# How much is a gallon of pennies worth $$$ ?



## light_emitting_dude

I have a glass gallon jar that I am using to collect my pennies. It is about 3/4 full and I will cash it in when it gets full. Luckily my credit union offers a free service to do this. Does anyone know approximately how much my gallon of pennies will be worth when it gets full? Hey maybe I can use this to buy a new flashlight!


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## benchmade_boy

i also have a gallon jar that is an old glass colorox bleach jug. it to is about 85% full . i think it is about worth 20 bucks of so?


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## Nitroz

I found this from google.

For pennies (diameter: 0.75", thickness: 1.55 mm) the above computation would give a "V" of about 0.029727 cu in, or about 7771 pennies per gallon.


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## Valpo Hawkeye

Nitroz said:


> I found this from google.
> 
> For pennies (diameter: 0.75", thickness: 1.55 mm) the above computation would give a "V" of about 0.029727 cu in, or about 7771 pennies per gallon.



Yes, but the pennies can't occupy the volume of the gallon perfectly due to their shape and the fact that they aren't hand-packed one at a time into the container. However, your calculation certainly gets us headed the right way. I say approx. $55.


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## BB

Contest anyone? :lolsign:

-Bill


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## Nitroz

Valpo Hawkeye said:


> Yes, but the pennies can't occupy the volume of the gallon perfectly due to their shape and the fact that they aren't hand-packed one at a time into the container. However, your calculation certainly gets us headed the right way. I say approx. $55.



Yes, the 7771 pennies would have to be perfectly packed. That was just something I googled and not my calculation.

If we had a contest, someone would need alot of pennies and settle on what to use for a gallon container.


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## Illum

weigh a single penny, then weigh an equivalent container, then weigh the container full of pennies

this'll give you a generalized idea of worth in cents


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## ABTOMAT

Pennies are worth more as metal (zinc alloy) than currency, I think.


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## swampgator

I have a quart jelly jar half full of pennies. Last count was less than $3.

But the quart jar of quarters is one day going to pay for my Corvette!


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## Morelite

I can tell you that a five gallon bucket (drywall joint compound) full will yield almost $400, Can't remember the exact figure but it was in the 390's. 

Oh, BTW, I gallon of quarters has yielded me close to $1,000


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## winny

Illum_the_nation said:


> weigh a single penny, then weigh an equivalent container, then weigh the container full of pennies



Good idea!

Better idea: Do the same but weigh ten pennies. That will give you ten times the accuracy. 

Even better: Coins are manufactured with very good precision. Your national bank can most likely provide you with a weight-figure for them, or perhaps google. Then do what Illum_the_nation suggested.


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## light_emitting_dude

So about $70-$80 for a gallon of pennies approximately? Sounds about right.
When I cash it in I will dig up this post and give the exact amount!


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## bwaites

Pennies aren't all copper, guys!! To use weight, you have to know the right alloy of zinc-copper (I think that is what pennies are now!) If I have it right, they are 97.5% zinc, 2.5% copper.

Bill


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## cave dave

a single penny weighs 0.1 oz

$10 worth would weigh over 6lbs

http://www.kokogiak.com/megapenny/1.asp


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## benchmade_boy

cave dave said:


> a single penny weighs 0.1 oz
> 
> $10 worth would weigh over 6lbs
> 
> http://www.kokogiak.com/megapenny/1.asp


wow mine weighs something like 30 or so pounds. how much would that be:thinking:


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## fire-stick

I'd like a 5 gallon jug of those sacagawea dollar!


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## Nitroz

benchmade_boy said:


> wow mine weighs something like 30 or so pounds. how much would that be:thinking:



Maybe around $50.


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## bjn70

My mother has 2 or 3 5-gallon jugs full of pennies.


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## KC2IXE

$54 - or at least that is what my gallon of pennies in a Gallo Wine "port" gallon was worth - plus a few cents


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## Trashman

bwaites said:


> To use weight, you have to know the right alloy of zinc-copper
> 
> Bill



No you don't! You only need to know the weight of a penny, the weight of the jar, and the weight of the jar with the pennies in it!

