Help! 1911 Liberty nickel grading and other issues!

TCiccone

I picked up this 1911 Liberty Nickel and need some help from the Nickel pro's.
First of all, it is raw and I am not sure how to grade these and what the grade actually is. The surfaces appear uncirculated to me and there are a couple of contact spots in the hair and above the eye. The lower left cornstalk is not full of definition and I am not sure if this is strike weakness or rub. The color of the scan is pretty true. Is this normal toned coloring? And lastly there are a couple of spots on the obverse. Will this dramatically effect the grade and is there any way to remove them? Dipping etc..and can these be dipped and how will it effect the spots and the color? please excuse the lint on the scan.


I thank you in advance for your assistance!

TC

TheNumish

Something has been done to that coin. I think it's been cleaned. It doesn't have the original mint luster that is present on uncirculated coins. The surfaces look grainy. I think the spots have grown on the coin after it was cleaned. Probably cleaned a long time ago.

darktone

Yeah the surface of that coin shows no luster and it really looks lifeless. mike

TCiccone

I thank you for your input as I said I do not know much about these. The price was worth it regardless for a learning experience! Is this color normal or should it be more silverish? or other?

WWBillman

An untoned liberty nickel would be nickel white. This series is known for toning and it can be difficult to find them untoned. I agree with everyone else and suspect it "could" have been cleaned at one time and it is not a MS coin rather an AU at best. You can dip these coins. Back in the day I had an AU 1883 NC I dipped and it came out pretty well. PCGS then slabbed it AU58.

Here ia a pic of an untoned one.

kryptonitecomics

I agree with everyone else's assessment on this coin. The Liberty Nickel series is one of my favorite series, and you will find it extremely difficult to find any examples MS or otherwise that don't possess the golden toning you coin exhibits. The surface is troubling due to the grainy appearence, which indicates to me that it took a bath in a pretty strong solution which actually etched or removed some of the surface layer of the coin. As for the price, as you pointed out it is always always a good thing to learn a lesson on a common date coin. If I recall correctly the 1911 has the highest (or close to it) mintage in the entire series. You should be able to find plenty of nice examples for cheap money. Your coin has very few noticable contact marks, which is nice, but I wouldn't attempt anymore conservation efforts to remove the toned spots. Leave it alone and enjoy what's left of the coins appearence.

TCiccone

Thanks all for the remarks! I knew I had come to the right place!

TC

dorkkarl

lower left corn on the 1911 is almost always weakly struck. in fact, the 1911 is well-known among v-nickel buffs as being quite rare with a truly fully-struck reverse. if you find a business strike w/ every kernel showing in the left ear of corn, BUY IT regardless of the price.

your particulr coin look AU-ish to me, but may be a slider unc. the spots look more like corrosion to me, and you basically can't dip nickel. well, actually you can, but not w/ any commercial dips.

hope this helps.

K S