I have no idea???

[Steven]

A friend brought this coin to me wanting to know what the deal was with it. I don't know. It is smaller in diameter and less than half the thickness of a normal cent. I can only guess it has been in some kind of acid causing the shrinkage and leaving most of the detail??? I don't think this is something caused at the mint. Any help.

Thanks Steven

[wavysteps2003]

I can not think of an acid that would shrink metal while still leaving the design in fairly good shape. It would be nice to know the actual weight of the coin ( it should be somewhere near 3 g ) for that would help in determining what is up. From just looking at your pictures, I would be more than inclined to think struck on foriegn planchet would be a passible explanation, however, other possibilities could exist, such as a deformed planchet.

WAVYSTEPS2003 aka BJ Neff

[coop]

It is acid dipped. Sulfric Acid. I've covered that subject on me ME page on Ebay.
http://members.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=coop49
It was used in 50,60's to reduce the Cent size down to the size of a dime and then used to purchase a soda from the vending machines. The rim is thinner, but the detail remains as it is pressed during the mint process, thus making it harder to disolve. Most were made in chemistry class to watch the fizz. Wait too long and nothing was hardly left.

[Steven]

Thanks, I'll pass that information along.
Steven

[eagames]

I've also found my share of these acid dipped cents and they are always dime sized. They also have a funny surface from the acid.

I have seen some cents on struck or unstruck dime planchets and foreign planchets but never seen a real cent that was struck on cent stock but cut to dime size. It would seem like they should exist. They could goof and cut dime size cent blanks out of cent stock material/sheets. I do know that nowdays the mint buys pre made cent planchets so it should not happen on modern ones but I've never seen one on older cents, do those exist or does anyone know why not?

[coop]

Ed: I've heard of quarters cut from the wrong stock material (Dime stock) I've even heard of Cents struck on dimes, but That is rare, but I do have an image of one not worked up yet. But here are a few that are on the wrong planchets:

Note that even if the design does not fit, but sometimes it is close, but it always flattens out the rim on the outside.

[eagames]

When you see OBW shotgun rolls at shops or swap meets look close at the sealed roll. If it has one of these in it the paper is often so tight you can see it if you look at the sealed roll closely. This is mostly for the modern tight white paper rolls, the old thicker brown rolls might not show these but the white paper does. If you see one with a ridge or valley along the edge and it's a cheap common date buy it and you might find one of these.

You can also find minor off centers that way, you can see them as ridge on the side of the white paper roll.