Back when I was 17 and had my first job working for Selecta Switch, Inc., I used to have to count their advertisement papers using a scale. I'd weight one single sheet of paper, set that as 1, and then drop any size stack of papers on the scale and it would actually count how many papers were on the scale! If there were a thousand sheets on the scale and I removed 1, it would register!


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## louie

cave dave said:


> a single penny weighs 0.1 oz



I just weighed 2 rolls of 50 on my digital scale and got 9.2 oz (264g), with the weight of 2 paper rolls less than .1 oz. (my scale only reads to tenths of oz)

So I guess 9.2 oz per dollar, or $1.74 per pound!


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## bwaites

Trashman, you are, of course, correct! IF...and only IF, you are are trying to figure how many pennies to the POUND.

The question is..."How much is a gallon of pennies worth?" That is a volume measurement, and to correctly estimate that, you must know several DIFFERENT things. 

1) Cubic measurement in cc's, or mm cubed, or cubic inches or cubic feet of a gallon.
2) The specific alloy.
3) The weight, by volume, of that alloy.

Bill


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## Lightmeup

Be careful when moving that jug around. It was designed to hold about 8 lb, not 80. It could easily break apart, and glass shards would be all over the place. I've seen it happen.


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## liqht

the alloy for pennies was changed in 1982 from 95% copper to 98% zinc with copper plating, so the weight will be different for older pennies and newer pennies. we all know pennies stay in circulation for a LONG time (you can still ocassionally get a wheat penny in change).

so if you're going by the weight method, you would have to consider the proportion of pre-1982 and post-1982 pennies you might have.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cent_(U.S._coin)


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## Trashman

bwaites said:


> Trashman, you are, of course, correct! IF...and only IF, you are are trying to figure how many pennies to the POUND.
> 
> The question is..."How much is a gallon of pennies worth?" That is a volume measurement, and to correctly estimate that, you must know several DIFFERENT things.
> 
> 1) Cubic measurement in cc's, or mm cubed, or cubic inches or cubic feet of a gallon.
> 2) The specific alloy.
> 3) The weight, by volume, of that alloy.
> 
> Bill




I thought you were talking about using the weight of the penny to estimate the amount of money in a full gallon jar (err, wait, that is what you're talking about!). I thought you were just over thinking it! (err, wait, I still think that!) The thing is, as others have pointed out, the way in which the pennies are arranged, or in this case, just happen to fall, in the jar is going to be a factor in how many pennies will fit in the gallon. It sounds, to me, that you're planning on melting the pennies down and then filling the gallon jar with the molten pennies, all the while, taking note of how many pennies worth of molten metal you've poured. As I type this, I'm even more convinced that you're over thinking the problem. The main thing to agree on, though, is that the pennies will never fall into the jar in exactly the same pattern, and sometimes, more pennies will with than at other times, just because of the randomness of their falling. A good scale will get you the right number every time, though there may slight differences due to the amount of dirt on each penny.


EDIT: After paying more attention to Light's post, above mine, I'm now wondering...what is the difference in weight between the new and old pennies? What do they each weigh?


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## Mike Painter

Trashman said:


> I thought you were talking about using the weight of the penny to estimate the amount of money in a full gallon jar (err, wait, that is what you're talking about!). I thought you were just over thinking it! (err, wait, I still think that!) The thing is, as others have pointed out, the way in which the pennies are arranged, or in this case, just happen to fall, in the jar is going to be a factor in how many pennies will fit in the gallon. It sounds, to me, that you're planning on melting the pennies down and then filling the gallon jar with the molten pennies, all the while, taking note of how many pennies worth of molten metal you've poured. As I type this, I'm even more convinced that you're over thinking the problem. The main thing to agree on, though, is that the pennies will never fall into the jar in exactly the same pattern, and sometimes, more pennies will with than at other times, just because of the randomness of their falling. A good scale will get you the right number every time, though there may slight differences due to the amount of dirt on each penny.



