'70 S sm dt. toned or stained?

[GrumpyEd]

And to bug me further, it looks like it has a small hit on the top of the 0, on LD they have a bulge there.

I thought that if the top of the 7 is below a line drawn from the top of the 9 to the 0, it is a large date?

The top line stuff works but not well, that's why people also look at the bottom length of 7. In general, the line stuff isn't as good as the 9 shape to ID them but if there's any shift or MD it can make the 9 tricky. Like a slight MD can make the blunt tip look pointed or look like it points differently.

Like Viv said the weak LIBERTY helps too but like Pete said, it can be anything on a LD and all SDs aren't as weak as others.

In the end, we need to look at everything. 7 is shorter and stocky on SD and on LD it is longer and has a crease at the intersection.
0 is taller and more oblong and has a bulge on top on LD. On SD the 9 center is wider and has a pointed curl that points more to the 7 and on the LD it is blunt and points more downward. Liberty gets weak as you read it on the SD and the motto has a sort of fine look to it. And with all that stuff... even TPGs and dealers get them wrong and many on ebay are wrong.

I had about 7 SDs and one of them I was never 100% on, it's because some coins have some issues that make them tougher to tell while others you can easily ID in a second.

[Roller]

If someone could do an overlay of the date and MM of a known SD (if there is only one combination) that might do the trick.

[jallengomez]

There are multiple mint mark/die combinations for the small date cents. This is a small date. I agree that it looks like oil from skin that has tarnished the coin.

[jfines69]

Maybe it is a LD that has abnormal die wear... The 1 looks thinner toward the center...I also see abrasions and flow lines plus it looks as if the L in LIBERTY is on an up slope???

[Maineman750]

Looks like a small date from here...pretty sure there was more than one die....but they all had the S mm

[GrumpyEd]

pretty sure there was more than one die.

Multiple SD dies, bus strikes and proofs and even the proof with LD/SD.

Also, not the same as the 70-S SDs but if you look at the DDO listings for P-D-S there are tons of them with bars over the top of the 7. They seem to have different levels of the 7 but the 9s are all normal. I'm not sure but it seems like there could be varieties with the 7 in different positions. Not sure how that could be explained (in hierarchy of the dies being made) or why they were messing with it but it would seem like they must have been up to something. Maybe someone has an answer .

[GrumpyEd]

The reason those P-D-S are puzzling to me is...

They sort of look like they were hubbed with a hub with a higher 7 that was mostly removed then hubbed with a complete lower 7.
BUT... that probably isn't true because most are listed as class 5 (pivoted hub).
But to me it seems odd that it mostly shows as a low over high 7 on so many dies. (sometimes also got the L of liberty)
Like I say, it seems like the experts determined they're normal pivoted hub DDOs and that it shows on some of the Ls of liberty might have been the reasoning. If it was something with a modified hub they would have called them class 7 (modified hub). But then again, almost no DDOs are listed as class 7.