Is it possible to remove the crud from these? Acetone brightened them up and removed decades old album grime but did nothing for the crud.
Dang, I wish I could take pictures that nice, there will be controversy over the question as usual, but if you really want to get rid of it, maybe a soak in distilled water and then a little gentle work with a wooden toothpick? Me, I'm a wuss, I have done an acetone soak, but some of these guys are doing toothpicks, EZ Zest and all sorts of hot rod stuff.
E-Z est will leave cents an unnatural color from what I've read. I only did a 10 second acetone dip. Maybe I'll try a few day soak before anything else. I really don't want to ruin these on an experiment.
The dirty brown looks like it is toning that has gone into the terminal stage. I am pretty sure that it is there for good. You might try some MS70 on it but that has the potential to give your coin a blue hue.
Leave them as is. These are not coins to experiment with. Some collectors like colorful "pocket change" and will pay good money to get it. Put the coins on Ebay as a group (as is/ no return/ free shipping/ with your images)and you may be shocked at the price they bring.
Useless to state “no return” in any listing. eBay’s buyer protection (known as the Money Back Guarantee, or MBG) overrides all such statements; they are completely unenforceable. A buyer may return any item for any reason (legitimate or not) for a full refund via other mechanisms beyond the MBG. For example, a buyer may file for return via PayPal for up to 6 months. The more creative will utilize credit card protections, which may allow returns for up to 18 months. The truly dishonest will use their credit card protections to illicit both a refund and free goods. eBay is the Wild West.
Precisely ! It's not crud at all, it's toning. As for the question - is it possible to remove it ? Of course it's possible, but as Insider all but said, it's highly unlikely you would be happy with the results ! I strongly suspect there's damage already done under that dark toning. Coins like this, you just leave alone. Now that doesn't pertain to all coins, but specifically copper coins. You can quite often produce amazing results, beautiful results, with silver coins toned much worse than these !
If acetone didn't remove something, the "something" is most likely not crud. The "something" is most likely toning, a chemical change of the surface metal of the coin. That's beyond the ability of acetone.
I like what you have shown. If you’re referring to the slightly darker outside edges forget it. Anything you do is sure to mess up the rest of those coins. Leave them alone.
I've only ever used acetone, and then only a couple times, but isn't anything more aggressive you do to it going to remove or mess up the toning?
No where in that article does it say acetone removes luster. Acetone is mostly virtually harmless to a copper coin, and absolutely harmless to nickel clad, silver, and gold.
If you only soaked them for 10 seconds in acetone, try soaking them for several minutes. There is no crud on your coins, only toning. By the way, where and how did you have these stored? If you want to preserve your coins and slow down the toning and eliminate corrosion, store them in 2x2 flips and then purchase a DANSCO album 7000. It's specifically suited for all 2x2 flips, no matter the size of the coin.