Old British Coins - What to do with them??

bella2121

Hope someone can help. My Grandad gave me a tin of old british coins, I dont believe any of them to be of major value, I have looked on the net and nothing jumps out. However they are just sat in a cupboard doing nothing. Anyone any ideas what to do with them, can you cash old coins in?

Thanks in advance

SailorSam

Put them in a picture frame and make a wall display.

lincroft1710

AFAIK you can't cash them in.

lilac_lady

Keep them for children/grandchildren's show and tell day at school.

Use them as stakes in family card games. Money goes back in the tin at the end of the games.

bella2121

Thanks for your replies i'll bear them in mind, there are literally loads and they weigh a ton! lol can you weigh them in as scrap metal i wonder?

SailorSam

Can you weld ?
If there's loads of them instead of a picture frame display, could you design some sort of sculpture.
Maybe even super-glue them together, or if you have a glass coffee table put them under the glass.

This is the sort of thing i was thinking about, just to give you some ideas

Gifts - perfect gift

geordie_joe

bella2121 wrote: »

Thanks for your replies i'll bear them in mind, there are literally loads and they weigh a ton! lol can you weigh them in as scrap metal i wonder?

I'm sure i've seen people selling coins by weight on ebay. Sort of along the lines of 1kg of mixed coins, all British and in various denominations.

I doubt you'd get much for them, but if you look on ebay and find the smallest weights selling, then divide your coins into that weight you might get enough to make it worth it.

Personally I would just dig a deep hole and bury them, it might make someone happy in a thousand years time.

But if I was going to go to all that effort I'd really have a laugh doing it. I'd do things like;

I'd buy a load of cheap spoons, find a nice field and bury 1 spoon and two pennies in the same hole, I'd do this many times all over the field. Then bury 1 spoon with 20 pennies and pee myself laughing at the thought of the archaeologists trying to work it out in a thousand years.

"We don't know what the connection between spoons and pennies was, but we think they worshipped spoons because they buried them with two pennies. And this spoon must be very special, because it was buried with twenty pennies."

geordie_joe

Another idea, back in the late 70's my sister got a necklace for her 18th birthday, it was made from 18 sixpences, one minted in each year she'd been alive.

Maybe drill a small hole in a coin, add a chain, and sell it to someone who was born the year it was minted.

geordie_joe

Just done a search on ebay for "1959 coin", because that's the year i was born.

Came up with loads of auctions but look at this

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1959-Birth-Year-HaPenny-Coin-Birthday-Keyring-Gift-/320492133033?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item4a9ed1daa9

Not a lot of money but he's sold 6 so far.

The search I did threw up loads of things, coins made into pendants, necklaces, cufflinks, bookmarks etc.

I thought old coins were worthless, unless they were special. But it seems they can be worth something to the person who was born in the year they were minted if you can turn them into something useful/decorative.

Lady_Python

There is one old penny that's very valuable because only a small amount were minted. The date is 1933.

http://www.2-clicks-coins.com/article/rare-british-coins.html

I remember using old money before decimalisation. Sixpence (6d - equal to 2 1/2p these days) bought all my comics for the week plus a huge bag of sweets - and I still had change.

When the government of the time change to decimalisation we suddenly went from 240 pennies to the pound to 100 pence to the pound - yet they said it wouldn't fuel inflation.

The day after decimalisation my friend and I went to the ice rink. In old money it cost 2/6d (half crown), equal to 12 1/2p to get in and 6d, equal to 2 1/2p to hire our skates. We found the cost had gone up to 15p (3/-) and 5p (1/- that is one shilling). We didn't have enough money so went home very disappointed and more than a bit angry.

Even as 14 year olds, it was obvious that overnight inflation was going to spiral, which it did.

I still convert into "old" (REAL) money even at the present day.

I also refuse to use metric measures as being taught in Imperial measures I utterly detest metric.

scotsbob

Check the silver ones, especially those minted before 1947, they have a high silver content and will sell easily.

One dealer is currently paying £18.70 for £1 face value.