My daughter and I were looking through her coin collection and she has a 1943 P nickel, but it feels light and seems to have a different type of metal underneath an outer layer where it is wearing away. I weighed it on my scale and it is 4.8g, but would that be due to wear? Is there anything special about this 1943 issue like there is with the steel penny? I am not too familiar with modern US coins as I'm an Ancients collector. Any help would be appreciated!
the 1943P is supposed to be 5 g but yours has some wear . It's also 56% copper, 35% Silver and 9% Manganese. Hope that helps.
It looks to have a bit of a lamination issue on the obverse which is incredibly common on war nickels. The rest of the coin I would attribute to wear. Welcome the world of modern coins
Wear and tear, lamination issue, it's a keeper. 2024 Red Book VF-20 grade gives it a $3.00 value and goes up in .50 cent increments through AU-50. Yours appears to be at or below the lower grade. You probably already knew this though.
For the most part it is only valuable in high grade and with full steps. This is a wartime silver issue so it is more valuable in lower grades than coins before 42 and after 45.