Agreed. To get an accurate and fairly precise answer to teh gallon question you would need a tube with and ID = the the diameter of a penny and a height that would hold a pint, quart, gallon of liquid.
Then put the pennies in and count. 
This could be calculated.
That half of the class will be given the needed information in inches, and pints. This half will use metric.
Winner gets the pennies.


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## Morelite

just for fun I weighed 10 pennies from the 1960's and got 1.105oz and I weighed 10 more pennies from the 2000's and got .885oz, so yes there is a 20% difference in pennies made before and after 1982.

Volume wise the count will be the same, but weighing to get a count will be off by as much as 20%.


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## Lynx_Arc

I once saved a plastic 2 Liter bottle of pennies, it holds about $30.00 worth not quite full and I took it to my bank and cut it open with a utility knife and poured them out in their bins. They didn't have anyone to count it so I got a receipt a few days later in the mail for the amount (deposit slip).


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## Trashman

Ain't that a *itch (scratch, scratch). Pre-'82 pennies weigh 3.1g and post weigh 2.5g. So, while you're separating your jar of pennies into two piles, you might as well just count them at the same time!

We could always get a decent estimate, though! My guess is that most of the pennies are post '82.


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## Morelite

Pre 1982 pennies are worth more in scrap copper value than they are as a penny. 100 pennies are worth one dollar in mometary value but they are worth $1.51 as copper (at the current scrap copper value of $2.20/lb)


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## Monocrom

Gallon of pennies?

I'd say, no more than $33.00


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## cave dave

Well according to the link I posted earlier, 1 cu ft of pennies in nice orderly stack is worth $491.52 (and weights 307 lbs)
1 ft3 = 7.481 Gal 

so one gallon would give *$65.70* and 41 lbs

I think it would end up being less since its not in a nice stack.


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## bwaites

There we go!


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## KC2IXE

65.70 is WAY High - at least for the gallon wine bottle I had - like I said, filled to the very top, it was $54 - not theory there - took a LOT of years to fill it with just pennies, but I did it - Call it "the experimental method" - I wrote down how much was in there on the label - still have it


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## liqht

i think you could use the displacement method to figure it out:

1) figure the volume occupied by a single penny (won't be 100% accurate, since pennies are not all identical; see Nitroz's post for dimensions)

2) with your pennies still in the jar, fill the jar to the top with water

3) pour the water into your precise lab equipment to measure the volume of water (won't be 100% accurate because some water will probably remain stuck to the pennies)

4) empty the pennies from the jar and fill it with water to the very top

5) pour the water into your precise lab equipment again to measure the volume

6) substract the "with pennies" volume of water from the "without pennies" volume and you will have the total volume of the pennies

7) divide the total volume of the pennies by the volume of a single penny to figure out how many pennies there are

there's no way this will be absolutely accurate, but you will probably get within $1!

then again, you could just count them by hand, but this would be more fun.


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## Trashman

My bank (Wescom Credit Union) provides free use of their counting machine! Counting up all those pennies would be absolutely painless! It's like the "CoinStar" machines in the supermarkets that charge 9% for using them, only its absolutely free for bank customers.


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## cave dave

I saw that some coinstar machines are surcharge free if you redeem the coins for Amazon.com certificates. 
Not available everywhere:
http://www.coinstar.com/us/WebDocs/A1-0-3-1

PS Amazon.com sells flashlights!


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## light_emitting_dude

Had to dig up my old post. Gentleman save those pennies! They may be worth more than you think! Like 5 times more. Read this article. 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070122/us_nm/usa_pennies_shortage_dc_1


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## LuxLuthor

cave dave said:


> I saw that some coinstar machines are surcharge free if you redeem the coins for Amazon.com certificates.
> Not available everywhere:
> http://www.coinstar.com/us/WebDocs/A1-0-3-1
> 
> PS Amazon.com sells flashlights!



