I was looking for some opinion on this coin prior to taking it to an appraiser. It came from my great grandfather's collection, which somehow made its way to my care after his passing. I am fairly sure that it is genuine, but not positive. The ridges around the edge are clean and the three layers are clearly visible. The peculiarity is that the outer layers are granulated and there is a large bubble behind Kennedy's head that is apparent on both sides of the coin. Detail is also still fairly apparent if you can look past the graininess. You can see the bubble in the attached picture but the granulation and quality are difficult to capture with my cheap camera.
Most likely the coin was in a fire. That would account for the granular surface and the bubble (which can be caused when a small bubble of air inside the coin expands when heated).
That does explain it some, but I thought that any coin made largely of copper would melt, if left in a fire that was hot enough to deform it, or at least flatten out the detailed parts on the up side and sag on the down instead of making it grainy without losing the detailed bits. This assumption just comes from watching glass melt, which has a melt point several hundred degrees higher than nickel even, in a fireplace.
Hi Lacey Lynn Miles, welcome, I'd like to start by saying hello, and also this particular thread is 11 years old, in the future I'd suggest starting a new thread instead none of those people are likely still here. As far as why you might find a clad coin like this: copper just turns red until it hits about 1,984 degrees Fahrenheit at which point it begins to liquefy and deform. you could roughly get there with a benzomatic MAP torch, but it's going to take a long time and most of a cylinder and perfect conditions. anyways my opinion, someone hit it with one of those torches to make it glow red for a bit and the copper got hot and gassed up a pocket under the cladding on both sides. then they let it cool, wiped it clean of soot, and spent it. if yours looks like this, this is the most likely answer as too why it looks the way it does. the highest temp would be where the torch flame is and it would drop outward from there, on the reverse side the bubble would be smaller because it would be a lower temperature.
