After further inspecting coins produced by both dies from the 12-die machine at Hollywood Studios, there does seem to be some differences even though the dies are supposed to be identical. The coins pressed with the first die seem to have a little more detail and the lines are more raised and rounded. The pennies pressed by the second die appear to be thicker and flatter. Part of the banner poles and some other small parts of the design seem to be missing.

Also, instead of using a catalog suffix of -2 we are going to add a suffix of a lower case 'a' to the original catalog number. We have also updated our original blog post about the die change with this information.

A new 4-die hand crank machine has been installed at the Prop Shop at Hollywood Studios. This will make the 7th machine at this location. The designs are based on the Disney Pixar movie Monsters, Inc. All four designs are similar with one of the characters from the movie standing in a doorway. The characters are Mike, Sulley, Boo and Randall.

In the past two years the Star Wars Machine was only available on the weekends at Hollywood Studios. When this annual event was over, the machine was removed and put back into storage.

This year the machine was located at the Prop Shop and it was also available during the week instead of just on the weekends. What is interesting is that this machine is still on-stage and it has not been removed like it was in previous years.

We are not sure how long this machine will be available but it is still at the Prop Shop in between two other pressed coin machines at this location.

The In Character gift shop twelve die machine at Hollywood Studios has been changed. The machine did have three die rings with four designs on each ring. These rings have been replaced with one wide die ring that has all twelve designs on it. The designs are still the same but there is now a different die making them.

Whenever there was a die change in the past, we would assign a totally different catalog number since there was usually something different when a die was replaced with the same design. Due to the dies being computer engraved now instead of hand engraved it is usually impossible to see any design variations. We are now faced with a problem where we know the dies were replaced but the designs are identical with probably nothing to indicate which die produced the design unless you know when the coin was pressed.

In the future we will create a new record using the same catalog number with a suffix. We believe this is better then assigning a completely different catalog number whenever there are multiple dies producing the same identical design. For example, we have assigned a catalog number of DHS0116 to the Snow White design at this machine. A duplicate record for this design will be created just in case there is a design variation with a note indicating that two different dies were used to produce the same design. The second record will have a catalog number of DHS0116-2.

Of course this creates all types of problems knowing which die produced a coin design unless you know when the die was replaced and when a coin was produced with that die. Also, we may not know when a die is replaced. With this machine you could see the die ring is now different then what was originally in the machine.

UPDATED 9/19/2015: After further inspecting coins produced by both dies from the 12-die machine at Hollywood Studios, there does seem to be some differences even though the dies are supposed to be identical. The coins pressed with the first die seem to have a little more detail and the lines are more raised and rounded. The pennies pressed by the second die appear to be thicker and flatter. Banner poles and some other small parts of the design seem to be missing.

Also, instead of using a catalog suffix of -2 we are going to add a suffix of a lower case 'a' to the original catalog number.

A new 8-die machine was put on-stage this morning inside Once Upon A Toy by the exit door at Downtown Disney. This is the first 8-die machine at Disney World and it is like the first 12-die machine that was installed last month at Hollywood Studios. This machine contains a numbered series with 8 designs from the popular Disney Frozen movie. Each design cost $1 to get but you can get all 8 designs for $5.

A new and first of its kind for Walt Disney World 12-die penny machine was installed today at Hollywood Studios. This new machine replaces the 3-die machine that was at the In Character gift shop.

Each design has a Disney character and is part of a numbered twelve design Heroines series. The twelve characters in this series are Snow White, Cinderella, Rapunzel, Ariel, Pocahontas, Mulan, Jasmine, Tiana, Belle, Aurora, Merida and Alice. Each design has the character's name in script letters at the top, Walt Disney World below the character and what number in the series the design is at the very bottom.

As you can see from the above picture each design is now $1 instead of the usual $0.50 plus your penny that you want to press. You can also get all twelve designs for $10. This new type of machine is currently preloaded with circulated pennies instead of uncirculated pennies. Since the machine is currently using circulated pennies that are randomly loaded, you no longer have any control as to how the design will look. Due to the Lincoln Memorial columns on the reverse of pennies that will sometimes cause a problem with designs in some machines, most collectors like to do their presses on the Lincoln Head side. Most collectors also like to use copper cents that are dated 1981 or older. Most likely you will get the design on a copper plated zinc cent since copper cents are not as common in circulation as they used to be.

The machine has a touch screen that allows you to select your language, what design you want or all designs and what method of payment you will be using. The current language options are English, Spanish, French, German and Japanese. The current payment methods are the major credit cards, cash or ApplePay.

If you only want one design you can only use a $1 bill for payment. If you want all 12 designs then you can use a $10 bill or a credit card.

Two new machines have been installed at Downtown Disney. The first machine is located inside the store Marketplace Fun Finds. The four new designs are Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Goofy. All of these new designs have the name of the Disney character.

The second machine is located at Cirque du Soleil in the gift shop. Even though this machine is not an official Disney machine, it is located on Disney property which is why we list this machine. All four designs have the La Nouba Cirque du Soleil logo and the PENNYCOLLECTOR.COM dot border. The first design is the BMX bicycle act. The second design has the Green Bird. The third design has three different characters from the show with the city name of ORLANDO at the top and the fourth design is of the Les Cons (The Nuts).