Hey all, So I can't recall who it was but someone had posted a folder of coins that were all damaged examples, bad looking coins. Almost like a lowball collection. I might have the details wrong but anyway, it hatched an idea for me to try and make up some folders and fill them using ONLY coins that I've dug up metal detecting. This is obviously predominantly for fun, as very few dug coins have value beyond melt if they happen to be silver. But it would be kinda neat I thought to try this at least for perhaps lincoln cents. Here's my main question, cleaning them. Regular coin cleaning logic need not apply here, I'm not concerned with putting hairlines in the surface of the coin, I wanna get the crap off of it while retaining as much of the metal as I can. I have a handful from the last season I was out that was just sitting in a jar so I've soaked them in distilled water for 48 hours and just moved them to acetone. I do not think this method is going to provide great results without some mechanical component don't you think? I could be wrong, maybe time is what I need? Soak for a week? Or go after it with a soft bristle toothbrush? The main purpose is to remove environmental dirt and grime the coin has collected whilst in the ground, while retaining as many details as possible (date, and mint mark, etc). So I guess I'm just looking for some opinions here. In the mean time I've got my little experiment going and we're at 48 hours distilled water and now about 24 hours in the acetone. I'm going to give it at least another 24 before I pull them out and inspect them. Thoughts? Suggestions? I'm looking forward to getting out and digging up some junk once the ground thaws.
In my experience, cleaning Lincoln Cents is almost impossible. Wheat cents especially. I've had good luck with Indian Cents though and Large Cents. Never used Acetone. Just pure Olive oil and time. Use a toothpick scraping it gently. You don't want to remove all the Patina or you will lose the design. JMHO. Here's my pride and joy "dug" Large Cent".
Oh wow, that looks great for having come out of the ground. I've heard of using olive oil on copper, I might give that a go on a few and see how it works out. I know copper and zinc coins take it hard being in the ground. I've dug a few zincolns that were half eaten away.
For your purposes, I would recommend an ultrasonic cleaner. The one I have works extremely well. It's from Harbor Freight, link below. I just use water and a good liquid dish detergent like Dawn. I've experimented with coins and I don't recommend it for good coins but for the dug coins you're talking about it should do a good job. Harbor Freight Tools – Quality Tools at Discount Prices Since 1977
You know I thought about that, bonus is I can use it to clean carburetor parts for my dirt bikes. I'll check that out, thanks!
Buy yourself an inexpensive ultrasound cleaner and put them in until clean. The vibrations should loosen and remove most "crud" from them. After all, you don't need to care about the coins in question.
I've been meaning to try my ultrasonic cleaner on some crusted-up coins. I plan to use a nylon net to suspend them, instead of putting them in the wire basket or directly into the tray -- I'd expect letting them rest against metal would scuff them almost instantly when the cleaner's on.
Disclaimer, be sure it's not a rare date first or something special. do not clean coins of value. save them for professionals to conserve them. personally, If I were going to do this, I'd probably buy a rock tumbler for $50 or so, Harbor freight again! keep it to like coins (copper with copper, clad with clad, and size with size) and then I'd let them dry out and toss them in there with some gravel and let the machine do the scrubbing and then rinse them off. if you want to polish them tumble again with some sawdust. that should make them acceptable in appearance but no collector value to them. I know for a fact a couple dozen half dollars will make short work of cleaning up a crusty cement mixer drum of the dried cement, so I'm sure it could work in reverse and knock encrustations off of buried coins. just make sure it isn't a coin that will lose value by being cleaned before you do it, if it's a dug up generic cent, it's still going to be a cent no matter how you clean it up. but some coins are better left alone, just saying. pretty sure the rock tumbler method is going to be noisy, lol, might be worth the extra $30 to buy the ultrasonic cleaner...
I got a rock tumbler for Christmas one year when I was very young. I was super-excited about it until I read the instructions, which said you were supposed to tumble them for A WEEK AT A TIME. Not a good match for a child's attention span. That, and the thing was LOUD. I think I found it in the garage a few years back. It ran, but it was even louder than I remembered. Not sure I could put up with it for even a few hours, even outside the house.
I mean technically, you should fill it with ceramic or plasticized pellets normally and it's quieter, but they are still loud, gravel or just rocks would be really loud. LOL like work boots in the dryer.
I like that idea although, if you're going to do more than 1 coin at a time it would have the same effect as sitting on the tray wouldn't it? Oh certainly - that goes without saying. I always do my best to identify the coin before going at it with anything potentially damaging...so usually just water at first. Haven't found anything noteworthy yet though. Lots of clad and zincoln's. But I've pulled up a handful of wheat cents and older Jefferson's. I've got some better research going right now so hoping for a good year this year as I get back into it.
i think the key really is the research to finding good spots to detect at. like my city goes back to 1920, but actually starts developing in 1926 with about 2500 residents scattered about at that time. no wars fought, kind of dull historywise, but finding the oldest properties/places people gathered for social events, shopping areas, what's been paved over, what's vacant, anything significant along the Florida East Coast Railway commercewise? lots to dig into to selectively choose places to detect. For me it was "detect the beach". bottle caps, cans, and pocket change every time, and I never got around to having a plan before I abandoned detecting for good, I liked fishing more for something to do with my free time if I was gonna be at the beach. But yeah, do the research, select some sites you want to look in, figure out what you might be looking for and date range of the material, and it will probably be more fruitful than blindly detecting like I did. I hear old local swimming holes can be productive, here, it's pretty much "the beach" lol
probably a softer tooth brush and a WD-40 soak and rinse with acetone would get the gunk off without doing too much damage as long as it's not of any value or rarity.
Ya well when i first got into it I was hitting the easy spots, swimming holes, parks, my yard. But living in NH affords me alot of history, my town easily dates back to the 1700's and even my house was built in 1890. So I'm starting to do some more research. The WD-40 trick might work too, although if I understand the chemistry properly...xylene would be the thing to rinse it off with as acetone isn't good at removing oils.
I have a two cent that was dug from a site where General Sherman was firing cannons at our state capitol building. The site was a riverbank and obverse side of the coin was face down in the muck. It became so corroded over the years that it is barely recognizable. The reverse is immaculate. It would have been a high quality two center if it hadn’t spent 150 years in the muck……… Anyway, I posted it here a couple years ago and asked about cleaning and the general consensus was that as it is, I have a damaged two cent with a cool story. If I clean the piece then all I have is a damaged two cent coin…. That made good country sense to me anyways. Just another way to look at things.
