I'm starting a series on coin counters, by the end you'll have a better understanding of what your circulated coins go through. First is the oldest coin sorter in our collection. A 1940's model. It counts up to 300 coins a minute. Coins are poured into the tray with the holes in it and are inspected and debris and foreign objects are removed. The coin is then pushed into the machine where the rotating discs with the scallops in it picks them up and brings them up to the hole at the top. Gravity pulls the coin in and in slides down a V shaped channel which determines which meter it trips to count. At the bottom the coins are pulled out of the channels by a metal bar that ejects them into the individual drawers. As the drawers fill a lever on the right side of the machine empties the top drawer into the lower drawer allowing the machine to continue to run while the lower drawer is pulled out and emptied. The meters on the left keep track of the counts for each individual denomination. These machines were designed for the most common 5 denominations in use at this time, cents, nickels, dimes, quarters, and halves. Diameter size determined how far down the V channel the coins could go. Which trips the count meter for that denomination and which drawer the coin will be dropped into so that your piggy bank is now sorted and counted. This system is still in use today in some models of counters except most use sensors to do the counting now as you will see in later machines.
Nice machine. I remember that model fondly. How many counters/sorters do you have? Interesting collection.
We have over a dozen different models. Not all on display, some are in storage. The company has been in business for over 65 years, and most of these have come in on trade.
No wonder the coins look beat up by the time I see them. LOL Thanks for the post, love those old machines.
Admittedly, I had to read and re-read your explanations several times while comparing with the pics. Thanks for this post. I have some questions but they have less to do with your descriptions (which are quite good), and more to do with the fact that some things have to be seen to be understood. I wonder what causes the individual counting meters to trip as the coins go down the V-Channel. Just curious. Also, what makes the top drawer transfer its contents into the lower one? Is this done by someone periodically or is it mechanically triggered (and if so, how?) Finally, if you've got 10 of these in a room, it'd be quite loud, I suppose.
In answer to your questions , the coins set in the channels as the channels move through a series of levers that are connected to the meter for each denomination with the halves at the top of the v and dimes at the bottom. The operator has to trip the lever on the right side of the drawer manually to empty the top drawers. And yes it can get loud when running these machines. Thanks for the interest.