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BorosilicateArachnid — Coin Rings
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Published: 2007-08-05 06:13:07 +0000 UTC; Views: 1878; Favourites: 21; Downloads: 15
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Before you say anything: As far as I can tell, this is not illegal. Coins have a value unto themselves (metal composition) unlike bills, which are stamped "legal tender" and constitute government documents. At any rate, the law, as I have seen it worded is that fraudulently defacing currency is illegal, such as trying to pass off a $10 bill as a $100 by altering the text.Both rings are made from quarters, which are a layer of copper between two layers of cupronickel. The top ring is slightly larger (and hence, narrower) and has been painted with strong liver of sulfur solution to turn the surface of the copper band into shiny gray cuprous sulfide. It has also been sealed with a high strength, clear nail polish. The lower band has a mirror finish on the outer rim and has not been sealed yet.
I plan to locate a silver half dollar and make a hefty ring from it, which will not require the nail polish coating. I have a few silver quarters, but the rings made from quarters are fairly small (for me). I can get the striped ring onto my ring finger and the mirror finish ring onto my pinky.
These are probably not the best work I could have done, but they were in practice for using a silver half dollar (As soon as I can find one). A half dollar coin will have more text visible and will be a thicker band.
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Comments: 30
Its legal if you make it so the money is unusable. Love this btw :3
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these are beautiful rings. I have several British pennies and Half-pennies that I was thinking of trying this with. What are your opinions on working with Bronze?
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im trying to make one of those out opf aregular quarter to see how it works
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I've made a handful of these out of various coins myself, but I have a question. How are you getting the mirror finish? Lots of dremel polishing? And mine always end up rounded, and the flatness of yours confuse me.
Nothing better then a coin ring! I'm working on one right now out of an Irish half-crown
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I'd been using a rather crude apparatus (ring jammed on a dowel with paper towel packing so it didn't move, then throwing the dowel in the chuck of a drill. Started with, maybe 400 grit sandpaper to get the serious dings out, then 600 and down. After that, used some nevr-dull in the same way until gleaming.
About keeping the edges flat, it's all a matter of hand stability. If you hammer against a flat metal plate and keep it vertical, your sides will be flat. if you tilt it a little by accident each time, you end up round. As you can see, the top one is definetly more rounded.
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thanks for the info!
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nice i made mine out of a silver dollar u have large fingers so the smaller coins would not work for me
i should polish it back up and take some pics
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I think I have some silver dollars somewhere, Let me find out and I can send you one.
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Thank you for the generous offer, but I have to decline. I have some solid silver dollars, but I am looking for a silver half dollar from a particular span of years (Which I believe has a solid 90%/10% silver/ copper composition) for this. Also, I am about to go back to college and will be far away from my workbench for a few months.
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as long as your not trying to defraud the government, it is legal to make coin rings
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Thank you for confirming that.
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My dad is actually in the process of making one of these from a Canadian quarter. I'm gonna have to tell him that he has to remember to seal the copper!
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Very nice!
Would heating the coin, to anneal it, help when hammering it? Then it was hammer faster, and crack less.
You'd need something like a torch, kiln, or annealing furnace. I'd look up the procedure first, to find out how to anneal correctly.
The US Treasury does anneal the blanks before striking them. Striking would harden the metal once again, being from hammering or when originally struck as a coin.
I wonder how much pressure it would take to put some kind of rod or pipe through the middle, and roll it out, instead of hammering? I would definitely anneal it first in this case.
I was thinking about doing something very similar with coins recently, but wasn't sure of the legalities.
I was also thinking of somehow punching the center out of pennies, and making some chainmail from them. Use it, if you like.
I just looked it up on the US treasury website, which essentially says it's only illegal if it's fraudulent (that's the key word), meaning that you are trying to pass the coin off as a coin of a higher face value.
Everything else I saw suggests there are no sanctions against altering coins for this kind of thing.
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Well, the reason that ammering w/o annealing is good in this case is that the final piece is incredibly rigid due to work hardening and immune to crushing. The problem is that a lot of coins are bi-metal and the layers may not anneal in the same manner. Copper is easy. Take to red heat and cool. I think that the hammer is more appropriate for shaping since it makes good use of torque and allows easy shaping of the outer edge. Rolling out a coin would probably be extremely hard since a lot of energy is expended in turning the coin instead of pressing down. Also, the rod applies pressure over a larger area than the hammer and therefore has less effect.
Someone was trying to make rings from dimes and make maille from them. I think they're off their rocker since they were polishing each one up like a finger ring.
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Yeah, good points.
As far as annealing, I thought about the different metals before commenting, and chaecked ustreas.gov first, to verify that they do anneal the blanks first. I'm not sure of the technique, though.
Also, after you annealed the coin, hammering it would harden it once again.
The comments were just my 
Now, if I ever do try the chainmail with pennies, I would only tumble polish the finished piece. That guy IS crazy!
Of course, if he is selling it as Fine Jewelry, those kind of details make all the difference!
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No I think he just wanted to make a point. I think he made about three and gave up on it. Haha.
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damn all you people for being so frikkin crafty.
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This really is not hard to do. If you have a workbench with a decent stock of tools (Or a father who does, uncle, friendly neighbor, etc.) you can make one in a few hours. Maybe I'll write a tutorial myself....
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that'd be so sweet. i'm currently studying abroad and have nothing here by way of equipment. i miss my tools... but i'm not gonna be away for ever
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I've been working on one out of a half-dollar for some time now. When she is finished I'll post some pictures.
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Given the work time and effort put into a very well finished one, probably around $30-35 US. I really like copper for all metalwork except this, I have to say. The "coating" is a total pain to apply and ends up chipping. I would rather do a finished piece with a silver quarter (or half dollar for larger fingers...costing more), which can be had for around $2.50US.
Since this was just the end result of a discussion on a chainmaille forum and some tinkering, I guess I'd feel somewhat uncomfortable selling one. As far as finger rings go, I barely know what I am doing.
I invite you to try it yourself. Here is a nice tutorial [link]
(A hammer is MUCH better than a spoon, but don't rush it)
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i see.. well if you ever go into production with the halves, let me know.. and i will Certaintly try it myself, im getting giddy now just thinking about it lol. Thanks for the inspiraton and direction.
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wow... they look thick.. how did you punch the holes?
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I drill a hole through the coin, use a small, round rasp to remove the remainder of the centers, smooth the rough rasp edges with a metal file and then sandpaper the inside until it is smooth enough for wear (400, 600 grit). A dab of metal polish never hurt either.
They are actually quite delicate. You hammer the coin on its edge while rotating and the coin shrinks in diameter while the edges widen and spread outward. The text migrates with the metal onto the curve and you cut out the flat center of the coin
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Ye gods, rasping out most of the center? That must take quite a while.
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Wow, that's so awesome.
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