Please Help Me Understand this Shield Nickel

[Amanda]

 

What would you grade it, and why? Is such a deficient strike common in the series?

 

I found the strike interesting, and I really liked the overall look of the coin.

 

To me, the obverse is at least a fine, but the strike deficient reverse holds the grade back a little according to the dealer I bought it from.

 

So what would you grade it?

 

Also, is that a lamination on the bottom of the reverse, or something else?

 

Thanks!

 

-Amanda

[WoodenJefferson]

I just viewed my raw Shields, I have a 67 with rays and one without rays and let me tell ya, yours is by far way better than both of mine. My examples show just a hint of horizontal bars in the shield, but even with that much wear, the 5 is still very full on the reverse.

 

I have no idea why the high spot on your reverse is the middle of the 5, there is plenty of rim left but then there is that low spot @ 3 to 5 O'clock on the planchet.

 

Does the coin sit flat on a hard surface?

 

Well, it might very well sit flat now that the details have worn even with the rim on the reverse. dunno

 

Anyway, Obv. slight wear on olive leaves, 90% of bars remain, Very Fine-20/ Rev. VG-10 for focal element wear, for net of half way inbetween VG-10 and Fine-12...tough critter to grade.

 

Still, a nice original skinned representative of that era.

[MikeKing]

Hopefully IGWT will chime in on this and the questions about lamination. I don't know the answer to that, but I would suspect the coin would net grade in VG. This is out of my realm though. The rays issues are notorious for poor strike, which is why, I believe, the rays were eventually removed. But I think, too, the hardness of the metal, the size of the coin, and the rays. all together made for a difficult strike. The '67 with rays is more scarce than the '66, which, as you probably already know, was entirely with rays.

[Dcoin]

The wear pattern is very unusual. Why would the center of the coin be flat and only one side of the rim (4,5,6 o’clock) be worn down. It almost looks like the strike is off-center but the actual design is nicely centered?

 

Sorry no answers just more questions.

[MikeKing]

Because the metal flow went more in one direction than the other during the strike.

[MikeInFL]

I have no idea

 

Paging IGWT, please report to Amanda's thread. Paging IGWT!

 

Neat coin, thanks for sharing...Mike

[BillJones]

Does the piece sit flat when you place it obverse up on a flat surface? If it doesn't it's been damaged which explains the odd wear.

 

I've seen poorly struck shield nickels. These coins chewed up dies because the copper-nickel alloy was so hard. The mint employees at the time called copper-nickel "the devil's copper." They hated the stuff. Still I've never seen one that was poorly stuck ONLY in the center of the reverse like this one.

 

If there were some die breaks, I could see why the strike was poor, but there are none that I can see from the picture.

[Amanda]

Thanks for the insight so far.

 

Yes, it does sit flat.

 

I was thinking about it today, is a strike-through grease a possibility maybe?

 

It's a weird coin, I guess.

 

-Amanda

[texasrichard]

I felt like I should contribute something to this thread and since I don't know anything about the shield nickels........

 

Hi Amanda !

[IGWT]

My fellow forumites give me too much credit, and others who are more knowledgeable in planchet and strike errors can likely give a better answer. It looks to me like the dies were slightly misaligned (which is not unusual). The void at the rim is clearly an as-made defect in the planchet; but, I'm at a loss to explain how it occurred. The reverse looks like a typical VG-8, and, as you noted, the mystery is its pairing with a VF-30 obverse. It's difficult to say with certainty the cause of the extremely weak 5. Unless it's caused by uneven wear (the coin doesn't appear to be bent), I'd venture that it's attributable to a combination of weak strike and possibly a severe relapping of the die. I'd net grade the coin Fine.

 

I'm glad to see you post a Shield, Amanda.

[Amanda]

Hi Richard.

 

Thanks, IGWT.

 

So the rim area is a planchet void, that makes sense. Those show up sometimes in Buffaloes too.

 

A severe relapping of the dies is an interesting idea, and as I think about it it sounds very plausible. The coin does not appear to have been bent any time in its life, there is no bowing to it at all, so while it might be uneven wear I do not believe it to be cause by damage.

 

My dealer sold it to me as a VG10, and I felt kinda bad because I was saying it was at least F-12. He said I could call it F-12 in my records if I wanted to.

 

I like shield nickels, they aren't as cute as buffaloes but I like them.

 

 

Here is its buddy.

 

It's a normal shield nickel, though.

 

I have to go do homework now.

 

-Amanda

[bsshog40]

It looks like someone used IGWT's coin as a pocket piece. Looks like perfect rubbing of a lucky coin??A person always uses thier thumb and index finger when rubbing. The thumb rubs in the middle while the index would always rub off center. Just a thought!!!

[MikeKing]

I don't believe this is uneven wear. I still think this is a striking issue, otherwise the rays wouldn't be half there, they'd be all there and worn. The center and the more central parts of the rays are evidently poorly struck out, not worn out.

[BillJones]

This could be a case of where the die simply sank in the middle and took on a concave surface. Perhaps there was an air bubble in the center of the steel that became obvious after the die went into service.

 

Here is an example of an 1800 Bust dollar (Bolender-20) that provides an example of this. The weakness in the center of the obverse of this coin is due to strike not wear. This die did not last very long. It was soon pulled out of service, and the variety is very scarce today. The reverse die lasted for many more impressions and was used for other varieties. As you can see the impressions from it were completely normal.

 

 

[DWLange]

I believe Bill Jones hit the nail on the head. The reverse die appears sunken, which would cause the coin's surface to have a bulge and be more vulnerable to wear. This is more typical of early USA coins, and it's quite unusual on a Shield Nickel.

 

Sinking of the die was caused by improper heat treatment in the hardening process. In addition, this reverse die began to crumble from erosion at lower right and was severely polished along its entire right side to keep its serviceable for additional strikes. This diminished the protective rim and further exposed the center to wear.

 

It would be fun to find a high grade example from this same die state.

[Amanda]

A sunken die? That's pretty awesome.

 

So I guess the die wasn't used too long, then.

 

Thank you guys, for lending your experience to the discussion.

 

-Amanda

[WoodenJefferson]

Ran across this looking for something else...but ties in with thread. Politics as usual, even in the mid 1800's

 

The Civil War of 1861-65 presented tremendous problems for circulating coinage. The silver half dime was one of the many denominations that wasn't circulating, and the five-cent fractional currency was considered to be a poor substitute. A solution to the problem was a coin of a new metal, and coins struck in nickel were introduced.

 

Nickel is impractical for coin production, as its hardness is conducive to laminations, die breaks, poor strikes, and many other problems. When James Pollock, director of the Mint in 1865, proposed a new nickel alloy for coinage, he was under the influence of political pressure. His personal preference was for coins made of French bronze, but nickel magnate Joseph Wharton had many friends in Congress, and the new nickel alloy won out. Nickel had been used in the copper-nickel cents of 1856-64, but the demand or nickel became unprecedented with the introduction of the three cent nickel (1865) and the five cent nickel (1866).

[MikeInFL]

How frequent does die sinking occur on coins dated this late?

 

My impression is that die sinking was a characteristic of coins up until about the mid '1840s, then after they are more rare, but this is only an impression based on large cents and I'm anything but an expert on the topic.

 

Just wondering...Mike