I was looking on Ebay at some coins, and they told me in the description that they had been acid cleaned/ acid restored/etc. etc. I was wandering what that meant. What does that do to a coin? can somebody just inform me about this, because I am very curious weather or not to buy it, stay far far away from it or jump on it. Thanks
Generally the terms acid and restored refer to a treatment of copper nickle coins such as 5 cent buffaloes. What is restored is an identifiable mint mark or date, what is lost is the original surface producing a totally damaged and identifiable surface. The profile of the buffalo coins was such that the date and mintmark wore very quickly, and that initiated the process. Most feel that any scarce date/mintmark recovered coin is only worth a small fraction of their "good" value. If it is any other coin such as lincoln cents, the process only destroys the coin.
Ok, thanks. I bought some liberty nickels last december that had been "cleaned". So, just nickles are acid cleaned? Should I stay away from them then?
the minting process for Buffalo Nickets had a raised date and mint mark. Once they wore off, the coin was unidentifiable. But the different pressures on the metal of the coin creates an invisible, substrata matrix of metal, and you can raise the date sometimes in a light acid bath, which will unevenly remove enough metal to see the date, making a virtually worthless coin at least a place holder in your coin album. I wonder if the same can be accomplished with xray refraction. Ruben
Usually when the term "cleaned" is used the person using it is saying that the surface of the coin has been damaged by the cleaning. But the correct terminology would be harshly or improperly cleaned for coins like this. And it is important to note that harshly cleaned coins have their value reduced by 20%-80% of the same coin in problem free condition. So if you know that much, and still want to buy harshly cleaned coins, then have at it. As for acid cleaning - no, nickels are not the only coins where acid is used to clean them. But there are many kinds of acids and they are of greatly varying strengths. Some are so mild that they may take months to work while others are so strong that in 1 or 2 seconds the cleaning is done. And sometimes the coin harmed or damaged by acid cleaning and sometimes it is not damaged. So there's a lot more to it that you would think. But the person selling this Buffalo nickel is not using the correct terminology when he says acid cleaned. Acid restored is correct however. For as the others have explained, what that means is that the coin was so worn that the date was no longer visible. But because the acid (it's called Nic-A-Date) was placed on the date area, the acid ate away the top layer of metal so that the date could be seen once again. And while this works, the coin is damaged forever and has virtually no value over and above 5 cents. So now - you have the facts, and it is up to you to decide if you should stay away from them or not.
I think it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. With acid restored dates on Buffalo nickels if you are trying to just build a set and fill some holes, then by all means pick up those keys and semi-keys for cheap by purchasing restored dates. Unless I'm mistaken, the TPGs will slab these as genuine, and I suppose that because of this, some of the key dates and varieties sell for decent amounts even though they are restored dates.
Pretty sure you are mistaken. Not long ago would have said you are mistaken without a doubt. But who knows, they may have started to do it and I'm just not aware.
Here's another one that sold for $368 and was given a details grade by ANACS. https://www.scoins.com/ViewLot.aspx?LotId=17033
I am not sure if it helps or hurts your case, but that listing is for 2 nickels. I have mentioned several times ANACS slabs them and Heritage sells them. Apparently PCI does also. See http://coins.ha.com/common/search_r...=acid&Nty=1&N=51+790+231+350&chkNotSold=0&Ns=
