Examples of Coins as Tools...

savoyspecial

I am looking for examples of coins fashioned into tools (spurs, pie crimpers, gears, working dies, etc.)


Recently I was able to pick up this example, a 1797 British Cartwheel doubling as a makeshift county seal (Linntown?)

MacCrimmon

krueger

I believe the large cartwheel 2 pence pieces of great britain (of1787?) were designed
to be a sort of a weight for scales. British experts check me out on this. If true then they probably can be said to be a tool also.
Do some research on this. I think i saw this info in an auction cat somewhere.

great idea for a collection.

Krueger

BigAlan

I think everyone has used a cent or dime as a screwdriver

SaorAlba

<< <i>I believe the large cartwheel 2 pence pieces of great britain (of1787?) were designed
to be a sort of a weight for scales. British experts check me out on this. If true then they probably can be said to be a tool also.
Do some research on this. I think i saw this info in an auction cat somewhere.

great idea for a collection.

Krueger >>



The 1797 Penny weighed 1oz, the Twopence weighed 2 ounces. When they were not well worn they were indeed used as weights. In a more macabre and final usage they were often used to keep the eyelids of dead folks shut during the funeral and were buried as a result. In a survey in Yorkshire in the 1840's they were still fairly prominent in quantity in transactions.

WillieBoyd2

I keep two silver dollars on tables and use them to discharge static electricity
that builds up sometimes when I walk in my apartment.

IloiloKano

<< <i>I keep two silver dollars on tables and use them to discharge static electricity
that builds up sometimes when I walk in my apartment.

>>


I'll trade you a static mat for your two silver dollars. Deal?

WillieBoyd2

I will keep them.

I have a solution and it works.

Andres

a device /tool made from a dutch nickel , a cent and a half cent cut in half = 6 1/4 cent total , pronounced in dutch as : zes en een kwart
nickname for Reichskommissar Seyss Inquart , who was the topdog in WW2 in the Netherlands.
device was used to quickly put out your cigarette in an ashtray, some sort of joke to show your feelings about the much hated Reichskommissar.

SaorAlba

My daughter has a bracelet made from those stuiver coins from Netherlands Antilles.

YQQ

way back some people needed washers for the knobs on kitchen cabinets.
Large penny was the cheapest I guess. I have a few of them.

Rickc300

I remember reading somewhere that Big Ben had a stack of pennies being used as weights or balances in some way on the pendulum, anyone know for sure? wonder how old they are and if I could trade some steel washers for them? edited to add this....

I did a quick check and found lots of info, here is one linky from google

Rick

RobP

<< <i>

<< <i>I believe the large cartwheel 2 pence pieces of great britain (of1787?) were designed
to be a sort of a weight for scales. British experts check me out on this. If true then they probably can be said to be a tool also.
Do some research on this. I think i saw this info in an auction cat somewhere.

great idea for a collection.

Krueger >>



The 1797 Penny weighed 1oz, the Twopence weighed 2 ounces. When they were not well worn they were indeed used as weights. In a more macabre and final usage they were often used to keep the eyelids of dead folks shut during the funeral and were buried as a result. In a survey in Yorkshire in the 1840's they were still fairly prominent in quantity in transactions. >>



The covering of the deceased's eyes with pennies is something that still happens occasionally. Only this week I sold a pair of 1937 pennies to someone from the NE of England for his father's funeral. 1937 being the year of his birth.

Andres

covering the eyes with coins of the deceased, is an ancient ritual first performed by the Greek,
sometimes they also put a coin (an obool) in the mouth of the deceased , to pay the ferryman Charon
to get the deceased at the other side of the river Styx, into the underworld (Hades)
also still performed in some parts of Indonesia.

theboz11

gecko109

The two examples I can think of are, I use a U.S. nickel to make sure my pocket digital scale is accurate....it weighs 5 grams exactly.

Also, in Chicago we have fire hydrants with pentagon nuts. One of the wrenches we use is made of cast aluminum, so the pentagon on the wrench begins to round out ever so slightly after alot of use. A good hydrant man always keep a quarter in his firecoat to place against one of the sides of the pentagon nut on the hydrant just before slipping on the worn wrench. It grabs like new.