The set of imputations may be empty, while the set of preimputations is never empty. Hence the nucleolus may be empty, while the prenucleolus is never empty. This happens, for example, in the two-player game v(1)=v(2)=0 and v(1,2)=-1.
If you look for a game where both nucleolus and prenucleolus are nonempty and yet they differ, Exercise 20.15 in "Game Theory" by Maschler-Solan-Zamir asks to compute the nucleolus and the prenucleolus of the three-player game where v(1,2)=1 and v(S)=0 for every other coalition S. The nucleolus is (0,0,0), since this is the only imputation. I do not recall what is the prenucleolus, but my guess is that it is (1/4,1/4,-1/2), where the maximal excess is 1/2.