I bought these three off of Vcoins. I have been wanting to try my hand at cleaning and have not seen anything worth buying on eBay. So I found these three on Vcoins. Thought I would give it a try.
IMO that surface crust leaves extremely pitted surfaces, I agree with Mat leave them as they are a nice desert patina.
I will try one at least. I only paid 9 bucks for the Aurelian so its a cheap way to try one. I will post it here and see what you all thing.
I'm not an expert, but those coins look nice to me. I would also leave them. I'd happily post a couple of uncleaned late Roman bronzes to you if you want to tackle those (though that may not be what you're after).
we would all like to be young again.realistically to be honest i have put far to many years into achieving the ultimate human i am today.btw what type of soap were you planning to use?
Lava with pumice from Pompeii. A tooth pick and a bit of time is what I have seen work well. Ok if these are in too good of condition I will look for some others.
Might be a mistake, but in my experience, making mistakes tends to be a valuable part of learning processes. My initial assumption is that a person with some expertise stopped cleaning those coins at those points for good reasons. But they are common enough coins and you got into them at painless price points, so if experimenting with cleaning is what you want to do, then have fun! But, regardless of how it goes, you have to post the after photos. (especially if it goes horribly wrong! )
Whatever, start off slowly with a soak in water (distilled or tap) and brushing with a toothbrush that you have cut the bristles to half their length to give more stiffness. Soak for a day or two at a time with periodic brushing. You can always get more violent, but repairing damage is much harder (usually impossible).
Don't do it... You'd be better off going on eBay and buying an uncleaned lot, coins that ACTUALLY need cleaning rather than pleasantly patinated coins. If you clean them, you risk removing the dirt filing the porous surfaces. Speaking from experience. My first Alexandrian Tetradrachm was pretty much ruined because of my cleaning attempt using distilled water and a toothbrush.
This lot looks to be not too bad. https://www.ebay.com/itm/3745529419...2+Z9dBIcaGxMWMo|tkp:BFBMpPqV0uJh#readMoreDesc
I bought about 10 coins from Nero coins. All uncleaned high grade. They were repetitively cheap. 5 to 12 dollars each.
If you want to try your hand at cleaning coins (& you should! It's a lot of fun), please do not start with those. You will almost certainly not like the results. I mostly buy from a site called Noble Roman Coins (not the ebay store). I just checked, they're out right now but get new stuff frequently. The cheapest grade is a couple bucks, perfect for practice. 2 other grades as well. They have free instructions to download. The owner makes it fun, too; clearly enjoys his job. I would highly recommend starting somewhere like that. Pumice soap might not be a great idea. Saoking in distilled water (regular tap water or whatever will do nothing) is your best tool. And patience; I've had to let certain coins soak for over a year (prob longer, you kind of lose track) before the dirt would loosen. Good luck! Please post your progress.
I'd leave the coins as-is. The earthen patina provides a really nice contrast to the devices and legends. Any attempt to remove the patina will likely result in a brownish coin, with possibly dull surfaces, not as appealing, I think, as they are now.
I echo the others here. Don’t clean those coins as they look nice already. When you do find a few to clean just start with distilled water and some light brushing. I’m doing that with a Constantine and it’s slowly removing some deposits and looking better every few days. Here’s the BEFORE. Soon I hope to share the AFTER.
Why not cut it into sections and use different techniques or chemicals; that way you can try 6-8 combinations to see their effects(substance used : time: technique:tool) It's your coin so do what you wish as its no great sample. IMO Jim
