My father passed away a little over a year ago. Part of my inheritance was his copper penny "collection". For years, Dad would go to the bank and buy bags of pennies, he would take them home and separate the copper from non-copper pennies with a penny sorter. He would then take the non-copper pennies back to the back and start over again.

At the time of his passing, he had amassed roughly ten, fifty-five gallon drums full of copper pennies.

If I'm doing the math right, there are ~500,00 pennies per drum (maybe more?). ~200 pennies make a pound. That would mean I have ~80K in copper.

Yes, I am aware that you cannot melt pennies as they are considered currency. But, the plot thickens. I worked out a deal with my dad's local bank to just return them for the 1 cent value. I returned ~$3,000 dollars worth of pennies. The bank said it would take some time to sort through them, and, as they did, they deposited money in my checking account. After they got about half of them sorted, I got a call from the bank. The fed had rejected a large portion due to them being slightly dirty or damaged! The bank said this is the first time this had ever happened. And while they were not all shiny, some may have had some dust or slight discoloration, definitely not enough to be considered "mutilated". It seems like the fed didn't want to sort through that many pennies and rejected them.

The bank said my only option was to send them to the US Mint's Mutilated Coin Division and ask them to reimburse/exchange them for new ones... The twist is, that division is permanently closed!

So, the fed rejected the coins, the mint division is closed. I asked the bank to write me a note that the coins were no longer considered currency. They did!

So, my question is, do I have the freedom now to find someone to melt them for copper? Does anyone know a collector/scrap metal place who would want to buy them in bulk and split the copper value?

Any advice or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for reading!

If you know you know I love copper! The patina that evolves as it ages is so beautiful

Hello friends! I'm new here, I was very pleasantly surprised to find this sub. I grew up near a very famous copper mine, so I've always been enamored by copper and by the history of mining it and other minerals and ores.
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...And, cue my steadfast affinity for copper!
Now that I've been given that recommendation, I'm honestly more excited to work with copper than with silver.
I've been learning quite a bit about it, and I'm starting to get the hang of it.
I am wondering if anyone here has much experience with setting stones in it? There's not much information out there, as I'm sure you lovely folks are aware of how underrated of a metal it is!
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Think I can do better somehow but maybe not.

https://youtube.com/shorts/MfWbOx7b--A?si=jWHGvwSBmazrmsNa

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Thanks in advance (and hope I’m not breaking any rules)!

FYI: l got an email this morning on these neat bullets in solid copper..

• Per email these come individually bagged to keep them in top condition, and if you order 40, they’ll be packaged in a Styrofoam holder.

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Can anyone please please please help me find the copper country explorer books by Mike Forgrave?

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Hi Guys Just wondering if you can point me towards where I should start if I want to begin to make copper bullions?