I have a very unusual 1992 penny in which Lincoln seems smaller.

How can something that is both smaller in diameter and thinner, weigh more?

 

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Since 2019, they've been struck in .999 fine silver. Of course, that's also irrelevant to the perfectly normal 1992 cent that you've pictured.

Coins vary slightly in thickness and even diameter according to how they're struck and how they're handled after they're struck. A fraction of a millimeter of difference here is not significant.

You can, of course, submit your coin to a third-party grader and request an elemental analysis (XRF). It won't be cheap, and it almost certainly won't tell you what you want to hear.

You might be able to find a local jeweler or coin dealer who has an XRF analyzer and would be willing to check the coin for you. You're clearly very curious about this coin, and I'm all about indulging curiosity, so I'd encourage you to look into this option.

 

It's not that much smaller in diameter or thinner, and it doesn't weigh that much more.

The thickness comparison you're doing is based just on the coin's rim, and a coin's rim makes up only a small percentage of the coin's weight. (This gets really pronounced in old silver like Barber coins or Standing Liberty quarters, where a worn coin might lose 5% of its weight, but a good 20% of its "thickness" -- the high points and the rim are the first parts to get worn away or beaten down.)

If you could measure your coin's entire profile, you'd find that its volume isn't significantly different from a regular cent. In fact, you could do a water-displacement test and calculate its actual specific gravity, although it's hard to get accurate readings at this scale without some specialized equipment.

 

Thanks, jeffB ...I will check with a local coin dealer.
It is hard to explain how this penny feels.
It feels so thin all over and yet has strong visual detail...
Including the different (smaller) look to Lincoln..."without glasses".

 

Tweezer booties.

 

Is the suspect "smaller" penny the darker color one? If so, this could be why it looks smaller than the brighter copper color penny.

https://youtube.com/shorts/QtGF9IxnAM0?si=dirdVvPKA5F9l5Qr

 

The question was where would a "copper plated" silver planchet come from. The mint certainly never used them. No way for that to happen.

 

I'm sure there's a very complicated and long explanation out there somewhere for how that happened at the mint. And it's most likely going to be a real dandy of a story.

 

I do not know if this is small or not, does this help any?

 

No, your coin is the same as my larger (red) Lincoln.
Its chin beard 'extends past' the lips and, the nose is a larger 'sharp' backwards L.
On my small brown Lincoln, the bottom lip is smaller and back from the top lip.
Also, the chin beard is 'equal to' the top lip and the nose is more rounded.