I found this penny and I immediately noticed it sounded wrong; it was too high pitched. I looked closer at it and noticed that it was missing some details and it was thinner than normal but it has a normal diameter. I made a balance to compare it to the weight of a zinc penny and the error penny was lighter. It has some parts such as Lincoln's beard that are very detailed so I don't think it was acid dipped. The details seem to get lighter close to the edge of the coin. Is it stuck on a foreign planchet?
Not a foreign planchet. It looks like the same size and composition as a normal zinc cent. Panama and Bahamas have many coins that are the same size and weight as ours, but if that were the case there would be no way to distinguish a difference. What does your coin weigh? If it's 2.5g it's normal. If it were struck on a foreign planchet, it would have to be smaller in diameter, since a larger planchet would not fit. If it were struck on a smaller planchet it would prob weigh less, and it would definitely not have full cent rims. Is there some recent spate of You Tube coin videos depicting US coins struck on foreign planchets? The wear could be from circulation, it could have been struck through grease, it could have spent some time stuck in a dryer and wore down.
It does weigh less than 2.5g but I don't know how much less. I will try to get it weighed at my LCS. The rim of the coin is almost flat but the image doesn't show that well.
If the weight is low it could be a tapered or thin planchet. I would like to know what the diameter is.. can you post a picture of the edge?
It is 0.043 inches. It is 0.017 inches smaller than what it should be so it is definitely outside the range of what it should be. This could be because the coin is just worn at the edge. Here is a better picture of the details.
I'd have that one looked at. Would need a half of tube of grease to be that bad of a greaser. Way to interesting not to find out about. Not PMD in my eyes
Nice calipers. That's an interesting one. I don't think it's a foreign planchet, but don't know. It will be interesting to find out what's going on here. Perhaps @Fred Weinberg can weigh in on this.
Assuming it is underweight, then the coin was most likely struck on a planchet punched out of rolled-thin zinc stock. Among zinc cents, such errors can weigh as little as 1.6 grams. Among copper-alloy cents, such errors can weigh as little as 0.53g. See my recent Coin World column for details.
I forgot your comment about sounding wrong. Could indeed be struck on a smaller flan. Still, a very nice numismatic puzzle worth pursuing. If you don't, you will be scratching that itch for a while. Cheers!
I don't know what a flan is, but if it were struck on a smaller planchet, it wouldn't have full cent rims. Even if it is not on a foreign planchet (unlikely), broadstruck is a good error.