How Many Members Are Collecting Lincoln Cents

I've been collecting lincoln cents since I started collecting. at first I collected the nicest ones I could find CRH for my books, as well as saving all copper cents I could find. Now, I am saving all 2013 cents I come across because they are in such nice shape. I am rolling them up, and currently have found $2.50 of them that I got for face. I also save any unusual coins and ones that are "problem free" no rust, spots, scratches, etc.

I have a Dansco album I've been working on completing. 1909-2007 including proofs. I almost have all proofs from 1971 on up to 2007. Still a few early wheats I need, but most of them are key/semi-key dates. 1959-2007 are pretty much all UNC/BU pennies.

Yeah...and here I thought it was hard when I pulled the trigger on the 09-S VDB. I really can't imagine paying a couple thousand for an error coin I don't even really care about that much, just to complete an album that thinks I should have one in it. I am planning to go to the Cowtown coin show in Fort Worth in a couple weeks and one of the things I am going to look for is a weak-D 1922. If the offer is right and I don't see anything else more appealing, I may consider it. Maybe.

I was just going through my want list for my uncirculated set this morning and I am in almost exactly the same position as you, SecretGlitch. The P's were pretty easy and even the D's are reasonable (except the 14-D of course which I have decided I'm just going to have to be satisfied with my nice VG coin there).

I am shooting a little lower than MS64 (62/63 is fine by me) but even then, those teen and earlier twenties S-mints in uncirculated condition are hard to find and expensive as heck when you finally do find them. $500 and up is not unheard of for nice examples of coins like the 14-S. That's gonna slow me down for sure. I miss working on the 30's and 40's where I could buy a couple a week sometimes. Now it's once every few months.

One of our CCF members has a product called Verdicare.
I purchase it through Wizard coin supplies.

I think it works very well on light verdigris, green spots.

Well for me, the fun comes from the hunt for a nice quality, affordable example of these difficult years. That's why I like looking for the D mints, especially from the 20's, as they're (generally) a lot cheaper than their S-mint brothers but nonetheless finding a well-struck, appealing piece is very challenging.

That's why I'm pretty happy with this 1925-D I recently picked up, it's a pretty strong example of a generally poorly struck date.

If I had the budget and the means I'd try to get as close to gem as possible, as my first piece in this set I ever got is a 1917 in MS-65RD. If you want to see a price jump, MS-64 to MS-65 does a whole lot more most of the time than MS-63 to MS-64. But if I was really trying to complete the set, with my budget I'd have to collect at XF. 64 makes a good compromise, and I don't mind if I never can get close to finishing it.

Also I'd buy an MS-63 if it was really nice for the grade, but a lot of the ones I've seen were pretty cruddy.