Posting Jefferson nickels in order by date

1945-D

 

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1945-S

 

1945-P



1945-D: Top Pop



1945-S: Appalachian

 

Wow!

 

Nice Luster!

 

The 1943 Lincolns that were struck on copper planchets are among the most famous and valuable mint errors. Are there any 1946 nickels struck on leftover silver planchets? Do they exist - but are just too hard to tell from the nickel composition? I'll take a close look at these next three coins just to be sure.

1946

 

1946-P

After the war years, the quality of Jefferson Nickels plummets with the exception of 1947 & 1948 & 1956. While the Denver nickels remained pretty nice, the Philly and San Francisco coins become exceedingly hard to find without problems. Planchet flaws, mushy strikes, overused dies plague the series for 2 decades. Here is the nicest 1946-P that I have ever encountered, and it suffers like the rest.

 

1946-D

 

1946-D over Inverted D

I'm not really a variety collector per se, but the Jefferson series has so few actual key dates that the variety coins and the tough full steppers become the keys. I think paying moon money for steps is dumb so varieties it was.

 

1946-S
These two examples highlight the differences in worn dies. The second example has a granular appearance at Jefferson's throat and the detail of his cravat is gone. The bridge of his nose and detail in the back of the jacket and hair braid is also worn away. On the reverse, the steps are nearly full, but there is wear just to their left and right near MO and LL.

 

Excellent post and both of those coins show remnant planchet flaws on the jaw and coat collar which are not factored into the grading process.

 

1946-S

The San Francisco issue from this date is extremely hard to find in MS67 with a total population under 150 and none graded higher. Alas, I own two of them, though I forgot to include the label on the second coin.

 

1947
Here again are two contrasting coins for this year. I think I like the first better, except for the huge tear in the planchet that marks the reverse. Since that represents the way the coin was made, I don't really mind it that much.



If this were a scratch made after striking, the metal that was gouged out would have been pushed around, causing a lump of displaced metal someplace. This gouge had to be created when manufacturing the planchet.

A gash can't really be eradicated unless you push metal up from the bottom of the groove so the surface is evened out. If it is hammered by the dies it is more likely to be pinched together, but not removed.

This closeup shows how marked the surface of even a high-end coin really looks. Somewhere on CoinTalk there are photos of raw planchets. They get pretty dinged up going through rolling out, punching blanks, cleaning and tumbling dry, being dumped into hoppers, and so on. There are contact marks just about everywhere except the right and left windows.

 

1947-D

 

1947-S

 

1947

This year shows the same trend where the Denver mint produced much better quality. A good year for toning though.



1947-D



1947-S

 

1948

 

1948-D