I just finished using that machine to get an Amazon certificate for $186 of various coins. Works perfectly, and no surcharge.


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## leadfoot

Years ago redeamed a glass milk jug full of pennies to the base of neck.....49.12 exactly.

Leadfoot

PS sold the milk jug to the teller for 15.00.


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## PhotonBoy

light_emitting_dude said:


> Had to dig up my old post. Gentleman save those pennies! They may be worth more than you think! Like 5 times more. Read this article.


Gee, if that happens, Canadian coins will soon follow, otherwise they'd disappear quite quickly, either to be melted down or cashed in along with US pennies.


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## rscanady

It might be worth more than you think...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070122/us_nm/usa_pennies_shortage_dc

Ryan


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## light_emitting_dude

I have heard before about Uncle Sam wanting to eliminate the penny and round off to the nearest 5 cent. Could this be the beginning of the "end of the penny"? 

Wow if I could cash in my almost jar full of pennies for 5 cents on the penny I could get a few new lights too!


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## Big_Ed

Today I cashed in (3) 40 ounce peanut butter jars filled fully with quarters. It totalled $629.00. That's just over $209.50 per 40 ounce jar. The teller asked me how much I thought the total would be, and I said about $500 or so. It was a nice surprise!


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## Hayzues

$100. Well I once had a gallon of pennies (just pennies) and i took it to my nearest coinstar and i got $100 the machine charged me $10 at that time this was about 10 to 15 years ago. I thinnk around that time the coin machine was charging like $.08 cents per dolloar but yup i remember cuz i was very surprised someone paid me with that gallon for a very, very small job and i didnt want it. Good thing i took it


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## NoNotAgain

The Federal Reserve bank places a weight sticker on all bags of lose coin that they send to the banks so that they can provide rolled coins for merchants.

$50 pennies = 34 lbs
$200 nickels = 46 lbs
$1000 dimes = 49.8 lbs
$1000 quarters = 50.2 lbs

I knew a guy that would pay his tax bill every year with lose coin. He paid the armored car company to deliver them to the IRS and then the IRS paid the armored car company to haul them to the Federal Reserve bank.

The IRS will no longer accept coinage for tax payments.


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## Steve K

I'm surprised anyone would consider using an armored car to deliver a few thousand dollars of quarters, dimes, etc. I don't think I'd be willing to go to jail for a bunch of change that would be difficult to spend. 

My understanding is that change is only considered legal tender for modest values. Unless you are carrying gold coins in your pockets, nobody wants much of your change.


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## NoNotAgain

Steve K said:


> I'm surprised anyone would consider using an armored car to deliver a few thousand dollars of quarters, dimes, etc. I don't think I'd be willing to go to jail for a bunch of change that would be difficult to spend.
> 
> My understanding is that change is only considered legal tender for modest values. Unless you are carrying gold coins in your pockets, nobody wants much of your change.



You'd be surprised what people will attempt stealing. Google up copper wire thieves. Again Google up parking meter coin theft. I like this one. http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/20150306_State_not_probing_meter_coin_theft.html


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## Steve K

holy cow.... someone stole $850,000 of parking meter quarters?? I wouldn't have guessed that there were that many quarters in circulation!

If my math is correct, that's 42,500 pounds of quarters. How do you get rid of that many quarters? Sell them for half price at car washes? This has to involve organized crime, it would seem. Or criminals with a lot of spare time.


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## NoNotAgain

Hey, it's only 850 Federal Reserve bags.

Back when the first copper shortage happened, early 80's, I had a friend that ran a coin and currency room for a small 10 location back. He would send 400 bags of pennies a week to the Fed. I knew of a bank 75 miles away that was paying $1.05 for a dollars worth of pennies. I bought two weeks worth of pennies, loaded them on a car trailer and sold them off for a $2.50 profit per bag minus expenses.


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## crnorwood

A 100% full gallon is worth $77.71. It varies from jar to jar.


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## raggie33

im sure someone else said this but just weigh the penies then do simple math


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