Wooden Coin Sorter, Scrap Wood

My project is a coin sorter that has the capacity to sort the regularly used denominations of coin currency of the United States as well as the ability to sort the larger Kennedy half dollars, Eisenhower whole dollars, and Sacagawea gold dollars.

I made this sorter with scrap wood, wood glue, and nails that I had from other projects. Ideally I would use plastics or metal to allow for reduced friction, lower cost, and increased accuracy.

I used mostly composite wood and pine for the construction, as well as the contoured part of an Ice Mountain 3liter water bottle for the funnel.

For tools, I used a coping saw, file, wood glue, hammer, nails, drill, drill-bits, sandpaper and silicon glue.

Starting with the sorter, I first measured out and marked the areas that needed to be removed, making sure to mark the edge away from the wall that the coins will slide down. This is to keep a tight tolerance on the size of the coin that is to fall into the hole reducing the amount of mixed coins. Once the holes are cut, file and sand the edges until the coins are unable to sit on the edge without falling in. Then I worked on the insert for the funnel to hold it above the chute allowing for the coins to fall down then slide down the chute. This was achieved with a coring drill bit of 1.5 inches in diameter, simply cut all the way through the block. Then it is time for the chute, I elected for one that is 12 inches long with one inch high walls, allowing for enough room that the coins gain momentum without the chance of falling over the edge even if they stack up on top of each other. After the walls and base of the chute were cut, I bound them together with carpenters glue. The chutes for the sorter were two 30,60, 90 triangles cut from the composite wood and two rectangular pieces cut to the width of the coin slots and glued under them to allow for an offset receptacle for the coins. The bridge requires two small pieces about 3/16 in wide glued with 1.5 inches between them with a 1.5 by 2.25 inch plate on both top and bottom, allowing enough clearance for even the thickest American coin to pass, while also limiting the coins through one at a time.

I started with joining the funnel coupling with the chute. Then adding the bridge, make sure that the floor of the bridge is level and smooth with the floor of the chute, to keep for having coins jamming. Then the sorter is attached to the bridge taking similar care and making sure that the wall of the sorter is even with the inside wall of the bridge to keep from having the smaller coins bounce over the first sorting hole.

The final assembly requires two tall pieces that allow for at least 6 inches of clearance under the sorter chutes to allow for removable collection cups, shown as the plastic bottles. Overall with over 100 of each common coin type, it took 2 minutes to sort and sorted the half dollars and whole dollars separately from the common denominations.