1981 Cent Struck On A Dime Or Nickel Planchet?

They used copper planchets until the year 1982, sometime during the end of 1982 they went to copper plated zinc planchets due to the rising price of copper. Your cent is not plated and is copper. Weigh it, if it weighs 3.1 then it's copper, if it weighs 2.5 then you have a small fortune in your hand.

Whatever caused the discolor to begin with may have had a chemical reaction to the acetone used. That would be my best guess. I can say this with certainty, it is the correct planchet. It was not struck on a dime or nickel planchet.

Size and strike would not appear normal if this was a dime planchet. It's struck on a normal planchet. Most likely the acetone reacted with whatever was on the surface.

I hope we were able to fill in the gaps for you. There are many chemicals/substances that can change the toning on copper. You can take a magic erase pad and turn a copper coated zinc cent from copper to red/blue toning. After a while you can easily tell the difference in a chemically altered planchet and natural toning.

Thanks.. Is it ok to store in little plastic craft bags?

Probably not. If the plastic has PVC in the them, they will tone the coins also. Best to use the 2X2's or the non PVC flips. Inside a loose bag the coin can damage them just from movement of the bag. I prefer the 2X2's. The soft plastic flips are know for altering coins. The stiffer ones are better. The soft square tubes also alter the color on BU cents. Again the hard tubes or clear plastic tubes are better. I prefer to buy them online used in larger quantities. I prefer the ones from the 1960's that have the clear plastic lids that lock. But the ones with the white lids are OK also. Check on your collections from time to time to see if they are still safe.

Bump