cleaning coins by tooth pick

some of my coins have a nice tone to them I don't want to clean them with a cleaner or polish them, but I found a lot of crud (dirt , skin cells, lint) I have been using a toothpick and carefully under a scope picking out the crud is there another way that wont remove my patena of the coin but remove or lift the crud short of 120 psi micro nozzle ( rather noisy too) I have in the past tried sonic cleaner and ruined some coins ( I sacrificed cheap ones to try first)

thanks for any input:headbang:

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Toothpicks actually can damage the surface of the coin. I've seen mention of using a sharp rose thorn here before. Probably slightly less chance of causing damage, and certainly more precise than a toothpick.

 

I heard the same thing...toothpicks can cause damage,
I also heard something simular, but instead of rose thorns, hawthorns.

 

I wouldn't use a toothpick for cleaning my coins. Certainly not for anything with much value.

 

I can't even imagine taking a toothpick to my coins. Ouch. If there's dirt and grime on them, let it be.

Verdigris may be a different story. When you remove dirt, gunk, grime or verdigris remember that after the gunk is gone a "bare" spot without natural patina will remain.

 

Forget the toothpick. Messed up seveal coins with this (low value). Rose thorn and mineral oil. Get the sharpest rose thorn use you can. This is not intuitive, but a dull surface will scratch the coin secondary to no control and more force needed to get the lifting effect (your essentially having to smash the toothpick into the coin). The rose thorn will not damage the coin if you don't use too much force. Mineral oil greatly reduces the friction. This degrades the rose thorn so you will have to use several of them. I feel very confident in this technique and have removed the mineral oil with acetone many times to be sure I have not scratched the coin. I actually really enjoy doing this and do it almost every night after work now. I wish I could be paid to do this as I find it very satisfing to see the before and after affect. I cracked out a 1911 S from an NGC holder with grime in all all the lettering and numbers. I will show some photos tomorrow before and after. Too tired right now.

 

great cant wait fr pics.

i use toothpick to get rid of verdi never a problem. what i do is splinter the toothpick and then soften it by dipping in biox and then use it where the verdi sticks or the pit where verdi wont leave on its own. quite fascinating but tiring effort

 

Harvey uses a toothpic to get food out of his teeth......

 

This might be an acceptable method [although a soft tooth brush might be better] for circulated coins. But it probably ruins MS coins.

 

STOP THAT!

You'll probably hairline the coins at least and do irreversible damage to them.

 

def, don't toothpick your coins. I've done it and done scratched them badly.

 

oouuch !

wow you thought I stuck you guys with the toothpick with the reaction I got back...... but thanks I really do appreciate the feedback.

I did presoften the tooth pick by moisture first , but the pick was so large compared to the lettering I could only clean around the edges, and my top condition coins I did not attempt to clean them at all that is why I was asking a better and safer way for the coins sake.

the cleaning that was done exposed some of my better double die coins that I did not know I had such as the 1945 DD merc.

thanks again to everybody

 

Sorry to be harsh but I'd hate to see you ruin your coins.

The only thing that you can do to safely clean silver coins with at home is Acetone. It won't alter the surfaces of the coin. If acetone won't do it, then leave it alone. If it's a very valuable coin then you might consider talking to the folks at NCS, but as a general rule, cleaning a coin seriously devalues it and causes permanent damage.

 

I've used toothpicks and q-tips in cleaning coins before. It was a painful, but necessary, experience, as they were covered with what I could only suppose was some ungodly combination of glue, wax, and coffee.

I'd bet almost anything that the gunk you're describing is actually minuscule and negligible. Post some pics for us! Before and after would be great too.

 

silly question:

As a relative newcomer to the numismatic arena, I'm curious about something. What exactly is the concern about cleaning coins? My wife certainly cleans her jewelry (quite often, I might add). Seems to me a clean coin is better than a dirty one, but folks seem to get pretty upset about a coin that's been cleaned. What's up with that? (Please don't beat me too hard.)

 

Not probably, it does ruin them. Using any sharp pointed THING on a coin is just redicuous. Why not just use an ice pick? How about a screw driver? May as well use steel wool.

 

See below.

 

Generally speaking, cleaning coins can damage original surfaces such as mint luster, and harsher cleaning will leave scratches and hairlines. Most collectors prefer original surfaces and will not buy cleaned collectable coins.

It's a whole different thing than cleaning jewelry.

...................................

 

Great question actually. So many shout out do clean them and then others yell no, don't do that. As noted you'll see posts about how someone uses ice picks, toothpicks, toothbrushes, etc to clean coins and they come out beatiful. When reading those remember one important thing. The individuals that state that don't care if you ruin YOUR coins. If you try something, such as a toothpick and ruin a coin, those that said to try it have nothing to loose. They said it and you tried it and found out they were wrong and they just say things like to bad, tuff luck, so what those are your coins so I really don't care. Just made up all that stuff.
Meanwhile back to why not clean coins. For one thing when your wife cleans jewelry she is probably dipping it is a solution that removes dirt, not contaminates that have chemically combined with the item. If so, little by little the jewelry itself will slowly vanish. Same with anything you constantly clean. You wax your car, then wash, wash, wash it. Eventually there is no more wax so you wax it again. WHY? If you don't eventually the paint will start to slowly come off. Then the car's metal parts will start to rust. Eventually no more car.
Same with coins. Each time you clean a coin you remove part of the coin. Not so if you use cleaners that have no effect on the metal though. Acetone for example. However, if a contaminate on a coin is there due to a chemical reaction, removing it will take away some of the coins metal. As with the car, the more this happens the less of the coin there is. And this is the primary reason not to clean coins.
Aside from the realistic side of things I myself use a sandblaster to make coins look new again. And battery acid works well also.:hail::smile

 

Appreciate your humor, Carl (at least I think that was humor ).
I can certainly understand not using harsh chemicals; and it never occurred to me to use a sharp object that might scratch the coin. But a steam cleaner like jewelers use ought to do little more than bring back the original luster of a coin while removing dirt and grime. Am I just being naive?