1958-D Lincoln Cent "WAY" Out Of Tolerance

OAKSTAR

The thickness, diameter and weight is much less then a dime and a normal copper cent! Your thoughts.

This picture looks out of focus and blurry but it's not, it's the coin.

Next to a normal copper cent:

Next to a clad dime:

IkesT

Acid damage - coincidentally, check out the first example they show on error-ref.com:

https://www.error-ref.com/acid-shrunk-coins/

gonzer

Timothy Leary's pocket piece.

MarkKelley

Immersed in acid which reduces the weight, diameter and thickness while leaving the design legible.

OAKSTAR

@IkesT said:
Acid damage - coincidentally, check out the first example they show on error-ref.com:

https://www.error-ref.com/acid-shrunk-coins/

OUTSTANDING! You Da Man!! 👍🏻 Thanks! So the next question: Will TPG'ers attribute it as such?

IkesT

It's PMD, so I'm guessing they'd either call it "Details - Acid Treated" or "Details - Environmental Damage".

jonathanb

@OAKSTAR said:
OUTSTANDING! You Da Man!! 👍🏻 Thanks! So the next question: Will TPG'ers attribute it as such?

Yes, TPGs are very good about identifying coins with damage, including coins with acid damage. They will happily accept your money if you want to pay them to attribute damaged coins.

OAKSTAR

I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

BLUEJAYWAY

So much acid on it needs a TUMS or 2.

OAKSTAR

I'm wondering if the kids used them as dimes in soda and candy machines.

MWallace

@OAKSTAR said:
I'm wondering if the kids used them as dimes in soda and candy machines.

Wouldn't work. The machine would kick it back out. Through magnetic properties the machine can tell if it's a dime or some other metal, even if it's the same size as a dime.

MWallace

This may help with my comment above.
From SmallDollars.com:

Here's an interesting footnote on Anthony Dollar planchets. Business strike planchets for the Kennedy Half Dollar (1971-present) and Susan B. Anthony Dollar (1979-1981, 1999) are made up of a copper-nickel clad composition. They each have outer layers of 75% copper & 25% nickel with an inner core of pure copper. However, not all is equal. On the Kennedy Half Dollar, the outer clad layers make up one-third of the planchet's thickness, with the copper core making up the other two-thirds, but on the Anthony Dollar the outer layers make up one-half of the planchet's thickness with the copper core making up the other half. This was done to make it impossible to grind down a Kennedy Half Dollar to the size of an Anthony Dollar for use in vending machines. If this were tried, the electrical characteristics of the ground down Kennedy Half Dollar would then be different than those of an Anthony Dollar. The slug rejecters in vending machines would be able to differentiate between the two, thereby rejecting the ground down Kennedy Half.

jmlanzaf

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

jmlanzaf

@MWallace said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I'm wondering if the kids used them as dimes in soda and candy machines.

Wouldn't work. The machine would kick it back out. Through magnetic properties the machine can tell if it's a dime or some other metal, even if it's the same size as a dime.

People did used to grind down cents to use as transit tokens. But it's rather impossible to say whether an acid treated coin was done for any particular purpose or just for fun.

I think you have to grind them down (edges) and not dissolve them or they would end up too thin...

OAKSTAR

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

So when I see a graded Trade Dollar w/chop marks and the label says damaged or detailed, it's not from the "chop marks" but the coin may have been cleaned or has some other damage?

AUandAG

@MWallace said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I'm wondering if the kids used them as dimes in soda and candy machines.

Wouldn't work. The machine would kick it back out. Through magnetic properties the machine can tell if it's a dime or some other metal, even if it's the same size as a dime.

It certainly did work back when those were circulating. I did it to many a penny to get a dime ice cream out of the machine.

bob
vegas baby!

ifthevamzarockin

@MWallace said:
Wouldn't work. The machine would kick it back out. Through magnetic properties the machine can tell if it's a dime or some other metal, even if it's the same size as a dime.

Back in the days before electronic coin validators it worked very well.
I would file a penny down on the sidewalk and they would work in pay phones, parking meters & pinball machines.

Speaking of pinball machines when I was a kid the local arcade caught me using pennies as dimes in the pinball machines and they made me pay them back for all of them in all their machines. IIRC the total was around $20 I had to give them.
Some of the other kids were doing it too so I paid for a few I didn't make.
I was doing more than anybody else and could turn a penny into a dime pretty darn fast.

jmlanzaf

@OAKSTAR said:

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

So when I see a graded Trade Dollar w/chop marks and the label says damaged or detailed, it's not from the "chop marks" but the coin my have been cleaned or has some other damage?

It's hard to say. The TPGs don't appear to be 100% consistent on this. I've seen straight grades and details on coins that I don't detect any other problem.

OAKSTAR

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

So when I see a graded Trade Dollar w/chop marks and the label says damaged or detailed, it's not from the "chop marks" but the coin my have been cleaned or has some other damage?

It's hard to say. The TPGs don't appear to be 100% consistent on this. I've seen straight grades and details on coins that I don't detect any other problem.

Thanks for the reality check. I've thought the same thing for years.

pcgs69

Could also be a beach metal detecting find.

GaCoinGuy

@OAKSTAR said:
I'm wondering if the kids used them as dimes in soda and candy machines.

I have 2 or 3 of these that were in the wife's grandfathers collection. My father (born 1946) told me they would often do this to use them in all sorts of machines in the 50's and early 60's.

rec78

Acid damage - spend it before it disappears.

BLUEJAYWAY

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

Out of curiosity, just a question. What was your purpose in acid treating dozens of cents? Thanks.

jmlanzaf

@BLUEJAYWAY said:

@jmlanzaf said:

@OAKSTAR said:
I was thinking of it like numismatic history. Things done to coins in the past, like chop marks on Trade Dollars. I consider them damaged but have seen them straight graded.

Chop marks are assay marks. They've become accepted. Anyone with a bottle of acid can make as many of those cents as possible. I personally have made dozens of them over the years.

Out of curiosity, just a question. What was your purpose in acid treating dozens of cents? Thanks.

Demos for students, mostly.