Salt solutions and washes were used to silver the surfaces of planchets made of other metals and alloys. It would seem plausible that a person could later de-silver planchets using similar solvents as a means to capture silver. I have several 19th century specimens that have the appearance of this possibly happening. The question is... Has anyone actually heard of people de-silvering coins/medals/tokens? Thanks, Cheetah
With such a thin layer of silver, it seems like it's more trouble than it's worth to de-silver gilded numismatic items. Probably makes more sense with silver-plated flatware, which has a thicker layer of the stuff.
Indeed it would seem so, unless the effort was undertaken in bulk; i.e., dumping a bucket full into a vat of desilvering solution...
I don't know about desilvering pieces, but I have been running some figures and it is about at the point where deplating these gold plated state quarters may be worthwhile.
