazy ideas for automatic sorting of pennies that I have come up with:
#1 - Depends on the frequency of the penny ring as it falls on a surface. Rig up a machine so that pennies slide down a slide and land on some standard surface, (a ceramic tile seems to work well to my ear). Then rig up a microphone attached to a computer. Now, you'll either have to find some software to do the following, or do some programming: Using a Fourier Transform, convert the time-domain sound into a frequency domain spectrum. Run through some known examples of copper and zinc pennies. Then you'll need some kind of pattern recognition software to recognize the frequency signatures of the pennies. You'll also need a digital I/O card or USB device because when a copper penny is identified, you'll use the digital I/O device to send a signal to activate a solenoid to kick the penny into a copper bin, and some other means to kick into a zinc bin. Weakness: If there is a bit of dirt or corrosion on a penny it can alter the frequency signature. Also, need a way to line the penny up with the solenoid(s) so they can be kicked into the bins.
#2 is a bit simpler. Need some sort of mechanism to lie a pennies one at a time at an angle against a solenoid. Then have the solenoid activate and kick the penny up and out in a reproducible way. Zinc pennies should fly further. Your mechanism would have to line the penny up against the solenoid in a reproducible way so that it hits the pennies in the same spot each time.
Actually the more I think about it, the more I like your method, Cerulean. Because the pennies roll down the ramp, they build up an angular momentum, so they will tend not to tumble. You could set up some kind of cross breeze to augment your separation. Just make sure your breeze is laminar and not turbulent. Better yet, give the pennies some headwind while rolling down the ramp. Zinc pennies would be slowed more and also spend more time going against the wind, and that will further improve separation. Much simpler than any of my crazy methods.
Should be fairly easy to build from 3 thin pieces of plywood: Trace the curve of your ramp onto the 3 pieces, and use a jig saw to cut along the curve. Then glue the 3 pieces together with the middle piece (a thin piece, maybe even wood paneling, slightly thicker than a penny) offset a few mm to form a trough. Then all you need to do is build some sort of mechanism to funnel the pennies into the top one at a time. Maybe use a flat piece of sheet metal bent so that it has a broad, horizontal area, then twisted to feed the pennies onto your ramp. Set this all on a table, and stick a pedestal type fan in front of it to provide the headwind and bins on the floor to catch the sorted pennies. Can you tell I'm making all this up as I type?
Metalophile |
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/04/2006 : 19:51:38
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I like the ramp idea. I wish I had thought of it. It is simple. It can be built cheaply and it does not require electricity.
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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pencilvanian
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2209 Posts |
Posted - 12/07/2006 : 17:51:42
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I just remembered another reason why hoarding zinc cents is a good idea, zinc cents were not built to last.
I used to find both copper and zinc pennies while metal detecting, the copper cents were dark brown but always physically in good shape, the zinc cents were usually disintegrating when dug up.
Even when beat up, copper cents will usually survive a beating and retain their recognizable appearance. Zincs, on the other hand, are worn away to silver slugs. Many of the first zinc cents tended to deteriorate and develop small bubbles on the surface as the zinc and copper pulled away from each other due to bad manufacturing processes.
The government won't have to do away with the penny, zinc cents will disappear on their own from environmental conditions.
It is probably the first coin with planned obsolesence in mind. |
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/07/2006 : 19:34:05
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I have a few hundred Japanese one yen coins. They are pure aluminum, although I don't know how pure. They don't seem to tarnish or oxidize, delaminate, or fail in any way. They are worth roughly a penny at face value and less than that at melt value. They feel light weight and therefore "cheap" but they are well manufactured and do not appear to have Planned Obsolesence.
US and Canadian Nickles and pre 1982 pennies, seem to have higher qwality than the clad coins, qwarters, dimes, and post 1982s.
Thank you for bringing up the qwality issue and making me think about it.
by the way, the newer qwarters do not feel like they have the same qwality of older qwarters. The edges look as if they are attempting to hide the copper content. The obverse head of Washington looks flat, but the reverse images are at least interesting.
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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Metalophile
Penny Collector Member
USA
320 Posts |
Posted - 12/07/2006 : 21:51:40
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The corrosion of zinc cents may explain why we usually find that 1982 coppers are more abundant than 1982 zincs. Zinc is much more reactive than copper. For example, in contact with acid or base it oxidizes, and hydrogen gas is formed. So all it takes is enough of a scratch to expose a little zinc, and corrision eats away . . .
