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 Replies: 24 / Views: 5,224 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
6130 Posts |
I was just reading through some old posts and was inspired to start this thread. What coins do the CCF members have that are made of unusual materials? By unusual, I mean anything except your usual: - Copper, bronze, brass etc - Silver, billon - Gold, Electrum - Platinum, palladium - Nickel, cupronickel - Aluminum, aluminum-bronze - Steel, Iron - Zinc, tin This could include an unusual or seldom seen alloy, a metal not typically used in coinage, or pretty much any non-metal. I am not opposed to seeing some unusual trade tokens etc, but let's try to stick to coins or legal tender of some sort with a clear face value. I'll have to do some digging through my own collection to see what I have to contribute, but I'll open up the floor for anyone willing to jump in  |
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Rest in Peace
United States
7075 Posts |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
937 Posts |
I have a clay 1 sen from 1945 Japan. Legal tender for a couple of days before the surrender. I also have a fiber composit coin made for Japanese occupied Manchuria in WWII.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1747 Posts |
I have a few of the Canadian Tombac Nickels from 42-43 which are 88% copper, 12% zinc and are a golden brown color.
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Pillar of the Community
Sweden
1078 Posts |
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88% copper, 12% zinc Souds like common Brass to me with a fancy name. I think this is my only rare composition coin I've got as far as I know - 20 Pfennig, Sachsen 1921, German Notgeld (locally-issued emergency coinage). It's made out of porcelain.   |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
1949 Posts |
If you are counting Notgeld Issues, I have numerous from rather interesting materials... There were many porcelain issues, here is one of my favorites...   |
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Rest in Peace
United States
2668 Posts |
Porcelain, you guys had to do that to me. Me wanna!  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4963 Posts |
Sorry, I know this isn't a coin, but I couldn't help posting it here. It's a sales tax token made of light green plastic and warped to the shape of a Pringles chip.  |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
6130 Posts |
Those are some amazing notgeld!  I would argue that the sales tax tokens do count, as they had a face value of 1 mill. Unfortunately, the only thing I have in my collection that comes close is a small handful of OPA red point tokens (change for WWII rations) struck in vulcanized fiber. |
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Moderator
 Australia
16806 Posts |
As an analytical chemist by training and occupation, "Elements" are a major collecting theme of mine. I'm always on the hunt for new and different ones.
Here are some of my favourites that aren't on your list of mundane materials:
Magnesium: Romania 500 lei 2000 and 1000 lei 2001. They look like aluminium, and they largely are - except the alloy they used to make these coins was an industrial alloy made with 3% magnesium. I don't have a pic and even if I did it wouldn't help much, because this particular alloy isn't actually very good for making coins out of; it corrodes and wears down much more easily than regular pure aluminium.
Lead: I don't have a pure lead coin, but I have a jital from the Sultanate of Khwarizm, made of "lead-bronze". I also have a couple of lead communion tokens.
Cadmium: Not a coin, unfortunately, but a medal issued by the Sydney Coin Club in 1966 for the introduction of Australian decimal currency.
Cardboard: A Spanish "coin" made of a cardboard disc with a revenue stamp on the back. This plus a Russian postage-stamp "banknote" are the only two objects that are listed in the Pick banknote catalogues that actually fit into a 2x2, so are therefore stored with my coins.
Fiber: made of a kind of fibreboard, a mixture of cellulose and a plastic resin. Some American tax tokens were made of something similar, I believe, but actual coins were made in Japan and in Japanese-occupied Manchuria. I own two from Manchukuo, a 1944 1 fen and 1945 5 fen.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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Valued Member
United States
434 Posts |
I found this a few months ago and thought is was interesting.
"The FIRST EVER coins or medals struck with that particular metal/element! (Gadolinium, Indium, Rhodium and Ytterbium are examples) This is what is available  The website: http://www.elementsales.com/ecoins.htm
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
3831 Posts |
I just had to post this coin. Struck (?) in antimony.  I personally like this coin due to the mixture of various elements.  Ring: 16 - 18% chromium, 0.75% nickel maximum, 0.12% carbon maximum, 1% silicon maximum, 1% manganese maximum, 0.03% sulfur maximum, 0.04% phosphorus maximum, the rest iron Inner core: Aluminum bronze The rest of element coins from my collection can be found here: http://gxseries.com/numis/coin_elem...elements.htmEdited by gxseries
12/12/2015 08:45 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
6130 Posts |
I suppose that manganese deserves an honorable mention as well, since to my knowledge, it was only used in the 1942-45 War Nickels (9%), and all dollar coins since 2000 (7%). Interestingly, the only use it seems to have on coinage is that it can alloy to provide the exact conductive signature of cupronickel. I have always struggled to figure our exactly how to classify the War Nickel alloy--with its 35% silver content, it is technically billon, but I have never seen it described as such, perhaps because it was not debased from a higher purity. Edited by Finn235
12/12/2015 09:04 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4963 Posts |
I also consider the War Nickel alloy billon, although billon generally has a lower silver content than 35%. DrDarryl- That's fascinating. I'm quite surprised that they have used sulfur, selenium and mercury yet have not used tungsten, osmium or manganese. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1119 Posts |
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although billon generally has a lower silver content than 35% I was always under the impression that under 50% precious metal content was billon Edited by Steele
12/12/2015 4:39 pm
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Moderator
Canada
10456 Posts |
I have a mining company medal that is struck in pure molybdenum...
"Discovery follows discovery, each both raising and answering questions, each ending a long search, and each providing the new instruments for a new search." -- J. Robert OppenheimerContent of this post is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses...0/deed.en_USMy eBay store
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Replies: 24 / Views: 5,224 |
Posted 12/11/2015 10:46 am
