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 Replies: 20 / Views: 4,528 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
996 Posts |
Many years ago as a child I hated clad coinage, thinking it was ugly and impractical. At the time, as a child in the 1960's, I was hunting pennies and would occasionally find an Indian Head penny and actively saved wheats. I would occasionally find Buffalo nickels then but dimes and higher were too valuable for the little kid I was to save. One dime would buy a candy bar and bottle of pop and represented much of a week's allowance. I would get 50 cents (or a whole dollar if I did extra chores) and I would buy a roll of pennies at the bank and save a couple wheats or the rare Indian Head penny that I might find every once in a while. When I did have "silver coinage" by then it was mostly clad, they stopped making silver dimes and quarters a few years back and I didn't save the silver I did see partly because I didn't know any better but mostly since I could not afford to. By the time I realized and could afford to save silver it was mostly all gone. Nowadays I get silver about as often as I found an Indian Head penny 50 years ago, once or twice a year in normal change or casual hunting. When I became aware of clad coinage I learned to despise it. I did not like the fact that it was a base metal fiat coin, not based on the value of the metal involved, I also did not like the appearance of the surfaces or edges. I like the Canadian coins at the time, the pure nickel and later plated steel "silver" coins had a better appearance in my opinion, both on the faces and edges. Where I lived Canadian coins were pretty common in change so if I could afford it I tended to keep them. Now as I grow older and more reflective, I have grown to appreciate the genius behind the development of clad coinage. The technology has not changed in a half century and coins of the mid 1960's are still perfectly usable now. They wear better than silver does and while they do not circulate as much as they did then the ones that do hold up better overall. The appearance is just as good as silver in my opinion, even better perhaps. They are shinier in use, silver coins tend to be duller after use. While I still get excited to see silver coins, mostly due to the rarity of doing so, I have to give kudos to the people who developed the technology to produce and coin this sandwich of metals. Imagine coming up with a device like this that not only would provide a good material for striking, providing a similar electrical property to that of silver so that it would work in machines and prove to be as long lasting if not longer lasting that the venerable silver. I wonder if they thought back in the 1960's that 50 years later the same composition would still be used or if they thought it would be a more temporary solution until some other metal was used. It is too bad the reduced relief in order to provide for the massive numbers of coins needed today is required. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
5238 Posts |
I agree that, looking at it objectively, clad coinage was an excellent product.
Personally I prefer the pure nickel but that is probably because I am Canadian.
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Rest in Peace
United States
18456 Posts |
Kudos , I never thought of it that way . I just was upset seeing a bright copper edge on the new Dimes ,Quarters and Halves . What the heck had they done to my beautiful silver coins ? But yes your right ; since 1965 the clad coinage have survived without a problem other than a minute amount of wear and tear .
Now the Zincoln (copper plated zinc Cent) is another story that I rather not get into right now because they make me sick and disgusted !
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
20753 Posts |
I never give any of this any thoughts at all. For me they are just coins. All of them, regardless of plating, cladding, toning, etc. If I need one for an Album, I really don't care how it was made, or who made it, or what it is made of.
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Moderator
 United States
187446 Posts |
An interesting reflection. Thank you for sharing.  |
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Bedrock of the Community
Canada
24885 Posts |
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Rest in Peace
United States
18456 Posts |
Quote:
I never give any of this any thoughts at all. For me they are just coins. All of them, regardless of plating, cladding, toning, etc. If I need one for an Album, I really don't care how it was made, or who made it, or what it is made of. Somebody give this man a tranquilizer . Must be stressing out with no more room for all his coin albums .  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1748 Posts |
Cupronickel clads have held up well. They are basically copper coins, as their copper content is 92 percent. Copper has worked well for coinage for centuries.
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Bedrock of the Community
 United States
12477 Posts |
Seeing how poorly Zincolns perform, I am more than happy with CuNi clad, copper alloy or straight CuNi. Getting clad quarters and dimes from the 60s and 70s in change is not uncommon, and they look great after all those years of providing a fluid means of exchange.
In Memory of Crazyb0 12-26-1951 to 7-27-2020
In Memory of Tootallious 3-31-1964 to 4-15-2020
In Memory of T-BOP 10-12-1949 to 1-19-2024
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Moderator
Australia
16805 Posts |
One main drawback with the clad coinage, and plated coinage generally, is the lack of recyclability. It's the Mint's job to withdraw damaged and other no-longer-legal-tender coinage and recoup the costs.
Take, say, a bronze coin and damage it so that it is no longer fit for purpose. The mint can take that damaged coin and toss it straight into the scrap bronze bin and melt it down to make new coins. Same for .900 silver, .900 gold and "nickel" cupronickel.
