Need help from those who Hoard Copper Cents

engine 823 · Dec 22, 2010

Okay I decided like so many others I would get into taking out copper cents from circulation. My problem is I bought one of those coin counters from office depot and it SUCKS! I want to run my copper cents through it to count how many I have but....
First it is one of those that has the plastic tubes the coins drop into. I took the bottom off and strapped it to a plastic jug. That way the coin just got counted then dropped in. The problem is I can't even get through $25.00 in cents before the digital coin counter starts flashing and freezes up. Of course that does not stop the machine as a whole and cents continue to drop into the bucket uncounted! Then my whole count is off.
What are you all using that counts coin on a large volume scale accurately

? I can't afford to invest $500 for a rydale machine so I just have a coinalyzer. I need something to count my copper cents as I look them

? It needs to be something reasonably priced but GOOD QUALITY!
Thoughts

2Cents · Dec 22, 2010

If you have a large quantity the easiest thing would be to weigh them. If you need an exact count then you will need the counter. I have a coinmate. It works fine.

AGCoinHunter · Dec 22, 2010

Weight. I also reroll my by hand. Have a plastic tube with a mark where I know 50 cents should be and scoop them in then dump them into a roll. Pretty easy.

CardsNCoins · Dec 22, 2010

147 copper pennies = 1 lb (it's not 1 pound of copper though since they are only 95% copper).

Get a 5 lb. postal scale and put a small box on it. Then hit TARE and it will deduct the weight of the box. Then fill the box until it hits 5 lbs. Then store your weighed pennies in increments of 5 lbs, 10 lbs, 15 lbs, etc....

Hope this helps.

HH

Nick

SFBayArea · Dec 22, 2010

My ryedale doesn't have a counter either. I count my coins the old fashion way like in vegas. by stacks of 10. I look at them by height. I get five stacks, that is $.50 cents. I then put them into a roll and weigh them. You can tell by weight if the roll is correct. A correct roll of 50 zincolns weighs in the range of 125.2 to 126.5 grams. Anything more, you need to look at. A digital scale is most important. You can get one for around $20 on Ebay.

jrf30 · Dec 22, 2010

engine 823 said:
I can't afford to invest $500 for a rydale machine so I just have a coinalyzer. I need something to count my copper cents as I look them? It needs to be something reasonably priced but GOOD QUALITY!
Thoughts

I'm going to be honest here. You are basically saying "I want something that is great, like steak, but I want to pay a cheap price, like for hamburger". You want quality, but you don't want to buy the Ryedale. then ... you get what you got, which sucks, and that is what you get for that price.

I don't mean that as mean. IN fact, I have a solution for you. :-) If you want quality, BUY quality. Nothing compares to the Ryedale. And it is not a counter. It is a sorter. It will increase your copper penny collection 10fold. You can put it on a credit card, USE it, get pennies, sell some on feebay, and use the profits to pay the machine off on your monthly credit card bills. Then, when it is paid off in a mere 3 months or so, the rest will still faster and higher quality than what you are doing now, still give you more copper, and will be without a charge to you, since you paid for the ryedale already with the profits.

the old saying that it takes money to make money is true. YOu could buy the ryedale though, have it pay fo r itself within three months, and then go on better and better, all without "your" money in it. Just the profits from the first few months of the ryedale.

Make sense? :-)

Goodluck on it. But step up and buy the Ryedale. :-)

cyberdan · Dec 22, 2010

When I had my ryedale I went thru so much coin I had to get a real coin counter.

Pretty fast and very accurate. It would count $50 in cents in about 10-12 min.

jrf30 · Dec 22, 2010

cyberdan said:
When I had my ryedale I went thru so much coin I had to get a real coin counter.

Pretty fast and very accurate. It would count $50 in cents in about 10-12 min.

Had?

Did you get rid of your Ryedale Dan?

engine 823 · Dec 22, 2010

Thanks guys for the info on everything!!!!!!!! I KNOW you all are right on the rydale machine but it is convincing my wife I can make profit and pay for it with copper cents! Maybe I can separate and count the old fashion way until I can sell enough to get me one with cash.
Thanks on the info for the weight of coin.

SFBayArea · Dec 22, 2010

engine 823 said:
Thanks guys for the info on everything!!!!!!!! I KNOW you all are right on the rydale machine but it is convincing my wife I can make profit and pay for it with copper cents! Maybe I can separate and count the old fashion way until I can sell enough to get me one with cash.
Thanks on the info for the weight of coin.

One more bit of advice.. if you're going to sell on Feebay.. don't overflood the market. I'd say do one auction of $50 face at a time. I've seen it before, if you overflood the market, it gives the perception of oversupply and it devalues the prices for them. Feebay is the only way venue right now since dealers won't buy them. It is also better that you sell outside of Feebay too. Meeting people through Feebay but selling outside of it so you don't have to pay commissions. I've made a couple private deals that work out just fine if not better outside of Feebay.

SFBayArea · Dec 22, 2010

cyberdan said:
When I had my ryedale I went thru so much coin I had to get a real coin counter.

Pretty fast and very accurate. It would count $50 in cents in about 10-12 min.

BTW, how much is that machine? Looks hefty.

TxTim · Dec 22, 2010

I use a CS-10.
It counts about 3,000/minute.
Great machine!

engine 823 · Dec 23, 2010

I've got to know? What is feebay

I have sold and have a account on ebay. Is feebay different

I have noticed feebay mention numerous times on this forum and never hear of ebay anymore??

GlassyEyed · Dec 23, 2010

FeeBay is...

From what I can guess is a nickname for EBay since they have so many fees....

JasonB · Dec 23, 2010

engine 823 said:
What is feebay

eBay charges a lot of fees. Folks like to call it FeeBay. Or, were you joking?

engine 823 · Dec 23, 2010

No I was serious! Just confused!

SFBayArea · Dec 23, 2010

engine 823 said:
No I was serious! Just confused!

It's definitely Feebay for me.. their commission is 9% plus they force you to use Paypal so they charge you another 3% on top so really the commission is like 12%.

So profit margin remains tight.. I sold a lot of 5000 copper cents on there two months ago for $75.00 plus $11.00 shipping which the buyer pays. After all the commissions on it, I only made something like $15.00 for a lot of work to sort that many pennies. Maybe if you already have a big stash to get rid of, it might not be so bad but $15.00 net profit is too little. It's better you do one or two auctions on Feebay to gain a good reputation and sell to potential buyers off of it privately. That way you don't pay the commission. It works out better that way. If Ebay's commission was less like 5%, I would definitely use it more and not call it Feebay. They've definitely raised their commissions over the years.

The worst part is they force you to use Paypal where they charge you another 3%. It used to be that you had an option of taking checks or money orders, not anymore if you want to auction on Feebay. Feebay is really geared towards the customer not seller. As a seller, you can't give negative feedback on a customer but the customer can about you. I try my best to make sure that everything is done right but I read a ton of horror stories about it.

engine 823 · Dec 23, 2010

Where did most of you buy your nice coin counters

Codes · Dec 24, 2010

I bought a Royal Sovereign FS-4DA counter on eBay for $84.95 about a year ago. Its not extremely fast and you have to keep changing out the tubes once they get full (there are 4 tubes), but I think its a great investment for the price. Also, when cashing in my dumps I run the coins through it before I take them to the bank to make sure I don't get jobbed by the coin counter. You wouldn't believe the looks of amazement on the tellers faces when I come within a few cents every time I cash in my dumps. :icon_sunny: