W Quarters
Onastone
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Where are they? Which areas are getting these? It's October and I still haven't found one. In fact, this years new state quarters are far and few between. I'm in Massachusetts and I'm searching through one box a week...my only finds so far have been six silver quarters pre-64, one silver statehood quarter, and one proof. I've noticed the D minted quarters are in better condition than the P minted around here. I've found two rolls this summer that had a dime in place of a quarter, a couple bent, mutilated quarters, one from Canada and one from Bermuda. One with a piece of gum stuck on it, and one with an M&M mashed into it.
Roll searching is sure dirty work. And yet, not a single W Quarter! Where are they? How many have been found so far? How long will these quarters be stuck in rolls and discovered into the future???
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Just luck. Better chance if you have a solid new box. Haven’t found any myself yet
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I have been through 47 boxes and have only found 13.
I have few answers for your questions, however I'm in AZ and have found three of the American Memorial Park W qtrs. recently. I'm not a roll searcher I own a small vending company and found these as I was counting the change I receive. These are the only ones I have seen so far, it seems that most have been found by the guys that are buying massive quantities.
My Collection of Old Holders
Never a slave to one plastic brand will I ever be.
@coinbuf ....I am currently in AZ for a few days.... will make some cash purchases and see if I get any here....Cheers, RickO
P and D mint coins are being issued in monster bags directly to the Fed Branch banks for rolling and distribution. The West Point W's are being sent separately to the Fed Branch banks where they get "sprinkled/salted" into the Ps or Ds (as applicable) during the rolling process. Fed banks are releasing them to armored car carriers who service local banks and businesses. Cities with or near a Fed branch bank are seeing the bulk of Unc. W's. They will eventually reach further out destinations.
Banks get their quarters (and other coins and currency) from local armored car carriers. These carriers get their quarters from two places.
(1) 95% of the time: Recycled dirty old quarters they pick up from businesses and banks (the carrier re-rolls and boxes them in 50 roll, $500 boxes and resupplies local businesses/banks).
(2) 5% of the time: When additional supplies are needed they get coins from the fed bank that were rolled by the fed bank. In my area fed bank rolls tend to show up in flat $500 brick boxes with the viewing holes on top of the box. One out of twenty boxes I have acquired came from the fed branch bank with these holes in the top, but not all of these boxes have new coins where one finds the bulk of the unc. W's. I'm seeing two other type $500 boxes, apparently carrier supplied with recycled quarter rolls. I have found a few boxes of nothing but new quarter rolls in these carrier boxes.
Once can usually look at the ends of a bank roll and tell if new quarters are in the roll. If the end quarters are both dirty old quarters, then 99.99999% of the time everything in the roll is a dirty old quarter. Don't bother to open these rolls. Any W that might be in these rolls (not common this early in the distribution) has been in circulation and got re-rolled with the dirty old quarters.
Usually when you find a roll of new quarters in a bank box, all 50 rolls will be the same new quarters. Not uncommon to have a few dirty quarters in these "new coin" rolls. These "mother lode" boxes are where the bulk of all unc. W's are being found. A "mother lode" box will normally contain 50 to 150 new W's all of the same type. I visit numerous banks. Some I buy from, some I sell unsearched dirty old rolls back to and at some I exchange opened box for sealed box. Opened rolls of non-W coins go in the coinstar.
Note of interest: Lowell rolls do not contain Lowell W's. The non-W Lowells were sent out and rolled at the Fed banks before the Lowell W was issued to the Fed banks. The Lowell W's (as well as the American Memorial W's) got mixed in with the American Memorial non-W's. A Mariana American Memorial new roll can include either of these W's but I have not seen both at the same time in a single roll.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
I live in Maryland and I have found 3 so far and my uncle in the same area has found one... Two Lowell’s and Two AMP. See many war in the Pacific Ps and a few Ds but no Ws. Have yet to see any San Antonio’s.
First of all - WOW derryb! I may have asked in another thread, but have you had any trouble giving the vast quantities back to the banks? Have they charged you a fee for returning them? Someone mentioned this as an issue in another thread.
I too have not found a single W quarter in circulation (also in MA) but I don't buy very much with cash.
Most banks will not deal boxes with you if you do not have an account with them. Helps to open a savings account to increase your pool of available banks. I find Wells Fargo has given me the most new coin rolls with W's in them.
Rolls I'm returning are unopened, and still in carrier's paper. Didn't need to open them, ends told me they were dirty old quarters. Since they remain in their original wrappers, these rolls look just like the ones the bank pulls from a new box it opens. They don't mind taking them but will let you know if they have too many stockpiled. Some of my banks quit ordering from the carrier (at a fee) and just depend on me to bring them good looking rolls. Sometimes I take the cash, sometime I deposit into my account.
Opened coins (not really that many once you know which rolls to open) go in the coinstar. An alternative would be to reroll them in aftermarket wrapper and take them to the bank.
Never visit the same bank branch more than once a week. Never more than 50 rolls returned per visit. Don't make work difficult for the tellers helping you out. A gift card here and there helps.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
Out of 47 boxes, 1 box was solid War in Pac. 2 coins were found, 2 boxes were solid American Mem. 1 coin was found, 44 boxes were mixed circulated 10 found. All but 2 coins have been BU/UNC the 2 were high AU. I buy from banks and return to Credit Union coin counter machines. The most I have found in 1 box was 4 and it was a mixed box, all 4 were Am. Mem.
Edited to add: Ooops, I forgot that 1 box was solid San Antonio and 1 coin was found. 43 boxes mixed.
sounds like the "salter" in your area put most of the salt in his pocket.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
Thanks @derryb.
Reply quote so I can find this/your post.
Good luck and enjoy the nice weather while you are here.
My Collection of Old Holders
Never a slave to one plastic brand will I ever be.
Not found any and not seen any at coin shows either.
Well from everyone that responded above, that's just over 30 W Quarters found. I'm trying to figure how diluted they will be in rolls and in distribution. Ten million sounds like a lot, but divided up by every state and how many banks?!?!? Personally I don't think they'll all be found.
Sounds like I need to take a trip up to Boston and look for some Fed Branch Banks...
The 12 Federal Reserve banks and their 24 branches do not do business with the general public. But if you can get some boxes from a bank(s) in/near a city that has a fed branch bank, your odds greatly improve.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
Everytime I read the title to this thread I think tungsten quarters.
W=wolfram=tungsten. 
"A dog breaks your heart only one time and that is when they pass on". Unknown
Has anybody checked out the US Mint sales office located at HQ in Washington DC.
Don't know if they still have a vending machine that dispensed new quarters as well as a machine that does the same at shows they attend or did they discontinue that practice as well?
For example did The US mint have one at the ANA show in Chicago?
Hang in there roll nerds! They are out there!
Not sure if there's any other way than just going through boxes and hoping for the best. So far I have found 3 Lowells and one AMP. I disagree with the idea that you should not bother with rolls that look like they have old coins in them. I found all of these in rolls with everything from old silver (just a couple) to 1965-1919, to some foreign coins, and a couple of electrical box knock-outs just for good measure. I feel like I'm doing okay....enough to keep my hopes up anyway. Actually I found 2 in the first box, and figured this would be easy! Jokes on me, probably 10 boxes later and I'm up to 4...sounds like I'm doing well from what I read in this thread though.
You do have to wonder though how foolproof the "salter" idea is. One guy at my local club (I'm in MN) found a whole roll of Lowell "W"s. That's not supposed to happen, right? He made out well on that find, believe you me! Also have to wonder how many of these end up somehow stashed away to be "found" later as someone has suggested. My take is they are probably pretty strict about that, and security probably pretty tight at the Fed. The vault companies...not so much. One of our local branches got caught taking silver out of Kennedy rolls a few years back, that's supposed to e a no-no.
Strictness comments:
Mint, yes
Federal Reserve, yes
Federal Reserve contractors, maybe
Regional Banks, maybe
Local Banks, maybe
Everywhere else, no
Regardless of the “strictness” throughout the distribution channel all it takes is one employee to make make or break it.
My PMD cent opinion.
I've been going through a box a week with some odd results. Huge amount of Memorial P&D's; hundreds and hundreds, Found two W's early on and that's been it. Lowell's, WiP's, and Missions have been very rare in general. Definitely no W's.
Hemisperical, re your comment: "Regardless of the “strictness” throughout the distribution channel all it takes is one employee to make make or break it".
Methinks an employee at the Mint would be subject to more procedural oversight than some guy down at the local Dunbar Carrier. Do wonder how a whole roll could get through to the local bank without somebody up the food chain saying "yeah, let's do that to make it fun".
Anyway...it's fun enough to keep us doing it
Agree. Therefore the strictness... as it gets further away from government handling the “strictness” of oversight is “looser.”
My WAG is the roll finds are occurring when a contractor rolls the big bags and happens to find and roll the Ws seperately.
Or, when someone has the $51,500.00 to do a bulk purchase of ATB quarters since it is not limited to dealers. Just need to pay and provide your own transportation to haul one of these from the Mint.
https://catalog.usmint.gov/bulk-purchase-program-landing.html#atb
$51,500.00 ?? That's a lot of quarters. Are they loose? I think our local bank would hate me if I brought those in to their coin counter!!!
I found 24 of the Lowells way back when it was them w/ Early Find but, I haven't seen any of the newer models yet.
Yes, loose (200,000 quarters, $50,000) in that very large mint bag at about 2500 lbs. $1500 (3%) is the processing fee.
Skip to about 1:07 in the vid for a look-see at the bag and the seeding of the West Point quarters into a bag.
I believe that I have only seen a total of three 2019 quarters in circulation so far through 15 October - two Lowells and one Mariana. Nothing W Mint marked. Local economy is on the slow side. People use debit cards and credit cards more, and cash less than in the past.
Of course, I should have thought of this! The cards are slowing down the progress of the cash.
I have found only one so far, and that was from a register.
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Update: I've to date found 3 Lowells, one WIP and one Am Mem in rolls.
So here's a dumb line of questions...anybody know how many quarters are in circulation at any given time? If the Mint is making almost 2 billion quarters a year (like 1.85 in 2018) do they dump them all into circulation? Really? So the increase in the money supply is almost 2 billion...just in quarters? Every year? That seems...impossible. Doesn't seem like very many quarters go AWOL each year either, so the circulating supply would seem to be growing...by that much annually? Nah...what am I missing here?
Philly and Denver Mints send the new Ps & Ds to Fed branch banks in monster bags. With each monster bag each of the two mints send a small quantity of West Point coins that arrived from the West Point Mint. It is my understanding that the W's get salted and rolled with the non-W's by contracted armored car carriers (i.e. Brinks) for initial distribution. All new coins enter distribution via the Fed branch banks. This is why virgin, unc. W's are found only in boxes of nothing but that particular new coin.
My experience after searching approx. 25 boxes a week since the W's were first released: W's found mixed with dirty old quarters have already been in circulation and have found their way back to re-rolling. They may look unc., but they are not. Note that a few dirty old quarters can appear in a roll of new coins. Probably left over in the rolling tubs. I have found over a thousand W's but never a full roll of W's. Most in a roll for me has been five with an average of about .5 per roll from a box of shiny new coins.
I quit opening rolls of dirty old quarters a while back. It's not worth the one or two circulated W's occasionally found. When you open a box of new, shiny quarters (the mother lode) you know you have something right away.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
There is a cycle to our coinage. Quoted from the US Dept. of the Treasury:
"How do our coins enter circulation?"
"The United States Mint ships its coins to Federal Reserve Banks, which are responsible for putting coins and paper money into circulation and also for withdrawing them from circulation when they are worn out.
When a private bank needs coins to provide to you and its other customers, it purchases them from a Federal Reserve Bank. Banks have checking accounts at the Federal Reserve Banks, just as you do at your bank. To buy cash for you, your bank uses special checkbook money called a “reserve balance.” The coins make their way back to the Federal Reserve Bank at some point because banks often accumulate more cash than they need for day-to-day transactions. They deposit the excess cash into their checking account at a local branch of the Federal Reserve Bank until their customers need it. Coins circulate from the Federal Reserve Bank to the private banks to you and back again until they are worn out, unfit for circulation. The Federal Reserve replaces those coins by ordering new ones from the U.S. Mint—and once those coins are minted, a new circulation cycle begins. A circulating coin generally lasts 30 years or longer."
There are supposed to be about 28 billion in circulation, circulating for 25-30 years before removed. So a lot of our coins are being taken out of circulation all the time.
Good info on the Fed banks but it leaves out the roll of the contracted armored carriers (i.e. Brinks). It is my understanding that these carriers maintain their own used coin inventory and do their own in house rolling to keep local businesses and banks supplied. It is also my understanding that the carriers go to the Fed banks for inventory of new coins when demand dictates a need for more coins than the carrier has in inventory. Would be nice if one of our members had the actual inside skinny on how this works.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
The FED doesn't actually do this work now days. They contract it out to counting houses like Brinks or Purolator.
Once coins enter circulation via a Fed branch bank, do you know if all future handling of the coins is conducted outside of the Fed facility (i.e. the armored carrier's location) or do all used coins get cycled back through the Fed branch where contracted carriers perform the work?
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
Finally! I found not one, but two 'W' mintmarks this morning! One Lowell and one War in the Pacific!
I gave a few out that I had to buy from a guy who is using a lot of cash flow to pluck them out. Have not seen any in change so figured I will buy the other series once the market drops on them. I was thinking about this the other day. Urr
Best place to buy !
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I believe each is getting 800k-1M and are released when Rolls are available to buy. So check the PD bags rolls schedule dates then figure 3 weeks after then to start seeing. Others are forking out 50k to search a monster amount to cherry pick em.
Best place to buy !
Bronze Associate member
Didn’t the first W coin show up in error in an uncirculated coin set? Or am I misremembering that point?
Best place to buy !
Bronze Associate member
The FED is pretty much out of the loop now days.
This might apply a little differently in different FED branches but at least in Chicago they barely touch coins at all now days. They have an awful lot still in storage (as of ~2005) but there's no hands on involvement with coins.
I don't know how close their relationship is with the carriers but I'm sure they set the guidelines and do at least watch over their shoulders.
I think the first W was handed out in change. And I think the last W was found before it was officially released.
I can't imagine forking over 50k to search through a monster amount. How long would it take to search through that?
Haven't been following the "W" quarters at all. Like barely even knew it was a thing. Figured the "W" was for West Point at that it must be something unusual but had no intention of looking.
Last month I was going through the quarters from my 6 coin ops looking for silver before cashing them in.
You can tell mint-fresh coins from even months old uncirculated quarters by how orange and fiery the copper is. They're both really bright and orange, but the newest of the new often stands out by comparison. It helps to have a bunch of material.
On a whim, I grabbed the 6 or 8 freshest looking quarters out of one handful and scanned them with my loop. The second one was this. I slapped it into a flip, threw it on a shelf and the rest back in the sack, and cashed 'em in. It was a week before I even remembered that I'd grabbed it.
--Severian the Lame
I was going through the quarters from my 6 coin ops looking for silver before cashing them in.
That' a cool story! Good job in finding one! Somebody spent it without even knowing it was a rarity.
About a month ago on a whim, I went into my Chase Branch to order a Box of Quarters. To my surprise, the young Lady said Yes you can get a Box of Quarters ! And to my extreme surprise she said I could get one NOW, no ordering required. 😆
Well, I got them home and to my dismay, found them to be mixed circulated Rolls. I never did open any of the Rolls. Should I ? Any chance I will find even 1 W Quarter ?
I had the impression they were only mixing in the W's wiith new Coins.
Not likely to have any W's but if it does they (it) will be a circulated one that found it's way back to the rolling machine. New unc. W's appear only in a roll of new, similar P or D coins. And these new rolls normally appear only in a box of similar rolls. Possible to purchase one of these rolls at a bank if they removed it from a box of new coins. Bought six rolls of new coins a while back, contained a few new W's. You gotta take what they give you whether it's a box or a roll.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt
There is a chance. However slim. @derryb is right, you need a new box....that's where you find the most, usually, and the highest quality. But it is kind of fun with an old box too, when you see a silver coin, it really stands out!
W’s were not placed into any sets. Only can be found via normal circulation route. Mint to Federal Reserve (and Fed Reserve Contractors) to Banks to businesses/people.
https://www.usmint.gov/news/inside-the-mint/mint-releases-first-ever-w-quarters-into-circulation
The River is flowing! Within the next few days we should hear about the first finds submitted to out host.
I've been following this thread with great interest and finally decided to sign up and join in!
I live in a mid-sized city, about 200 miles from the nearest release city. Starting in April, I would get 2 test rolls from the bank a few times a week looking for W's. It had been pretty dry all year until the end of September, when I got rolls of brand new War in the Pacific quarters, starting a 6 week (and counting) frenzy of bank hopping and roll/box gathering! Our area must have gotten a shipment around then, and that shipment is still producing- while the new coins much less frequently found vs. a few weeks ago, there are still pockets - I just got a box from the bank today with the WIP quarters.
My bank uses Loomis, and based on how I've been getting my W's, they may distribute coins a little differently compared to derryb's city. All coins, whether recycled or 95-100% new, come in "Loomis" wrappers. The distribution of W's has also been interesting - this has been my general observation, though my sample sizes aren't that big. This must be a function of where in the "monster bag" the coins came from, as I'm not sure if the whole bag gets "salted" evenly
Week 1: W in every 2-3 rolls of brand new quarters
Week 2-present: W in every 7-10 rolls of brand new quarters
Week 3-present: Some boxes of brand new quarters had no W's in them
Week 3-5: Some rolls I found during this period had 50% new quarters, and 50% recycled circulated quarters. These rolls averaged a W in every 2-3 rolls. These were actually my most productive rolls, as one of them produced 3 W's, and a couple others had 2 W's!
I've also found 3 W Lowells (circulated) and 3 W AMPs (circulated) in rolls, though I don't remember a cache of either type hitting our city (at least through my bank) this year. San Antonio Mission or the River (I know, it's early) coins of any type haven't shown up as of yet.
The new WIP quarters arrived in my city 3+ months after their initial release, so I'm hoping for another wave in a few months of the San Antonio Mission or the River of No Return coins!
I've been comparing notes with an acquaintance (in a release city), who hasn't had much luck so far. Most banks there use something other than Loomis (Brink's maybe? The rolls have "$10 Quarters" written along the circumference of each edge of the roll, with no writing in the middle). Based on derryb's comments, I'll tell him to look for the "fed boxes" with the holes - they may have a different wrapper too ("$10 Quarters" written horizontally across the roll). I may drive to my release city this weekend to sample the landscape - based on my roll gathering there, it seems like a Brink's town. Different distributors seem to have different methods, and it's been fun sleuthing and trying to piece everything together.
What I've said is all conjecture based on my observation and trying to put 2 and 2 together. Thank you for sharing your experiences with the W quarters; seeing the "W" pop out on a roll has rekindled my passion for this hobby! If I have more W-related experiences, I will definitely post to this thread!
Good luck everybody! I hope you all find some nice "salt"!
@MercsNWalkers welcome to the CU forums.
Thank you for posting your experience and observation on these W-quarters.
Another thread(s) you might be interested in reading about the Ws.
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1027805/w-idaho-2019-quarter-quest-thread#latest
Links to the other quarters are generally at the end of each thread.
Enjoying the hunt!
This is the week that worries me! If I ever get a box of brand new quarters, I'd better find a W in good shape! But I know they can't be in every box, the way they are salted in makes me think it'll be feast or famine.
Quite interesting to hear your best finds were in rolls that were 50/50. That's similar to my find, only my rolls were more like 5/95. I'm heading to the bank for another box, fingers crossed, the great W hunt continues!!!!!!!!!