Struck Coins ???

[CNC Molds N Stuff]

Ever since watching a woman dressed in pirate garb at a renaissance fair (or faire if you prefer) place a blank in a set of dies and drop a heavy weight on it to strike a souvenir coin I have had in the back of my mind the idea to strike my own coins.  I can certainly make the dies.  4140 is relatively easy to machine if you know how, and it will harden "hard enough" for a low production number of from a few hundred to a couple thousand coins.  I also keep a bit of O1 and W1 on hand for those cutting tools I can't hand grind from HSS or carbide.  I even have a propane forge in the back along with a toaster oven for tempering (although it gets used more for powder coating).

I started writing with two questions in mind.

Where to buy/make coin blanks at the best price?  Not the 10-20 on Ebay or Amazon, but a couple hundred to a couple thousand at a more reasonable bulk price.

I forgot the other question, so my second question is what question (or questions) did I forget to ask?  Maybe what alloy would best?  I suspect an annealed copper alloy of some kind.  Many an amusement facility used to have a machine that would take your penny (and a dollar) and roll your penny into a souvenir key tag back in the days when pennies were still copper.

Other questions already answered below:

• Yes, I am aware of challenge coins and all the companies making them.  I do not want to buy finished coins.
• No, striking novelty, challenge or other coins is NOT illegal as long as they are not intended to be used as current currency.
• I am looking at a variety of sizes perhaps, but primarily about the size of a classic American silver dollar.