I purchased a 1961 mint set for melt about a week ago. The cellophane was torn around the half, and blackened a portion of the half (tarnish from air). It was not a good rainbow tone or anything, it was solid black tarnish. I took a very fine sunshine cloth and rubbed the tarnish off. Now the half DOES look a lot better than it did, but if held at a particular angle, you can see the very fine scratches. So what grade with this be? It would still have to be mint state I would think since the coin has never been in circulation.
Way to be drastic! The coins still have value. If your plans were to sell them, throw then on ebay and hope for the best.
You should never clean your coins - ESPECIALLY by rubbing them. (Please note that there are ways to 'conserve' a coin that do not damage the coin but these practices are best left to the experts.) We could have told you that before you ruined your coin. Luckily you ruined a relatively inexpensive coin so the drop in value is not a lot. If you sent the coin to a TPG (third-party grading service) you would probably get the coin back in a 'Genuine' slab with no grade because of the scratches. It wasn't that long ago that TPGs would simply body bag coins with damage like that. Once you scratch a coin the damage is forever. The scratches do not heal and go away. That is why 100-year-old coins that have been preserved in high-grade and undamaged condition are scarce and worth more than the same coins that were rubbed and scratched along the way. I hope you learned a lesson here not to rub your coins.
Aw, shoot. Why didn't you ask before rubbing it clean? There are better and safer ways. If you can see the hairlines so will the TPG's. It will be put in a genuine holder with a notation about improper cleaning. But you're probably not considering having it graded anyway, right? Not a big loss and certainly cheap tuition. We all pay tuition, learning about this hobby. Sometimes far more than what you just paid. Lance.
Being that you got it for melt you didn't lose anything... Luckily this should be a cheap lesson. Anything that requires rubbing or abrasion is a no no.
Carry it as a pocket piece for the next thirty years as a lesson. The only people that don't make mistakes don't do anything. And the only real mistake we can make is to not learn from our mistakes.
Is there any kind of product that removes tarnish without rubbing? Like I said this coin looked like crap.
Coin dips and acetone will remove "tarnish". (Coin collectors call that 'toning', by the way.) In the wrong hands both will damage a coin because while they both remove toning they also remove some of the metal on the surface of the coin. A couple of words of warning regarding acetone: 1) Acetone is HIGHLY flammable. DO NOT use acetone near an open flame. 2) Do not use fingernail polish remover to dip your coin. Fingernail polish remover has impurities that can damage your coin. Use only pure acetone. If you choose to clean your coins I would recommend that you experiment with inexpensive coins until you know what you are doing. Thousands and thousands of coins have been ruined forever by people trying to make them look better.
It sounds like you're confusing acetone and "dip". "Dip" is for removing tarnish (sulfide deposits), and is typically based on a strong but dilute acid along with another chemical (thiourea). It's sort of like chemotherapy -- it attacks tarnish somewhat faster than it attacks the metal of the coin. If you use it in the right concentration, and for the right (short!) time, it can remove tarnish without visibly damaging the coin's luster. Use too much, or leave the coin in too long, and you'll ruin it. Acetone is for removing organic deposits (grease, fresh fingerprints, "gunk") from the coin's surface. It won't attack the metal of the coin, period. But it also won't do anything to tarnish. I've got a pretty good grasp of the chemistry, but I'm not an expert in putting these techniques into practice. I hope someone like BadThad can confirm what I'm saying here.
Sorry but I was trying to cover both bases and keep it very simple. Sorry for any confusion I may have caused.
That right there is the problem - looked like. That is the most common reason there is or ever was for people messing with their coins. They "think" they can somehow improve or fix it, so they try all sorts of things in order to do that. Thinking all the while that whatever it is they are doing must somehow be OK because the coins "looks" better in their eyes. Of course never realizing that "their eyes" are uneducated eyes and that their reasoning is 100% wrong.
Sounds like we have a new crop of coin interns in the house. Simple fact is coin doctoring is sneered at in the coin profession by the majority of the members. But I will mention that brasso does wonders on making my unmolested coins worth more as the ruined coins pile up.
You all are being too hard on him. I use to scream the DO NOT CLEAN mantra, but have stopped. Why? Sometimes, people need to learn the hard way what they did was wrong. Take your coins to a show where the PCGS and NGC are taking submissions. Recommend using the PCGS as you will get more money when you go to sell the slabs, er, I mean coins. Get them graded. When you get them back, post the results. Finally, go sell them to a dealer or on eBay or some place and post the results. News flash: you're permanently altered the surface of the coin. There is nothing you can do to "unscratch" it. Over time, that "badly tarnished spot" will come back and always look like a dull gray. A collector will take a loupe to the area to inspect what is wrong with this coin and will see the scratches. Your coin now has a much worse problem than toning and is thus, "a problem coin."
