1977 D LMC Not Sure

Tapered planchet?
John1

Looks more like the coin was altered, reducing the obverse to use in a vending machine to buy a soda?

I'm thinking a good deal of wear/damage from long ago--likely mechanical (not from being jostled in a pocket). Damage may have been intentional--again, long ago.

Dont know when they would have used a penny in any soda machine since I've been alive there isn't any signs of being tampered with and according to my mic it is perfectly flat as well as round edges are flat no file or machining Mark's what would be the reason to alter a penny for a vending machine its smaller than a penny but larger than a dime and dosent weigh the same as a penny or dime so someone please explain what is a tapered planchet and wouldnt that fall under a mint error and if the coin is perfectly round and flat where is the taper coming in same with a vending machine when did they use pennies except gum ball machinery 77 dosent even resemble the one coop posted here are some more pics

I dont understand why someone would spend all the time to save 9 cents or whatever coin they used this in place of and I know how vending machines work and I still see no evidence that this coin has been altered no file mark's or machine mark's and unless they polished it before they used it I see no evidence that this isn't what you see unless I'm not seeing something that you are ?

First cant compare to the 60s this is a late 70s coin and again the coin is smaller than a penny and larger than a dime I dont understand the rim thing if the planchett was undersized then I cant see the entire image being present anyways you can tell it was struck a little off to begin with if the coin had been worn smooth from years of being handled I'm thinking that more of the date would have worn away aswell and 1977 I'm not seeing too many people willing to go thru the trouble to alter a penny in order to use it in a vending machine when I was younger either the vending machine wouldnt accept the penny returning it in change or just eating it and you getting no credit for it a dime weighs in at 2.2grams a penny at 3.1 and my penny at 2.6 roughly being 1977 it's not a Lincoln Cent a penny being .75 inches round and a dime being .701 inches round and mine being .695 to .696 so I'm kind of curious on how they take a perfect circle remove some metal from one side only and still wind up with a perfect circle within a 1000th of an inch seems like removing metal from one side only would make the penny more like a football not round any more or atleast belonged the thickness is.049 to .051 with the thickest part of the edge being right at the top where god we trust is at regular penny has a thickness of .o50 to .058 so it's not like they are alot different that way relatively the same maybe less quality control with the newer coin being that much difference in the thickness of the planchett if anything the newer penny has more of a tapered planchett so without any evidence of filing Mark's or grinding or sheer Mark's I'm still convinced there is a different explination for what is going on with this other than it was used in a vending machine I'm not as young as you might think I remember vending machines verry well ours never took pennies unless it was gum thanks for listening to my thoughts its discouraging when you dont get back any positive feed back ever 150 coins later and nothing but debunking or whatever on your side just dosent seem fair that the commen joe dosent have the knowledge or luck or ability to find an error verry seldom do I see somebody getting cudos from anyone on here it's a shame so many people like me find interesting things and submit to get advice and the advice always being the same PMD or acid wash or heated up I dont think you can heat a penny to the point of making the copper ripple on the two sides in different directions it seems to me when copper reaches that point you would end up with a puddle of copper I dont know how you would control 2000 degree temperature in order to save any images atall an the reverse or obverse seemed like a penny would heat up evenly front and back it's not that big of a piece of metal I'm sure when that copper reaches its melting point it's over with there would be no stopping it from creating a puddle that's just an example of something I find odd to use heat to alter a penny to fool the coin community doubtful getting the two surfaces of a penny to have the copper run in different directions at the same time doubtful again thanks for bearing wi my complaining I'm just trying to figure what really goes on in the so called experts heads when confronted with something they might not know how to explain or come up with something they havnt seen I had one person on this site make a comment one time about what you think you found a one of a kind well they do exist and somebody has to find them is a one of a kind not possible or is it someone someone of my caliber of being a novice not worthy or lucky enough to have it happen to me thanks again I would post more coin questions it's just I think I've heard all the reasons why not and why it cant be to make me think twice

Remember boys and girls, just like the policeman and the fireman, punctuation is our friend too.

Seriously, your coin is missing about 20% of it's weight. It was either underweight to start, which means a tapered planchet (thinner at one edge than at the other), or someone took metal away.

If the planchet were tapered, the devices on the thin side of the coin would be less well struck. Look at these examples:

http://www.error-ref.com/?s=tapered+planchet

The first one is a particularly good illustration of what the coin would look like if the planchet were tapered.

But on your coin you don't see that. On the reverse, One Cent looks just as strong as USA. So a tapered planchet seems unlikely.

Since the rim is missing on a good part of the coin but the strike is strong and the coin is missing weight, the most likely scenario is that someone removed part of the coin on purpose.

This would account for the missing weight and why everything else looks normal.

Finally, if you look under One Cent on the reverse you can see what looks like a little bit of the rim left, sticking up ever so slightly? Except that it's not in the right place. It's running through the bottom of the letters when it should be underneath them.

That's because it's metal that was pushed up during the grinding or removing process, as opposed to the actual rim, kind of like that little bit of metal that's left on the edge of a knife blade after it's been sharpened on one side only.

The lack of tool marks is explained by the fact that it could have been done 45 years ago and copper, being a soft metal, smooths quickly with routine wear.

Why was the coin altered? Who knows. Could be for laughs, boredom, malice or any number of reasons. I ground down a cent some years back just to prove to one of my young son's friends that they weren't copper any longer and dropped in the "Leave a Penny" holder at the local convenience store the next day.

Surprised it hasn't turned up here yet.

I agree with Cujohn. I think you should send your coin off to PCGS to have it graded and confirmed to be the error you believe it to be. Your local coin shop should be able to help you with this. And please, when you receive it back, please take a photo of it and share it with us. Bonne chance!