1996 Silver Colored Penny ?

Modern pennies have a copper coating (layer) and underneath is zinc. The "silver" is actually zinc. In the manufacturing process of making modern pennies sometimes along the way the copper layer is not added and as a result you get an error coin that is desired by certain collectors. However, this error can be faked and the copper layer can be removed with chemicals. It is hard to tell by the graininess of your photos if this is an actual error or PMD.

Its actually very smooth and in great shape. Looks like it was made that way but cannot tell the weigh is 2.5 would it weigh more if tampered or less if not

omg ..lol I promise I wont dare. I try not to lick them if possible.. LOL teasing of coarse but would the weigh be different

It can be very dangerous to lick any coins, whether they have Mercury on them or not.

"Average bacterial content on the coins ranged from 2.3 x 10(3) to 25.5 x 10(3) and fungi content from 11 to 377 colony forming units. The following potentially pathogenic bacteria were among those isolated: Escherichia coli, Klebsiella, Serratia, Enterobacter, Salmonella, Acinetobacter, Enterococci, Staphylococcus and Bacillus cereus. In addition, this is the first report of potentially pathogenic fungal isolation from money coins. Penicillium spp, Aspergillus niger, Fusarium, Rhizopus, Altenaria spp, Candida spp and Cryptococcus were isolated."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20084997

Oh no ...I'm in the middle of CRH cents. Stopped to have a sandwich and some chips, didn't wash my hands.

Copper is antibacterial, but you still shouldn't lick coins. I didn't realize this was such a problem, maybe we should set up some sort of support group.

I couldn't begin to guess how many tens of thousands of coins I've searched. It can be addictive, but somebody has to do it or we wouldn't have all the errors and varieties that we know today.