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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Oldhoopster, post: 3101352, member: 84179&quot;]Every situation is unique and is dependent on the coin and experience/knowledge of the person doing the cleaning. In order to offer an opinion on cleaning, you have to know; what are you trying remove, is it physically adhered (dirt), chemically reacted (toning), corrosion, verdigris or some combination?&nbsp; You also have to assess the knowledge level of the person asking the question.&nbsp; Do they know what cleaned coins look like?&nbsp; Do they know about hairlines? Do they understand the chemistry?&nbsp; Can the safely use chemicals?</p><p><br /></p><p>You can see where doing the initial assessment can get very detailed, very quickly.&nbsp; But how you can you offer specific advice without that information.&nbsp; Let’s look at a driving analogy.&nbsp; Somebody asks, “how can I be a better driver”?&nbsp; Is this person a 16 year old just starting, or a professional race driver trying to improve their lap times at Indy.&nbsp; What kind of vehicle are they driving, Prius? Ferrari? 18 wheeler?</p><p><br /></p><p>You also need to consider that most of these questions are coming from new collectors who likely have very little experience.&nbsp; Like the new driver, you aren’t going to teach them about trail braking and late apexes, when they just need the basics.&nbsp; And like a new driver, you don’t want to give them the keys to a Ferrari at Indianapolis, you give them safe, conservative information, especially since you can’t be with them every step of the way to make sure they don’t make any mistakes.</p><p><br /></p><p>Bottom line is most of us don’t have the time to flush out all of the details from a newbie, and in all honesty, the newbie probably doesn’t have the patience to listen to all of the details.&nbsp; They aren’t asking “how much should I dilute the thiourea in order to reduce the risk of damaging flow lines using a 2 second immersion and neutralization with deionized water”&nbsp; Since there are so many ways to for a new collector to screw up a coin by cleaning it, the best answer to a general question is <u>Don’t clean it</u>.&nbsp; If the questions become more specific, then a more detailed explanation is warranted.</p><p><br /></p><p>If you think replies aren&#039;t helpful, you can always jump in and help teach the newbie the basic details.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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