I had 50 dateless buffs, so I decided to give nic-a-date a shot and start an album. Some came out good, some hard to read, all look bad where the date was restored. But it's been a fun project so far.
I have done the same thing with some of our IHB's. It is interesting how the dates come up, but it does scar the coin. I've tried doing the entire coin, but it makes for bad images, best to do just the date. Thanks for sharing.
interesting that of all the coins requiring Nic-a-Date, most were in the teens and early 20s and none were in the 30s.
I know Buffalo nickels were still "in circulation" decades after 1938, but I would guess that once the Jeffersons started showing up, people tended to set the Buffalos aside. So, it's not just a matter of circulating 100 years instead of 80 years -- it's more like circulating for 30 years instead of "less than 10". So why don't we see the same for Barber dimes/quarters/halves? I'd guess that the larger the denomination, the more it "costs" to set it aside, and the greater the temptation to spend it when things get tight. But at this point I'm just speculating. (Not to say that people would've been happy to get rid of Barbers because the Mercs/SLQs/Walkers were so much more beautiful... )
With the 1913 if you can see the mound, no need to etch the coin. I made this mistake. I got a bunch of dateless buffs for cheap just to experiment with peroxide (and something else?) and most of the dates came up, but some of the coins were very white so I used less peroxide. One of the coins is a 1913-S which I can now only sell as etched to a collector who wants to fill that hole for $20 or whatever I have it marked as.
@R.Morgan I have had two 1934 and one '35 IHB nickel dates come up with Nic-A-Date. The earlier coins are more prone to fading though.
Like the others said, I think it's because the later dates were pulled from circulation earlier in their lifetime. Plus nickels worked harder in the teens and 20s and early 30s (when Buffs skipped a few years) than they did in the late 30s and 40s. I do have full date or partial date nickels that I'll plug in the later dates with, simply because a no-date 1937 will be a tough find.
Interesting you say this. I could have sworn I had a dateless type 1 somewhere, but I haven't been able to find it. Maybe I sold it years ago as is. But I was hoping to fill one of those type 1 holes (no such luck).
