odd reading on nickle

[jonhls]

found a jefferson nickle this morning 1945 but it reads 7-23 on my screen.all my other nickles read 10-6 or close to it.anyone ever have one read like that before.thx jon

 

[jimdoc]

It is probably a silver war nickle, the mintmark
should be large on the back.

 

[christopher-ohio]

A Jefferson "war" nickel with on average 56% Copper, 35% Silver, and 9% Manganese will "read" differently on the numerical/smartview display on the EXII compared to the "usual" clad nickel which is 75% Copper and 25% Nickel. I have found that there is a tremendous variability in the metallic composition of many of these "silver-clad" nickels as evidenced by my own finds and the corresponding tone, number, or icon depending on the machine I was using. I have read many a forum post with similar reports. Any Explorer is an unbelievable machine when it comes to analyzing a metallic target both numerically and by tone-that's what makes it so great when you've finally made it through the learning curve but also makes it so frustrating to new users...HH

 

[Rick(ND)]

First was a guy posted on the BBS forum about a war nickle that read like a zinc penny I had a hard time believing, so he sent it to me for me to try out. Most war nickles will read the same or slightly higher because of the silver in them from 1943-1945, but not this high. When i got it here I tried it on my Sovereign and my Explorer and got the same reading as you do. Then he E Mails me and said he got another one in the same field too that read this way. I posted this on another forum as i was wondering what was going on as they should not read this high. I got some response that this was discussed a while back and it seem some ground do affect the nickle content of the war nickle so the conductivity will read higher than normal. I believe James got one this past month too he told me about as it read almost to where he thought he may have a IH penny.
The war nickles I have found will read as high as 151 on a Sovereign 180 meter and a 10-7 on the the XSII and most reg nickle are 10-6 or 10-5.

 

[Anonymous]

Hello john,

I wrote an article several years ago on this subject, Seems like yesterday.

The Manganese breaks down under harsh elements from the ground or weather, The silver nickel "when buried" for long periods will cause the manganese to break down depending on the surrounding elements, Some worst than others.

The silver war-time nickel was the only coin to use manganese so many dug up war-time silver nickels will read different, Thank goodness

Paul (Ca)

 

[James N.D.]

I thought I was going to dig up an older Wheat Penny or an Indian Head since it was bouncing around a bit on digital and read 25-26. I got down about 8"-10" and found the War Nickel in the hole. I knew it couldn't be the Nickel I was getting and stuck my X-1 Probe in the hole again and then it nulled. I figured that the Iron made it read that high and didn't think much of it until I went to clean the Nickel that night. I cleaned it and sat it on the counter with the rest of my finds and this is when I knew there was something different about this Nickel. When I sat it on the counter, there was a dense thud noise. Usually there should be a low pitch type ring to it but this one was way too dense and just gave a thud sound. Then I took it and ran it across my detector and it read in between what an older Wheat or an Indian Head would read on the meter. That is the only War Nickel I have ever found that reads like this. Has to be some real bad ground conditions for this to happen.

 

[bgscofield6]

I've dug 2 silver war nickels in the past week. One rang up about 4-5 ony my digital and made your typical nickel sound. I was really surprised when I cleaned it up and saw the mint mark above the monticello. Then the next day I got a signal about 7" deep that was sounding off like a penny would and out came a 45P war nickel.