40% Junk Silver Half Dollars

Look at it this way: It's 60% crap base metal. What good is it except for being a legal 50 cent coin?

Has $2.65 worth of silver in it, but you still need five to buy a gallon of gas.

Nope! Keepin mine Mark - good try tho -

"The best silver to buy as scrap is .925 sterling silver, because it can be re made into new sterling silver product without silver refining costs."

Yes and no. Lots of jewellers will just cheap out and use "old" metal, which is metal that used to be jewellery but was straight melted and remade. What people can't understand is that every time you melt karat gold or sterling silver, between 100 and 300 milligrams evaporates or gets stuck to all sort of things like the crucible, the stirring rod, the crucible holder, etc. It's called wastage. Not only that but every time you heat up a metal you screw up its temper and its "composition". Always try to do the minimum work possible to preserve the integrity of the metal because it gets oxidized then dipped in hot salt-based acid, then reworked, etc. The metal is not the same, it's like dipping a paddle in a river; philosophically it's not the same river. And that's only because of using "old" metal, nevermind the jewellers who will dilute the karat to save a few bucks.

Yes, I used to think the same thing, because on paper yes it makes sense, until you start working with precious metals and realize that it takes at least 10 years to really master the trade. People who value their coins according to what the ASW or purity is just do not have experience dealing with refiners, who are ALL crooks. ALL of them. I stand by my comment that they are worth only 50 cents. Here's a challenge for those who disagree: If you take some silver Mexican Pesos from the late 1950s to 1960s (they are .100 silver purity), what do you have in your hand? Do you have 10% silver or do you have 90% copper? The answer is, you have a cool coin that once circulated but it worth less than nothing because you can't even spend it at face value, and that's the cold hard fact. Now... how many of them do you think you need to send to the refiner to make it worth your time? The refiner will screw you with a small amount and with a large amount. You have to find that "next idiot" to take it off your hands to even break even, and will that person take one coin or the whole bag?

I know I talk about this purity topic a lot on this board, but it's worth repeating everytime because it just doesn't click with people who have all these books that tell them black and white things. Without living outside the book you can't say you know 100%. 40% silver is filth. Anyone who has worked with 10 karat gold can back me up on this. I would never, EVER, trust a .925 silver item (or any stamp) these days. I've seen too many Chinese fake trinkets come in my workshop, it's sick that my government allows us to do business with robbers like that. If you think that .925 is .925, then you aren't taking into account the different alloys used over the decades. Melt a handful of old British coins into a ball, and then repeat that for a piece of .999 silver with your own added alloy. The difference in the cleanliness of the metal is very obvious when you do this experiment. Today our alloys are so clean and produced with the help of argon so that the grains do not oxidize. The old coins will oxidize and turn black. Never use old metal to make something new. You wouldn't Dr Frankenstein a car from parts and sell it as brand new.

The best silver scrap to buy is: none of them. Get pure .999 bars.

Price them low enough and someone will buy it. I myself dont want them at all....silver dollars and 90% are much more preferable and easier to sell

@Silverbullet68 There's no refining cost with 40%, they just change hands. What I mean is, it's just not worth the refining costs...even the Hunt bros avoided 40% silver.

Several years ago, I listed 3 rolls of 40% on Craigslist. This was during $30 silver. They sat for over a month with only one inquiry. I sold for 70% of spot.