THE RUSTING OF NAILS PENNIES AND PAPERCLIPS
Robert Schellenberger
Cary Academy
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this experiment was to see if different temperature water changes
how much nails, pennies and paperclips rust and how much they rust against each
other. The hypothesis was that the nails would rust more than anything else because
the others look like they have an extra defense against rust, then paperclip then penny.
3 nails were put in 3 beakers and 1 was put in an incubator 1 was left out and 1 was put
in a fridge, and the same with the pennies and paperclips. Then they were taken out
and it was determined what rusted more on a scale of 1-10. The penny in hot water was
determined to have a rust score of 2. The nail in hot water was given a score of 7, the
paperclip in hot water was given a score of 3. Overall the hot water items rusted the
most. The room temperature penny had a rating of 0. The nail was given a score of 6,
the paperclip was 5, and the cold penny = 1, nail 4, paperclip 1. The cold water items
overall rusted the least.
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of the experiment was to see what rusted more nails paperclips or
pennies and what temperatures make more rust. A nail, penny and paper clip will be put
in cold water and the same with hot and room temperature water. The water will stay
cold in a fridge. The warm water will be kept in an incubator.
Observations were done about what was being tested. The nails that were being
tested are shiny, ridged ends and weigh 2.4 grams are 5.2 cm long and have a .75 cm
long head. The paperclips are silver, curved and smooth. They weigh 4 grams have 2
ends are 3 cm long 8.5 cm of wire. The pennies are shiny and circular with a 2.5 cm
diameter. The beakers used to do hold the items are hold 100 ml of water.
When metals corrode they lose electrons and form cations. An example is when calcium
is vigorously attacked by acids. It makes CA2+, ions. This is oxidization. When an atom,
ion, or molecule has become more positively charged (lost electrons), we say it has
been oxidized. It is called oxidization because the first reactions of this sort were to be
studied thoroughly were with oxygen.
Most elements are metals. They are usually shiny, very dense, and only melt at
high temperatures. Their shape can be easily changed into thin wires or sheets without
breaking. Metals will corrode, gradually wearing away. Heat and electricity travel easily
through metals.
If steel is in water continuously for 3-5 hours, the rust will appear on the surface.
But as soon as some water makes contact with it, it will start rusting. Iron takes about 45 days to rust. Gold doesn’t even rust at all.
It is hypothesized that the pennies will not rust very much because they are
made of copper and not supposed to rust easily and that the nails would rust a lot
because they seem to have virtually no protection against rust and have been known to
have rust (tetanus). It was also hypothesized that the paper clips would not rust much
because they have a shiny coating to combat rust.
MATERIALS & METHOD

Nails

Paper clips

Pennies

Beakers

Cameras

Refrigerator

An incubator

Gloves
There were 9 beakers, 3 filled with hot water, 3 with cold and 3 with room temperature.
Each will have a nail, a paperclip, or a penny in it. The nails were propped up on its side
against the beaker and the nail and paperclip were placed on the bottom. A picture was
taken of each penny/paperclip/nail before being put in a 100 ml beaker with about 80 ml
of water in it. The beakers for the hot water were put an incubator, the cold water was
put in a small fridge in an empty cardboard box. The room temperature water was put
on a shelf. There will be a penny in each temperature of water (same for nail and
paperclip). They will be left in the water for 3 days and then a picture will be taken of
each penny and nail and paper clip. The one that rusted the most (in each environment
and overall) were determined. The control is room temperature pennies. The
independent variable is the temperature of the water. The dependent variable is the
amount of rust that the surveyors say there is. The safety concerns consist of the
beakers breaking avoiding the glass is wise. If that happens and be sure to dispose of it
properly and to wear gloves when handling rusted objects, tetanus could be caught.
An extended experiment was to do the same experiment but, once a day take each
piece of metal out hold it under a flame for 2 minutes. Then put it back in the water
afterword's to see if that will make it rust more or less.
RESULTS & DISCUSSION
The rust score given to the items
8
7
6
5
4
Penny
3
Nail
2
paperclip
1
0
Hot rust (scaled 1‐ Room temperature Cold rust (scaled 1‐
10)
rust (scaled 1‐10)
10)
Environment the items were in Figure 1: Graph of the amount of rust(scaled 1‐10)
As shown in the graph, the penny in hot water was determined to have a rust score
(1-10) of 2. The nail in hot water was given a score of 7, the paperclip for hot water was
given a score of 3, and overall the hot water items rusted the most. The room
temperature penny was given a rating of 0 out of 10 (it seems to have gotten cleaner).
The nail was given a score of 6, the paperclip = 5, for the cold, penny 1, nail 4, paperclip
1. The cold water items overall rusted the least. In the extended experiment the nail was
given a score of 4 (note that was less than the any other nail). The penny was given a
score of 3 out of 10. The paperclip was given a score of 2 (less than the penny).
CONCLUTIONS
The hypothesis was confirmed. The hypothesis was the pennies will not rust very
much because they are made of copper and not supposed to rust easily also that the
nails would rust a lot because they seem to have virtually no protection against rust
and have been known to have rust and that the paper clips would not rust much
because they have a shiny coating to combat rust. It was shone above that overall
the nails rust the most then the paperclips then the pennies.
The reason that the nails did the worst to combat rust was because it was not
designed to fight rust but to be sturdy. It could be that the paperclips did better than
the nails because it has a shiny coating that seems like it would at like an extra
defense against rust and I think that the pennies did the best because they were
industrial made a (not unlike the others). They were designed to withstand a lot so
that money didn’t come out of circulation and make money worth more than it
actually because it will mess up the economy which is bad. To extend the
experiment we could have added needles, nickels and quarters. To improve the
experiment we could take a survey instead of just having one person deciding
Here are tables of the observations that were done.
48 (2 days) hours
Hot
Control
Cold
has rust on it and
rust covers most of the
basically no rust
looks disgusting
nail
has bubbles all over
bubbles are at the top
the beakers
of beaker
brown water with a
has bits of white on it
unaltered
Hot
Control
Cold
More rust and
unaltered
A small amount of rust
after put-in
Nail
Penny
Paperclip
unaltered
slight white tint on the
paperclip
92 (3 days) after
put-in
Nail
disgustingness
Penny
paperclip
is on the nail
Water has mostly
Has an odd tint to the
evaporated
water
unaltered
Has an odd tint to the
unaltered
unaltered
water
It seems odd that the penny in the hot habitat had the water almost evaporate
completely but not the others and that the nails and stuff held over a flame were overall
given a less rusty score, maybe the rust was burned each day so it couldn’t build.
REFERENCES
Brown, Theodore and LeMay, Eugene and Bursten, Bruce Chemistry the central
science.
F, Marilyn. “To Rust and Trust.” Finishing dot com. Finishing dot com. January 12 2012.
Web. January 12 2012.
Materials Science and Technology. “What Are Metals?.” MAST. Materials Science and
Technology