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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;ancient coin hunter, post: 2970585, member: 87200&quot;]There are a couple of methods to try. I&#039;ve used a distilled water soak over a period of several days. After the soaking, I rinse them off under the tap and then use a toothbrush to remove loose dirt. After that, I apply a dental pick to remove encrustation gently.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some folks recommend an olive oil bath for a period of several days to months to remove tougher encrustation/dirt. I&#039;ve tried this method and after removing the coins from the olive oil I use the same toothbrush technique, followed by the dental pick. This works better than simple distilled water but be warned that the olive oil will impart a dark color to the coins. Not totally unappealing, but just something to keep in mind.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;ve heard of boiling coins in olive oil (the so-called hot pot method) but have never tried it.</p><p><br /></p><p>Another method is liquid descaler, which I would not recommend. I read about this method on the web, but after 24 hours in the descaler (which did remove the dirt) I found out that it removed patinas and in some cases with late roman bronze obliterated legends and reverses which just slid off the coins.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are even more methods out there such as electrolysis but I have not tried those yet. These days, I&#039;m pretty much not buying uncleans and I still have about 500 coins to clean up sitting in a mayonnaise jar.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here&#039;s an example of a cleaned Arcadius which was basically a featureless slug before cleaning, but at least now can be attributed...</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]728727[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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