how many pennies does it take to fill a 5 gallon jar?

Answer 1

Penies are mostly Zinc (Copper coated).
The density of Zinc is about 7.140 g/mL.
5 gallons = about 18927 mL
Therefore, it would take about 135139 g of Zinc to TOTALLY fill (and I mean TOTALLY, NO air pockets) a 5 gallon jar.

I just happen to have an electronic scale near by which is precise to +/- .1 g. I measured the mass of a penny (1980) to be about 3.1 grams.
Therefore, it would take about 43593 pennies to fill the jar, or about $436.
These calculations make two critical assumptions,
(1), pennies are made entirely of Zinc
(2), The jar is filled totally with Zinc, nothing else, no air pockets, ...

Answer 2

A penny has a diameter of 19.05mm and a thinkness of 1.55 mm
That gives it a volume of 441.8 mm^3

A gallon = 3.785 liters. so 5 gallons = 18.925 liters = 18,925 c^3 = 18,925,000 mm^3

18,925,000/441.8 = 45956.77

so a tall, thin 5 gallon jar (actually a tube) could hold 45956 pennies. More if then had been in circulation and had worn away.

Feel free to check the arithmetic.

Answer 3

A five gallon jar should weigh 40 pounds which equals exactly $70.00. So there should be 7,000 pennies in a 5 gallon jar.

Answer 4

Coinstar maybe right, but based on the density of copper 63.546 g/mol vs. water 18 g/mol I think the value is probably more. There would be a lot of open space though. Where they got the 40 pounds for 5 gallons is based on the density of water

Answer 5

5 gallons

Answer 6

Its really good to practice doing estimates for science and for life.

Fill a one ounce container then multiply by 128 times 5.

probably 60,000 or so

Answer 7

I'll take a wild guess and say 9800 pennies.

Answer 8

About one less than it does to over fill it!!

Hope that helps