i missed nickels for years until i finally learned to use a nickel to set my non vdi machine.but more trash more nickels and then a VDI let me ID them better. all nickels the same basic alloy except the war nickel with silver, which ring up in a common pulltab beavertail here. thats annoying but sometimes with some machines its a better signal sound cross checking. i find V nickels here regularly but never ever shields. they are the same alloy. so maybe its just a lack of them. never found a trime either and i dig lots of dimes, the ole timers here hit it tremendously hard in the 70- 80s and they were good. our limited parks produced a ton. my guru had 3 cloth bank bags of silvers. and he was a kid when he found them. his uncles and thier families wore it out. i saw the last of the real ole timers in the late 70s as a cop on patrol. nail aprons bulging, and fewer urban aluminum targets and nobody cared they detected. many of those places now under buildings and parking lots. the dirt hauled to landfill to cover city garbage dump. man what a silver mine!
on my AT Pro a 52 is most time a nickel. a 56-58 is a tab of sorts or a war nickel. . 53 always a tab. but i dig it all to rid and check below.
May the last hole i dig be my own, and will a fellow detectorist cover me up. And you can have the pulltab!