Finding Counterfeit Coins In Circulation

That is very interesting. I don't understand why anyone would counterfeit common date coins- not worth the money and time.

The only counterfeit I've gotten, and I kept it as a conversation piece, is a 1944 no mint mark Jefferson nickel. It is most likely a 1941 that was sodered to a 1944.

I have a 1970something Lincoln Memorial cent that I beleive is a fake. It only weighs about 1.5 grams and it's porous and the wrong color, more like a zinc without the copper plating.

What a cool find! A friend showed me some American counterfeits yesterday, and I was surprised how obvious they are.

At one time Lead alloy types were common in halves. Tin, Zinc or even Copper were mixed with Lead and coins were made. Most were half dollars but also quarters, nickels and even some Silver Dollars. It is obvious the majority of people on these forums think of pennies and nickels as almost worthless. When I was a kid my parents sent me to a neighborhood store with possibly $2. That would be for a gallon of milk, loaf of bread, lunch meat for the entire week, mustard, ketchup, a possilbe few candy bars snuk in so not noticed. Eventually I would come home with two large, almost shopping bag sized bags that I could hardly carry. And all for a few dollars. Gas for your car was about $0.22/gallon. A fake half dollar was a lot of money.
Counterfeiteing any coin was profitable. Many founderies, factories, etc would make some. Way, way back then there were phone boths everywhere and a call was $0.05. Those machines went by sound of coin being put in the slots. Many people had counterfeit coin/washers made to match a Nickel sized coin for just that reason.
The best one was the people that knew about the sound only and just used tuning forks. Great for long distance calls when the operator said please put in $xxxx you would just keep on tranging the tuning fork by the mouth peice.
Naturally not me. Others that were not as honest as me of course.