Hello!! I literally yesterday started collecting and went through my old change jar. I almost broke my eyeballs trying figure out the difference between sm and lg date. Im pretty sure the top right is one, but after staring at them for so long I want to make sure that's the only one. I kinda feel like the bottom middle is one too but just really messed up. Any help would be appreciated!
The easiest way to tell Lg date from Sm date is the number 2 in the date. On the penny on the top right see how the 2 has a curve going up from the bottom line on the 2 and the middle Penny has a straight uncurved line going up. That is the easiest way to tell.
Before you ask the next question, you'll need to get a jewelry scale (not a food scale) to confirm actual weight out a couple of digits (thus the need for a jewelry scale).
Many food scales round differently. And thus can lead people to believe something that is not. Just search on "food scale" or "jewelry scale" and you can see many people's food scale that just are not very accurate. Accurate enough for food, just not for something so small needing the 2 decimals.
WOW!! THANK YOU ALL FOR ALL THE GREAT INFO! I actually weighed them yesterday. They're all copper except for the sm date, that one was 2.53g. Im curious about the "woodies"? Does that only happen with copper? I took better pictures today and marked them with the weights. Each picture is a separate coin. I happened to have 6-82s in my change jar.
I added additional pics of each coin. Each individual picture has 4 shots of the same coin in different lighting.
Thank you! My eyes are garbage and after looking through a magnifying glass for so long it got harder to tell. I found out using the crop on my camera to scale each coin works so much better for a side by side comparison!
The distance from the 2 to the rim is what I look at first. The large date 2 is much closer to the rim. The other diagnostics work also.