1943S Shilling Struck on US Nickel Planchet

[markn]

Andrew Crellin at Sterling Currency has just posted up an insanely cool 1943S Shilling struck on a US silver war nickel planchet.  IMHO it's severely under-valued at the price he's asking given how few of this type of error are about the place.  Here's the coin:

http://www.sterlingcurrency.com.au/items/1943-shilling-s-metal-strike-usa-nickel-planchet-good-vf

PPH and I wrote about an (almost) identical error in CAB a few years back.  This error was a 1944S Shilling struck on a war nickel.  We've just reproduced the article on the blog here:

http://www.australian-threepence.com/blog/2013/04/the-foreign-planchet-shilling-1.html

[Triggersmob]

I'm off to weigh my 1942 S and 1944 S.

Hey, you just never know.

[enworb]

Very cool! Too much for me though

[trout]

There is a fair bit of discrepancy in the silver content in this.
war Nickels are supposed to be 35% not nearly 42% ?

[Triggersmob]

I'm off to weigh my 1942 S and 1944 S.

Hey, you just never know.

Well, just checked mine and both weigh about 5.6g as they should, but turns out the 1944 is Melbourne not S. oops!
Just checked my 43, which I had listed as Melbourne and that is a S,
but still 5.6g. Oh well, it was worth checking. At least I fixed a couple
of my errors.

[markn]

There is a fair bit of discrepancy in the silver content in this.
war Nickels are supposed to be 35% not nearly 42% ?

Supposed to be.  I've read several references though that suggested the silver content was all over the place.

[trout]

There is a fair bit of discrepancy in the silver content in this.
war Nickels are supposed to be 35% not nearly 42% ?

Supposed to be.  I've read several references though that suggested the silver content was all over the place.

yes I suppose that is why there is a 5% discrepancy in the weight as well

[enworb]

I assume the alloy content is from one of those XRF thingys. I saw one show 62% for an Aussie florin once. Might be the machine rather than the coin?

[markn]

We had our error tested on two different XRF machines and they gave very different results.  Not sure how accurate they are if a specimen isn't prepared properly.  Back in the distant past when I did my final year engineering project I made heave use of an XRF machine and it required metal samples to be cut and polished before testing.  Clearly you don't want to be doing this to a coin!

[enworb]

I think that is the problem here then, not the actual coin.

[Fulvio]

Hmm.. how did the manganese turn into Iron I wonder???

Mn   Kα1   0.2102nm
Fe   Kα1   0.1936nm

Surely not operator error?

Also, I'm wondering about the lettering.. die fill or damage?

[enworb]

Id say the planchet is slightly smaller and that would be the explanation of the weakness around the rims.

[trout]

Id say the planchet is slightly smaller and that would be the explanation of the weakness around the rims.

the nickel planchet IS smaller 21.2mm compared to 23.5 for the shilling planchet :ok:
I do however have a problem with the appearance of this coin, I have a full set of Jefferson nickels and many spare war nickels.
On all of my War nickels the   high points when worn turn a bit dark and nasty.
The shilling however is the reverse.
IF these are the same alloy then I would imagine that they would have the same problem as the War Nickels.

[accumulator]

The fishtailing on the obverse legends is the most obvious example i've seen & on almost every letter.

[acrellin]

I'm pleased you guys have an interest in this coin - I think there's more to it than meets the eye so far, and I'm doing a little research into it at the moment.

I posted the specs of the coin in the "Error Coin Information Exchange" over at their yahoo group - it's a very active group so there have been a number of comments made on it, all of them very constructive.

If you want to cast an eye over the discussion to date, you can do so here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/errorcoininformationexchange/message/26647

I had the coin XRF-tested here in Fremantle, and although the exact specs measured each time a test was done (they tested it multiple times to confirm the readings), the range of readings was fairly accurate.

My initial reaction was that, based on the difference between the alloy AND weight of this error and that of the standard "wartime alloy" US nickel, chances are it may have been struck on a foreign planchet (from neither Australia nor the US!). Feedback either way from the gents over @ the Error Coin Information Exchange has been inconclusive - I've weighed the ten or so "wartime" US nickels we have in the junk silver box here in the office, and they varied in weight incredibly - 4.90g - 5.07g as opposed to an apparently standard 5.00g.

Based on that, my guess is that if the weight varies such a great deal (nearly a 5% range based on my very small sample alone), then the alloy could well vary just as much as well.

We know the circumstances that the staff at the Australian branch mints worked under during WWII, so it should be hardly surprising that the US mint might have endured similar challenges to their own quality control during the same period.

A definitive answer will be to have the coin authenticated by PCGS, so it's heading off there shortly, in the meantime I'll be continuing my reading into foreign coins struck at the US mint to see if there's a coin with specs that are closer to this error.

It's an interesting coin to look into, particularly if it turns out to be an "orphan" planchet error.

If I compare the value of a decimal off-metal error with the value of this one it looks cheap indeed!

The fishtailing on the obverse legends is the most obvious example i've seen & on almost every letter.