i did a "no-no" but...

so curiosity got the best of me and i put some dateless buffalos in vinegar to bring out the dates. most were common (quite a few 1919), but one got me excited. it's a 1913-d type 2! it fills a hole for now, so i'm happy!

 

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if it was dateless but you could tell it was type 2 you should of left it right?

 

i couldn't even see the mintmark on the reverse originally.

 

No, type ones were unique to the year 1913, all of the other years plus some of the 1913's were type 2.

 

sweet find! i wanted to get some bulk dateless nickels to bring out the date and start a folder with them.

 

Nice find! The "no no" was worth it!

 

You got me thinking... Hmmm I have a bunch of dateless Buffs as well. Maybe time to get a New Whitman Folder, some Red Wine vinegar (I'm Italian!) and have some fun! I'll mark the outside of the Folder as "Vinegar Treated Buffs" Hah!
Steve

 

Hey, that didn't come out all that bad ! How long did you soak it and did you rotate it ? Details please.

gary

 

it soaked for a little over 2 weeks in white vinegar (2 weeks was my original plan, but ended up going on vacation right before the 2 weeks were up, so it got a couple of extra days). i changed the vinegar every 3 to 4 days. i kept it obverse up because i didn't know it had a mintmark, yet the mintmark came out too!

i had a total of 8 dateless buffalos. some of them took about a week for the date to show, and were pulled earlier.

 

Could anyone explain exactly how the vinegar works?

 

Vinegar of course is a mild acid. Police have known for many years that a gun with the serial number ground off can be identified by using acid to "raise" the number. When metal is stamped or impressed with an image the hardness is altered where more pressure (which results in a local hot spot) is exerted. It's actually the heat from striking that changes the temper (hardness) of the metal. Thats why you can "raise" a date.

 

Do you have any 'before' pics of the coin? It would be interesting to see what you got off.

 

Thanks coinhead, got it!

 

sadly, no, i didn't take any before pics. i wish i had now.

 

That gives me a project for this afternoon. Thanks

 

I got a 1913-S type two kind of like this. Found it in a dateless bag. I never used vinegar on it but somebody probly did at some point. I cant really tell.

 

i have a feeling that may be the only way i could afford one. nice find, nonetheless!

 

And the vinegar method results in a much better looking end result than pieces done with Nic-A-Date.

 

2 weeks huh?
That sounds a little long. Does anybody know what the standard time of said procedure would normally take to see results. I have no intentions of doing this, just curiosity.

 

i read on here on ct a week. after 1 week, no date was visible, so i gave it an extra week.