Sometimes It Just Doesn't Pay Off.

I know the feeling. You go through a couple hundred dollars in pennies,zilch.Then you get twenty and will get several.

Sorry to hear of your bad luck, coppercoins. It's hard for me to imagine going through that many coins, but I only learned what a 'roll search' was about 5 months ago. My local coin club had a roll search instead of a lecture one month. I didn't know what they were talking about! LOL I had to ask for an explanation.

My husband has been throwing his change into drawers and on top of the dresser and even into his empty pistachio canvas bags for ages. I haven't sorted through all of that yet. But once I started I found a keeper just about every other coin -- but now I know better so I started going through the keepers again.

But I will have to start over one more time because I got both volumes of the Cherry Pickers for Christmas. And now I am convinced, more than ever, I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING! LOL

Maybe someday I will be able to imagine going though that many pennies but I doubt it will be any time soon.

Again, sorry for you bad luck -- but doesn't that make you think the next batch will be full of goodies?

Unfortunately - no.

I have hit streaks of a thousand coins before with nothing. Then another thousand. Then another. And int he next thousand I would find 20 coins with a lot of interest value. It's just how the game works.

I have been looking since 1983 to find a 1983 doubled die reverse. I have found a dozen doubled die obverses, but never a doubled die reverse. About four years ago I sent a box in trade to a collector in Florida for a better chance of finding a 1983 doubled die reverse. The box he sent to me was rather blank, but the box I sent to him contained a 1983 doubled die reverse. It's just the luck of the draw. I had one in my possession and sent it away.

I have been through more than 800,000 coins in my lifetime searching for die varieties. I have been lucky to pull thousands of them out of that group, and I know how uncommon it is to find them. The part that makes me chuckle are the number of people who think they can go through one change tray and find a diamond - it just doesn't work that way...at all.

As for me having 'knowledge of more die varieties' - that may be true, but I still hold firm to the same advice I give everyone else. Don't try to memorize a long list of what to look for - just look at everything for anything out of normal. That's the key. Know what all the normal coins look like, and know how to pick damaged coins from gems. That's all I do. I run into stuff all the time that I never knew existed.

I hear ya, I just went through 25.00 of LMC of all year and only came up with the two MD 1983s I posted and a 2009 Formative Years DDR, to which there are several out there.

After reading this thread, I have to add: if you think you know everything, it's time for a new book! :D
I set aside all my old coins from circulation to re-search once new knowledge is mainstreamed.

Last night as a pay-back to myself for not finding anything in the '8' bag, I went through a couple of rolls-worth of the '3' bag. Coins dated 1963, 1973, 1983, 1993, 2003. I ran into plenty of 1983 cents - but alas - nothing. Nothing at all, save one 1993 doubled column that I tossed back in the pile because of grade.

In all of my roll searching I have not found anything. though I have only been though about $60 With $18 left in current box, but I have found a few RPM in wheat cents I have bought from my local dealer.

All in good time is what I keep telling my self.

Then I look at what I have found in my wheats I have searched and it keeps me going. even though I still have 2 big bags of wheats I have to find time for.

Things tend to come in clumps, no matter which denomination I am hunting...nothing..nothing..nothing..then, bam..2, 3, 4 of the same...happened to me in August and found 4 1996 lathe lines in 2 rolls...I just searched a $50.00 box of cents from my local bank..the best I could do was 2 tilted partial collars...the worst recently was a "bullion" buy off ebay..most sellers don't have time to search all rydale-sorted cents, and, I have done pretty well in the past...this time...nothing..there's nothing worse than that sinking feeling you know your probably skunked..but, I could NOT NOT finish searching the leftovers of that $15.00Face-lot, as I kept hitting 69-s one was machine doubled, and gave me a 2-second heart attack...then, back to reality..
Bottom line? I'll NEVER give up the hunt!