Before & After: Cleaning a Nero Victory As

I've recently been "perfecting" cleaning Eastern European uncleaned lots of LRBs. So a couple weeks ago when an uncleaned Nero As came up from a well known Ebay seller, I had to bid. Turned out, I was the happy new owner of this...



I wanted to try out my hand at more in depth manual cleaning, and was actually really excited to find out what was under that crud.

I started out with a few days in DW and a first pass with a cut toothbrush. Then back in the DW. Did this another time, but then added onto it with some mechanical cleaning with dental pick and Andre crayons. So that was repeated every 3 days for about a week and a half until I felt petty good about where I ended up getting to. Here are the results:



I think the portrait turned out pretty great... I love the detail on the hair!

Have you had done since cleaning of earlier Roman large AEs? Or ARs?

 

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Super impressive!!! You should be proud....

 

wow.....i gotta go clean some of my coins...that's super fantastic Justin..

 

Not bad at all !
I wouldn't have bid on that one in first place fearing it's just crap, but you did a great job revealing its beauty

Q

 

Wow, Justin... what a masterful cleaning job!

 

You really cleaned up your act with that puppy.Great job

 

What is "DW" and what are Andre crayons?

 

That cleaned up rather nicely. Good job!

 

distilled water
&
Coin cleaning tools

 

Thank you all for the kind words!

Edit: it looks like the last bit of my OP was attacked by autocorrect.

"Have you had to do some cleaning of early Roman AEs or ARs? I'd love to see them!"

 

Great job @Justin Lee ! I wish I could get some of my LRBs to look like that.

 

I have only one coin which was a cleaning success and it wasn't because of any exacting skills... all I did was soak it in vinegar.

Before (pretty, in a 1970s black light poster way, but the surface deposits hid details):



After:

 

I suppose I should add the ID...

Nero, 54-68 AD
AE As, Struck 65 AD, Rome mint
Obverse: NERO CAESAR AVG GERM IMP, Laureate head of Nero right.
Reverse: Victory alighting left, wings spread hoding shield inscribed SPQR, S-C across field.
References: RIC I 312, Sear 1976

 

You did a great job, however simple it was, in bringing out the detail, @TIF!

 

Really great results. Nice work!

 

Wonderful cleaning job @Justin Lee - and it didn't take months and months...

 

Lovely transformation and excellent work @Justin Lee ! You've figured out hands-on one of the angles for locating good-deals that many might take a pass on at first glance. I wish you the best future luck in locating more coins that just need a little TLC to turn into nice pieces!

I'm awaiting a Hadrian denarius with Aeternitas holding the head of the Sun and Moon on reverse, misattributed as a Trajan and possessing a superficially ugly mottled sulfide patina. The underlying coin looked solid and the patina thin enough so I'm pretty sure I can remove the nasty sulfide and have a nice coin worth the 33 shipped:


Here's a 1.04g 11mm AR fraction of Metapontion in Lucania that was 28 shipped, ugly but worth the gamble as I love me some Barley-ears and the price was right:

I figured the electrochemical foil process was risky due to the thick sulfide which might not have much detail left underneath but it's the only method I'm familiar with, and was reasonably pleased to have this come out:


Not advisable for rare coins but I'm content with the results.

 

Thanks! Yea, I was thinking it'd be months or it wouldn't come this clean at all.

That is a great coin and deal!

I would be happy with the results too.

 

amazing and inspiring...will open some purchase opportunities!