There once was a man who had a small nickel mine in upstate New York. He had a lot of friends in Washington DC. He used his friends in Washington to convince others that the large cent was too large, and they should make a smaller coin valued 1 cent with a copper nickel alloy, (the nickel coming from his mine). This worked pretty well, the new coin coming out in 1857. However, a pesky Civil War broke out and pretty soon even the new cents were being hoarded due to nickel composition. After a while, private citizens started issuing copper only cent tokens, the mint noticed people accepted them, so the mint started making copper only cents. Well the nickel miner didn't like this. He went to his friends again and now said, "its silly to have silver 3 cent pieces, they are all being hoarded. Surely a nickel 3 cent piece would not be hoarded". They started making nickel-copper 3 cent pieces but the volume was not great, (since no one really wanted a 3 cent piece anyway). Well, Mr. nickel miner noticed ANOTHER tiny silver coin, this one the half dime, and used his Washington friends once again to make a change and start making a nickel-copper 5 cent piece. That is where we are today 150+ years later.
My question wasn't worded properly I suppose. Should have been: Why is 5 cent CuNi alloy, while 10 cent and 25 cent are CuNi clad over Cu core?
Because the nickel was created in 1866 before vending machines. Its specs are the same since then. The other coins were meant as a replacement of silver coins, so made to be used in vending machines seemlessly the same as silver coins.
Believe it or not - vending machines. Many of the coin alloy design choices of the 20th century came down to vending machines. In the 1800s, this wasn't a huge issue - the coins could be made of a pure CuNi alloy (which is much easier to make than a clad coin). However, when they were transitioning from silver to clad coinage, vending machines had become big business. Vending machines use the electromagnetic signature of a coin to determine if it is authentic or counterfeit, and what denomination it is. So, the replacements for silver coins had to have the same electromagnetic signature as silver coins. Hence, the clad design. Interestingly enough, a similar reason was why we ended up with the silver-manganese War nickels instead of some other alloy.
a quarter costs like 9 cents to make. a dime costs like 4 cents to make. a nickel costs like 8 cents to make. a cent costs like 2 cents to make. Now.... A quarter weighs 5.67g A dime weighs 2.27g A nickel weighs 5.00g A cent weighs 2.5g So if you make a nickel out of copper plated Zinc like the cent, it's going to cost 4 cents to make. If you made it out of clad, it's going to cost around 8 cents to make. in the case of clad, the savings isn't there. in the case of the copper plated zinc. the savings isn't there either unless you went to the zincoln formula, and even then it's a 1 cent savings. and this isn't even factoring the weight or size differences that might push it up further in cost in order to match size for the weight of the composition. As it stands the nickel is 75%-25% copper/nickel to begin with. the savings really isn't' there to do it so it's stayed the way it is. I guess it's possible to use a zinc core, then copper nickel plate that and it would be the same color, no idea on what weight it would be but could be a gram or so lighter and not sure if it functions right in machines either.
Well, the outside layers of clad coins are exactly the same composition as the five-cent piece, but the interior is just copper. So, a five-cent piece is 75% copper and 25% nickel throughout; a clad coin works out to 8 1/3 percent nickel, the rest copper. (The outer layers constitute about a third of the coin's weight, and the copper core two-thirds, if I'm right.)
Anyone ever look at that photo? I have seen the meme before, but I hate it. Look at it any of you math minded people. Bunch of gobblygook pretending to be important looking. Does that make me a geek or a math nerd?
That's exactly why I find it funny, there's stick figures, houses, a mountain vista, a light bulb and I think that's pac-man over his shoulder pretending to be a pie chart. My younger brother has a degree in mathematics when I sent it to him I think his brain exploded also. Hahaha.
I don't often cover a wall with what I imagine to be math symbols, but when I do, I always throw in some organic chemistry diagrams. And I get those completely wrong, too.