Aluminum may well be a good coinage metal in terms of wear, even though it is also reactive to acids and bases. In air aluminum metal oxidizes to form a thin layer of aluminum oxide at the surface. This is a pretty tough, inert layer which usually prevents further corrosion. In order for the US mint to adopt an aluminum penny, I would think they would experiment with anodization or some other way to impart a copper-like color to the aluminum. Don't want people to complain that they look like dimes! I think copper plated steel is the most likely material for the mint to switch to should zinc prices remain elevated.
Metalophile |
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479 Posts |
Posted - 12/07/2006 : 22:02:33
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You are probably right about copper plated steel.
The Japanese one yen aluminum coin feels like play money, it is so light.
I got those coins in 1989 while I was there and they are all at least that old.
They don't have the aluminum oxide I see on say the wheels of a car.
I wonder what process they used to make a finish that hasn't oxidized in all these years?
I also think it is just as likely that the GovMint will just stop making pennies instead of replacing them with steel.
If the GovMint were to stop producing pennies, do you think they would continue to circulate or be hoarded out of circulation?
A billiard ball dropped from 1,362 feet (height of the South Tower) in a
vacuum would require 9.22 seconds to hit the ground. How then did the
towers collapse in 10 seconds and 11.4 seconds, and why has not one
member of the mainstream media insisted on honest answers from the
government in this regard?
"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy
so monstrous [that] he cannot believe it exists."
- J. Edgar Hoover |
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Metalophile
Penny Collector Member
USA
320 Posts |
Posted - 12/08/2006 : 10:59:17
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The aluminum oxide coating is normally so thin and transparent that you don't notice it. I think only if conditions are severe do you get a thick enough build up of oxides or other corrosion products that you can see it (as in what you see on the wheels of a car).
Metalophile |
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Cody8404
Penny Hoarding Member
USA
602 Posts |
Posted - 07/26/2007 : 16:10:09
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BANK HOLIDAY!
There is another reason to hold a few zinc cents. When the Depression of the 1930's hit the world the first thing that President Roosevelt did to the US was to put all the banks on holiday. Basically they closed and no one was able to get cash from the bank. This also meant that no one would accept checks, what few were around, as they didn't know if the banks were going to open again.
A big reason that I collect the zinc cents is because I have a ready flow of cash. How many people would be dead in the water if in the morning the Feb said, "We will no longer honor Checks or Credit Cards." Or, "We have had a breach of security and so we will stop all credit card transactions for the next week." How many people do you know that wouldn't have anything to eat for the day if they couldn't use their credit card?
Second, I have a coin the really is worth what it says it is worth. I have real money.
Third, I am not a good target to get robbed. I would like to see the burglar running away from my house carrying $50 in cents. First off I don't thing he would get far and second. What would he tell anyone when he showed up to buy a big screen TV with cents? The banks in my area know that I buy cents and if I was missing some and someone showed up I think there would be a cut and dry case.
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Posted - 07/26/2007 : 16:19:49
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I hold onto both because I'm too lazy to unload the zinc. By the way things are going it looks like my laziness will pay off.
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pencilvanian
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2209 Posts |
Posted - 07/26/2007 : 17:25:38
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Welcome to the forum Vegeta.
I should have chosen "Cut-n-Paste" as a forum name, since that is what I do, mostly. |
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2 Posts |
Posted - 07/26/2007 : 21:45:13
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| Thanks, good to be here. |
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HoardCopperByTheTon
Administrator
USA
6807 Posts |
Posted - 07/27/2007 : 18:50:58
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I only hoard the copper pennies because I am too poor to hoard everything.
I can only afford to hoard so many pennies.
I would rather have a box of copper pennies than a box of mixed pennies.
I would rather have a box of mixed pennies than a box of zinc pennies.
So the zinc pennies get turned in to swap for mixed pennies.
The mixed boxes then get sorted.. and the zincs are recycled back into more mixed cents.
I suppose there are always a good # of zinc pennies in my hoard as they cycle through this process, but I don't intentionally hoard them, and I convert them as soon as I can.
We each only have so much capital available to put into our hoards. You just have to decide for yourself which type of pennies you want that capital tied up in.
