Are There Any Circulating Coins Still Made Of Pure Metals?

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Author	Replies: 6 / Views: 1,664
oriole Pillar of the Community Canada 5240 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 5:50 pm Silver and Nickel are long gone, but the Japanese 10 yen is still issued in bronze. This is probably because it only has about 3 yen worth of copper. Are there any others that you know of? I mean ones that actually circulate, not special mint products. Report this Post to the Staff

sel_69l Bedrock of the Community Australia 21786 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 6:15 pm Aluminum? Report this Post to the Staff
Crazyb0 Rest in Peace 10197 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 6:22 pm Take it you mean single sourced metal? Almost all coins have to be made out of alloy. Some are too hard like steel, or too soft as tin or lead. The tensile strength (that which holds together)is that certain mix of ally. Why our old coins were bronze, pure copper is too soft, and silver was only 90% rest was copper manganese for strength. Very few single metal substances were used in 18th-21`st century coinages. Technically, even an alloy is a "pure" metal, impurities have been forged out to heighten purity of all ingredients. The reason the Mint doesn't ISSUE 99.99% silver is it has been highly "refined". Edited by Crazyb0 02/16/2018 6:26 pm Report this Post to the Staff
sel_69l Bedrock of the Community Australia 21786 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 6:28 pm Steel is an alloy of carbon and iron. Report this Post to the Staff
oriole Pillar of the Community Canada 5240 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 6:41 pm I should have clarified. Ignoring aluminum, I mean almost pure elements: 95% or more. I am really mostly thinking of copper alloys where the copper is 95% or more of the composition. Report this Post to the Staff
january1may Pillar of the Community Russian Federation 5173 Posts	Posted 02/16/2018 7:18 pm Some coins are still made in pure-ish nickel, IIRC. It's easily recognizable, because they're magnetic, but not as much as steel. The 50 franc piece of French Polynesia comes to mind. ...wait, just checked Numista, and even those hadn't been made from nickel since 2007. IIRC, coin aluminium is 2% magnesium. Not sure if that's true for all aluminium coins though. I wonder when the last zinc coins were made... Staff edit - sites are banned for a reason, trying to suggest them by misspelling is not good The below is all based on another site, with adjustments where Numista contradicted it. This means that there might be some later issues that I missed because they weren't listed there. With that in mind: the last non-fantasy issues made in nickel were the West African States 100 francs of 2009. For zinc, the last were the Austrian 5 groschen (1992 for circulation, 1994 in sets). As for copper, the last were probably the Greek 1 drachma and 2 drachmes, both of 2000. (Coinect lists some later circulating issues, none of which were actually copper.) Report this Post to the Staff
mcp New Member United States 7 Posts	Posted 02/18/2018 12:43 pm From mid 1982 up until today the United States Lincoln Cent has been comprised of an alloy of 97.5% Zinc with a 2.5% copper plating with the exception of a rare 1983 error comprised of 95% copper and 5% zinc. Report this Post to the Staff
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