But a clad coin cannot be de-cladded. Melt down a clad coin and you get a lump of 92% copper, 8% nickel (or perhaps less nickel, if the coins were badly worn or the cladding layer was otherwise partially stripped away) which is useless for making either new copper coring or new cupronickel cladding.
Yes, it can be re-refined and re-purified back into useful metals, but not easily - and probably not by a mint-owned facility. Recycled clad coinage will never be turned back into coins again. The recycling loop is not "closed".
This has not so far been a major issue in America, where the economy has been stable enough that a mass recall and remelting of the coinage has not been necessary. Other countries that have used similar cladding technology to make their coins (such as Thailand) have not been so fortunate.
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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Pillar of the Community
United States
2270 Posts |
Quote:
One main drawback with the clad coinage, and plated coinage generally, is the lack of recyclability. It's the Mint's job to withdraw damaged and other no-longer-legal-tender coinage and recoup the costs.
Take, say, a bronze coin and damage it so that it is no longer fit for purpose. The mint can take that damaged coin and toss it straight into the scrap bronze bin and melt it down to make new coins. Same for .900 silver, .900 gold and "nickel" cupronickel.
But a clad coin cannot be de-cladded. Melt down a clad coin and you get a lump of 92% copper, 8% nickel (or perhaps less nickel, if the coins were badly worn or the cladding layer was otherwise partially stripped away) which is useless for making either new copper coring or new cupronickel cladding.
Yes, it can be re-refined and re-purified back into useful metals, but not easily - and probably not by a mint-owned facility. Recycled clad coinage will never be turned back into coins again. The recycling loop is not "closed".
This has not so far been a major issue in America, where the economy has been stable enough that a mass recall and remelting of the coinage has not been necessary. Other countries that have used similar cladding technology to make their coins (such as Thailand) have not been so fortunate. Until the last few years the number of clads being recycled has been nominal and it probably isn't worth the cost of shipping the metal to the strip manufacturers. But when clad was introduced they said that one of the advantages of clad was that it could be melted with nickel to make the outside cu/ ni strip for new clads or to make nickels. They also said that nickels could be melted directly to make the cu/ ni strip. Time don't fly, it bounds and leaps.
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
996 Posts |
I would imagine it is a fairly simple process for those who know how to do it to melt the coins down and separate the metals. I am not by any means a metallurgist but would think they have different weights and properties which would allow the nickel and copper to be separated. Of course you would have to have large quantities to make it worthwhile. Otherwise just melt it into ingots and sell them to scrappers.
In that same vein, is there an alloy that would produce a uniform silver color and similar electrical, striking and wear properties these days to replace clad? I would imagine an alloy would be easier to produce than the clad sandwich and even if the metal cost is slightly higher might reduce the costs involved. I know they spent a boatload to decide that a slight difference in nickel to copper content would work on nickels, dimes and quarters but AFAIK it went nowhere.
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Moderator
United States
187446 Posts |
Quote:
...when clad was introduced they said that one of the advantages of clad was that it could be melted with nickel to make the outside cu/ ni strip for new clads or to make nickels. They also said that nickels could be melted directly to make the cu/ ni strip. That makes sense to me.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1795 Posts |
All Interesting Points of View as far as I'm concerned. I cannot disagree with any of it!
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
17884 Posts |
Quote:
I would imagine it is a fairly simple process for those who know how to do it to melt the coins down and separate the metals. I am not by any means a metallurgist but would think they have different weights and properties which would allow the nickel and copper to be separated. Actually copper and nickel are almost identical in weight and are very similar chemically. They would be rather difficult to separate cheaply. Quote:
In that same vein, is there an alloy that would produce a uniform silver color and similar electrical, striking and wear properties these days to replace clad? Yes, Coppernickel, the same as the 5 cent piece. The clad compositipon came about because they were looking for a replacement that would be difficult or impossible to counterfeit. (Back then coins had significant purchasing power so counterfeiting was a serious concern) Back then the way to bond the coppernickel ingots to the copper ingot before rolling was done by explosive bonding. They actually used shaped charges to bond the layers of metal together. It was felt this would be something the counterfeiters would be unable to do. Later they learned how to do it with surface treatments and high pressure rolling and they were able to dispense with the explosives. Wy they still use clad today I don't know other than it is distinctive, and possibly cheaper than a solid copper nickel alloy. Nickel is more expensive than copper. |
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Valued Member
United States
456 Posts |
N9jig,
We must be about the same age. In 1963 when I was five, my dad gave me a big jar full of coins, some Whitman folders, and told me to have at it. I was lucky because there were lots of dimes and quarters, including Mercs and almost slick SLQs in there.
I hate clad coins.
I hate the designated hitter.
I am a curmudgeon.
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Replies: 20 / Views: 4,528 |
Posted 12/11/2018 08:04 am
