1995-Ddo ?

I dont know the true benchmark of Double-Die; however, I look for how much of any letter or digit is doubled...if the entirety of it is doubled, that usually means the die struck twice rather than the ' Machine Doubling' result from die wear and tear. If you look at pictures of the 1955 double-die and poor man's double cents, you can see the difference I'm suggesting between the true double-die and the poor man's double. One of the experts here can explain in numismatic terms better than I've described this.

1026, you will learn that the most misidentified doubling here on the forum and most everywhere else is Machine Doubling. Truth of the matter is that Machine Doubling, especially in certain dates or period are loaded with them. Call it die hop, or as I like to call it, die chatter, it comes when there is movement between the die and coin at the time of strike. The die itself is perfectly normal and has no doubling on it, the doubling is cause by the mechanical process, not the die proper.

That said, spotting it really becomes quite easy when you learn the traits to look for. The best is the shelf effect as I have heard it described. The doubling is flat and much shallower that the devise that is doubled. quite often is mirrors the devise perfectly. Die doubling often shows a phase shift, say to the Northeast, for example. I once heard someone trying to describe it and they said that it looked like the devise had slide off of it's base. I thought this very descriptive. Picture slicing off a devise with a razor blade and moving it ever so slightly in one direction or another. You could not cut the devise off cleanly and would leave a thin slice of the devise in it's original position, this in my minds eye is what Machine Doubling looks like.

Coppercoins has an excellent website with much of this information available. I would suggest buying his book, "Looking Through Lincoln Cents", it has a complete description of the different types of doubled dies that have value and then doubles that people confuse with them that are worthless. The pics are invaluable.

Jim

I am by no exaggeration of the word an expert at any of this, but that looks like Machine Doubling to me. The "sliding" aspect is the best way for me to grasp what I am looking at when trying to discern doubling. If you look at your example, if you can imagine the devices(numbers) to be made of mud(don't laugh-this works for me!)and you just slid them in any given direction, would the result look like what you see on a coin? If so, then its Machine Doubling.

Now with the same analogy, if you had a press that pushed out mud stamps of numbers, if you pressed out a number then moved ever so slightly and then pressed the same number again, imagine the visual and you will see a true double die.

LOL-Dont laugh!

This is not a DD but rather a coin struck semi deeply from the die onto the blanket causing a slight edge view of the #5 on coin giving it sort of a 3D look. Nice clear photo.

Here's a great site for understanding the different kinds of doubling and identifying wich ones are worth anything

http://koinpro.tripod.com/Articles/...Doubling.htm

Richard

The differences between Machine Doubling and doubled dies can be very tricky and difficult. I still haven't grasped it but I'm getting better. And sometimes when I think I've really gotten the hang of it I get thrown off. But I haven't stopped trying to get the hang of it.

Not so on a 1995 D cent. The Mintmark is part of the hub that creates the dies. It is not punched into the die individually.

The fact is that there is a 1995 D Doubled Die cent that has nice doubling on the D as well as the Date.

This one just isn't it. This one shows Machine Doubling.

Prior to 1990, you would have been more correct as mintmarks were punched into the dies by hand.

This coin however has none of the diagnostics that would indicate die doubling.

In this case, the mintmark being doubled has no bearing other than the fact that it lends more credence to the Machine Doubling diagnosis.

Actually two of the known 1995D doubled die Lincolns that I know of DO show doubling on the mintmark as well as the date for reasons Bill explained above.