I want to take baking soda to my steel cents to make them shiney... (Yes I know you're not supposed to take anything abrasive to coins) would I deplete the value?
Yes, you would hurt the value -- that's not a super-valuable coin, but it's a steelie with honest wear, and there's no reason to turn it into a details coin. I'd recommend trying the "baking soda rub" on some modern cents from circulation first, so you can see what effect it has. Rotate the coin under a light both before and after you've rubbed it. After the rub, you'll be able to see how it picks up highlights from the light in one direction. That's because of the tiny hairlines rubbing leaves on it.
How much is a circulated 1943 steel cent worth? Maybe 10-50 cents? So you don't have much to lose. If having a shiny steel cent makes you happy, go for it. If you were for some reason trying to resell it, cleaning it won't help the value and might hurt it a little. But for low-valued coins, most of the hit you take comes from the spread between the retail sale price and the buy price. A little bit of cleaning is secondary. If you never play to sell it, why worry? Edit: Since I am verbose, let me add an analogy. Consider turning a coin into jewelry. It ruins the coin numismatically, but coin jewelry is its own thing which some people enjoy for its own sake. Likewise, some people enjoy shiny coins. If it were a scarce coin it would be a shame to damage one, but these are so plentiful it doesn't matter. That being said, you may get more enjoyment out of the hobby if you can also enjoy coins with their natural patina, even if they are not shiny. And an uncirculated steel cent is only a few bucks, so you could also just buy one of those.
I used Vinegar . No harm . it's just steel . I like them though, piece of our history . "There's No crying in coins" .
Well, to be honest with you that's about the most common reason there is for those new to the hobby, and or those collectors who are inexperienced, either wanting to know how to clean coins, or for their actual trying to clean coins - and doing it improperly. In other words, it's why they make so many mistakes and so many coins end up ruined forever. So, you are far, far, from being alone in your thinking ! To be honest with you about something else, coins with significant wear on them aren't supposed to be shiny. They're supposed to look like that coin of yours. So making them shiny tells the rest of the world that somebody has been messing with these coins ! But yeah, I get it, I get that thinking, EVERYBODY gets it ! Everybody wants their coins to look as nice as possible, and for lots of folks - that's nice and shiny. But usually the only time you're gonna get that is when the coins are unc, and do not have significant toning. In a way wanting your coins to be shiny is kinda like waxing and polishing up an old car. If ya don't - it just looks like another old car. But if ya do, it makes it look special - and not just top you but to everybody else too. Thing is though, coins aren't old cars. And people who know coins know they're supposed to look. And when they don't look like they're supposed to look - first thing that comes to mind is that coin has been messed with and there's something wrong with it ! So what I'm trying to get across here is that wanting coins like that to look nice and shiny - it's gonna have exactly the opposite effect that you want it to have ! About the only folks who are gonna think it looks better all shiny are those who don't know any better. Those who are new, or inexperienced.
When I was a kid (1950's) I started collecting 1943 steel cents. I even had a lady at a neighborhood store set them aside for me. Well i wound up with over 200, some of them rusty. Well, I put them in clear plastic tubes and squirted some motor oil in them. I still wonder if I did them any harm but they're still in the oil.
Enjoy what you have and place it's value in it's historical event, 1943 WW11. My opinion only, thanks for asking. Very good post.
Although there is not great deal of value there, the answer is YES. It would look really bad now and worse later. The zinc plating is part of what made the wartime steel cent interesting.
The last coin I took baking soda to went from being worth $750 to a $250 coin. Give it a try and then send the coin to a TPG service, preferably PCGS. LOL
They used to say the same thing about the passenger pigeon, flocks so large that they took hours to pass by. So why worry about shooting or hunting them. Last one died at the Cincinnati zoo in 1914. Said the same thing about the American Bison, they covered the plains. In the late 1790's there were over 60 million of them. By 1889 there were just 541 left. If it were for conservation efforts in the eary 20th century the American Bison would be extinct today. So yes there are plenty of XX coins around, but why destroy them if you don't have to?
Fair enough. I suspect these days our most perishable resource is not our coins but ourselves. I don't recommend destroying any coins, or harshly cleaning them either. But if you're going to pick a coin minted in the hundreds of millions, there are always going to be far more coins than collectors, so the consequences are less significant than for a scarcer coin.
