In 1982, the mint switched from using bronze to copper plated zinc for pennies. Some grading companies, such as PCGS, apparently don't list which variety the cent is on the label. Is there a way to tell if a 1982 cent is made from zinc or bronze while in the holder?
Best way is to weigh them.....though I don't know what kind of weight variances there are in slabs. Beyond that, experience and an eye for details. Most early zinc plated cents are easy to spot because of "bubbles" in the plating that are not there in the copper cents. This bubbling is even evident in bright shinny cents. When minted the copper plating also takes on a kind of "stretched" look thats hard for me to describe, but easy to see. Hope this helps.
Very good tips. I've seen those features before and now I know what I'm looking at a little better. Any other tips?
Those have been one of my favorite Lincolns to collect. I've probably got a few thousand of them. Everytime I've seen one it went into a plastic tube to be checked later for which one it is. Since there are both large and small dates, copper ( not Bronze ) and then the flimsey new Copper-Plated Zinc. The wewight is very noticable when using a balance beam scale but not to noticable with out. The colors are about the same if the wear is about the same. Some of the early Copper-Plated ones did have a bubbly finish but many, many do not and look exactly the same as the earlier, heavier versions of Copper, Tin and Zinc mixtures. Even using a senitive for chemicals type balance scale is tricky since the coins on both sides must be of equal or approximate wear. Now as for incapsulated ones that would even make the difference more of a problem. Since thier may be so slight differences in materials due to when and by whom a coin is put into a slab there may also be a weight difference. Good question. If you look at enough of those you'll eventually realize that as the dies were used the quality apparently changed on both types. So good luck. Like I said I've got thousands of them and not easy to figure out which is which.
When you check them, check your Large date copper versions for die doubling on the obverse. There is a real nice one and it is easy to see on the IN GOD WE TRUST motto. Use an 8X lens to pick it up! have Fun, Bill
Slight offsets also very common for that year. Then there is the RPM's and the 82D with the broken mint mark die. It should be noticed that when dropped the sound different. The Zinc plated ones sound like lead. Regarless, they are a real novelty and just not worth much. I meant Zinc with copper plating.