"Preserving coinage.. 2 tons at a time"
HoardCode0.1:M48/14USCA:US1Cu639700:US5Ni2400:CA5Ni46 |
Edited by - HoardCopperByTheTon on 07/27/2007 18:52:23 |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 07/27/2007 : 19:06:59
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One other reason I hoard the zincers too is because I'm too busy to re-roll them. Even if I had a machine that would roll them, I still wouldn't want to have to haul them down to a bank and experience the warm greetings I would get from the tellers. ;0
But the main reasons that I hoard the zincers is that I'm bullish on Zinc and I consider the zincers as part of my home cash reserve.
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Fanaticism is doubling one's efforts, yet forgetting one's purpose.
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HoardCopperByTheTon
Administrator
USA
6807 Posts |
Posted - 07/27/2007 : 20:48:17
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Much better if you can find a place to turn them in that does not require you to roll them. Best is if they will count them for you too. It is a chore to haul them into the bank though.. even with a nice cart to roll them in on. I know what you mean about the "warm greetings".. I remember the fist weekend I rolled up 2600 rolls and took them in.. LOL. "How many pennies to you have?" "You don't want to know" "No, how many pennies do you have?" You really don't want to know" "How many?" "About a million"
I figure I have enough unsorted boxes on hand to qualify as a home cash reserve. With a 40 box a week habit I have to turn in that $800 of zinc every week.. otherwise I would quickly run out of money. Also, there wouldn't be enough room to store all those copper coins I hoard if I had all that zinc laying around. I'm bullish on zinc too.. I am just more bullish on copper.
"Preserving coinage.. 2 tons at a time"
HoardCode0.1:M48/14USCA:US1Cu639700:US5Ni2400:CA5Ni46 |
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Jason
Penny Pincher Member
USA
138 Posts |
Posted - 07/31/2007 : 00:51:11
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I was at a bank getting a couple of 60 rolls and the teller, who knows my passion for the penny pretty well by now, told me that the main branch would count and roll the ones i bring back. That would end my use of that bank to get pennies, but i sure wanted to save some time in rolling. The next day i loaded a five gallon bucket of zinc i had been working on for a few weeks on the back of my truck and headed to the bank. I muscled my bucket through both doors and to the counter where i found out they were a week behind in counting coins. Well, i needed some cash to get new rolls, so i asked for some tubes, muscled my bucket back to the truck, and headed home. I had to use a dolly to get my coins back in the house. "What's the moral of this long and dull story," you may ask. "Before you haul, give the bank a call." Next time i'll see if i can scedule an appointment or some such arrangement.
I also consider my zinc as a cash reserve and as soon as it is cashed in i put it right back into pennies. I'd only use it for something else if i was in a bind. Since i buy pennies pretty often, albiet in small amounts, and i'm limited by time on how many i can sort, before long i will have so many that i'll be able to put some in reserve not to be recycled into new rolls and still have plenty to sort. I don't think space will be a problem for a while, but having to move wouldn't be too pleasent:) |
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just carl
Penny Hoarding Member
USA
601 Posts |
Posted - 08/01/2007 : 05:48:57
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The aluminum oxide coating is normally so thin and transparent that you don't notice it. I think only if conditions are severe do you get a thick enough build up of oxides or other corrosion products that you can see it (as in what you see on the wheels of a car).
Metalophile
This is true and that is one of the best reasons Aluminum is used for so many items nowadays in construction. For example if you had your window frames in bare Aluminum, it would form that coating and the rest of the Aluminum would be safe forever. Some steels used in industry are now made with Aluminum mixed in to form that coating so that the steel will never rust. NO, not stainless steel. Different subject and different additives.
As to the subject of sorting Zinc from Copper. Already being done. Of course the method means you would get a flat rate for all pennies. The recyclers that have the proper funaces simply melt all at one time and the different melting points allow the metals to be easily separated. The steel mills have been using this method for many, many years. They skim off the Aluminum from the top of a steel batch and dump it off in areas around the mills. One such sight in a place called Alequipa had 16 feet of such Aluminum slag.
The system isn't perfect but separating Zinc from Copper is already being done with such methods. Against the law? A bar of Zinc or Copper is just a bar of metal.
Carl |
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Do you hoard zinc pennies?
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