3 nickels found today

[Digger2]

I found a 1943 S nickel, a 1943 D nickel and a 1942 no mint mark nickel.
The two 1943 nickels had no patina, but the 1942 did. Odd (to me as they both have or suppose to have silver in them (I think).
Do these coins have any collection value, or just the value of the silver?

Roy

 

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[oddcoins]

Sounds like the 1942 is NOT the 'WAR NICKEL" silver planchet, while the 1943 are definitley the silver planchet type.

The first 1942 nickels weren't made with the war time silver planchet ~ but the last part of the year in 1942 they were made with the silver planchets. ALL the 1943, 1944, and 1945 nickels are made with the silver planchet. Then they went back to the normal composition in 1946.

 

[wvwildman]

nice finds congrats HH

 

[Digger2]

Thanks for the info, I also found 4 wheaties from 1941 to 1957, and an old barlow (I think) pocket knife. It's probably worthless, but since it was on family property, I'll try and restore it.
The only (besides the nickels) silver I was able to recover was a 1943 25 cent piece. it shows sings of pocket wear, but I am sure worked for it. While digging it I was hit real hard by fireants, but when I saw silver it was worth it!

Roy

 

[cudamark]

The "war" nickels were only 35% silver so there is no major value in just the silver content. The composition of the soil and amount of moisture will attack metals differently. There is actually a trace amount of gold in the war nickels too but not enough to bother melting them down for it unless you had thousands of them.

 

[Generic_Lad]

The 1943 nickels you found contains no nickel. It is:

35% silver
56% copper
9% Manganese

Because of the silver content and the alloy, they turn "greenish" in circulation, but in the ground, they won't turn the reddish colour that is typical of dug nickels because it contains no nickel and less copper (all other nickels other than the 1942-1945 war nickels are 75% copper and 25% nickel).

The alloy changed midway through 1942, the nickels without large mintmarks over the monticello are the standard 75% copper 25% nickel alloy while the ones with the large mintmark are the 35% silver alloy.

All other years of nickels from the shield nickel in the 1800s all the way to the nickels produced today in 2013 is 75% copper and 25% nickel.