Has anyone used ANACS conservation service?

Update: Images were finally uploaded today, and holy crap they are horrible. In the slabs, glare on the slabs, not even straight overhead. Oh well, at least they spelled grandpa's name correctly. I wouldn't spend money on it next time.

Since my previous post 01/18/23, the order has been stuck in "finalizing", despite them showing "shipped date" as 01/19/23. Hopefully now that the imaging is done they will ship soon.

 

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Wow seems they need help in their photography department.
Why not photo them before the slabbing?

 

I knew going in that they imaged them in the slabs (NGC does too) but the examples I saw were not this bad. Granted, it's tough to photograph a highly reflective coin, but some of them don't even have the whole slab in the frame. They definitely need to find someone who knows how to photograph coins.

Got the shipping notice with the old "label created but not really shipped yet" thing. Hopefully I'll get them this week, and then return to the original topic about conservation.

 

Ha, I checked this morning and tracking still said "label created." I checked half an hour ago and it said "delivered." So I have the box in my hot little hands. Tracking history only shows three entries - shipping label created, arrived at post office, available for pickup. Time to open the box.

 

I'm impressed with the conservation. I'll attempt to take pictures when there's natural light available. For some it's hard to believe it's the same coin. Some of the "personality" seems lost, but it's probably mostly the sterile feeling that comes with seeing them in slabs.

One of the interesting things, that I hope to capture in images, is the specimen 1947 ML CR 50c mentioned earlier, with the lacquer they hoped to remove. I had studied this coin for hours, and something was different now that I couldn't quite put my finger on. Then I realized that a bunch of tiny strike-through features, one even with an embedded bit of bristle or wire that I presumed was from polishing the dies, are gone! Previously I couldn't even tell that there was lacquer on it at all, and now as it turns out it appears that what I thought were strike-through features into the coin's surface were actually in the lacquer. More to come...

 

Here's probably the best I can do of a before/after comparison (the "before" are 7 year old images). I'm almost as bad at photos as ANACS. This 25c was the most concerning to me previously, with all the milky haze on the coin. Now it looks fresh from the mint. ANACS gave it MS63, which seems conservative to me but we all think that about our own coins I guess. I don't know what "dipping" involves but whatever they do, it works.

 

This 1947 $1 Maple Leaf they did not indicate conservation, but I'm certain they did. The "before" images again are 7 years old, this time outside the 2x2. Very difficult to photograph as it's like a mirror. I tried to capture that today. I never noticed how "wavy" the reverse fields look, I wonder if that was deliberate. It's like the planchet isn't flat. The blemish on the cheekbone is "die burn" and not wear. Probably fairly graded as MS62, there are a lot of dings.

 

Hopefully you're not sick of this thread. Perhaps someone will find it useful later. Here's the 1947 50c Maple Leaf, curved right 7, SP62 now, previously UNC - Cleaned (PCGS). Supposedly only around 200 of this variety were struck in both specimen and MS. Before and after images. Note the squiggle next to ET and the various other "pits" in the fields. I was convinced these were all strike-through remnants from polishing the die, and had examined them under a microscope. The one near ET even had a retained bit of bristle, which I assumed was embedded in the coin. As you can see, these things are now gone. I couldn't tell that there was lacquer on the coin. How did ANACS remove it? Now I'm curious why it only got a 62, but that's a subject for another time.

 

Very interesting, thanks for sharing.