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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Kentucky, post: 1310944, member: 33176&quot;]Wow, people are really in love (or hate) with cleaning coins.&nbsp; In the case of many ancient coins that are encased in crud, cleaning is necessary.&nbsp; In the case of proof coins or MS60 and up coins, cleaning would probably do more harm than good.&nbsp; The middle grades are where people seem to disagree.&nbsp; Pure solvents are unlikely to cause any problems, abrasion (rubbing) seems to be the real bad boy.&nbsp; Now, which pure solvents offer the most hope.&nbsp; In general there are two kinds of solvents, polar like water and alcohols and non-polar like xylene.&nbsp; Each has benefits.&nbsp; Non-polar solvents like xylene, lighter fluid, kerosene will remove grease and,in some cases, plastic gunk.&nbsp; Polar solvents like water and pure alcohol will remove salty type materials.&nbsp; Acetone is just in-between, polar, but not too polar.&nbsp; Alcohols are not all the same.&nbsp; Rubbing alcohol is available in three strengths that I have seen, 50%, 70% and 91%.&nbsp; The 91% seems to leave the least residue, but especially the 50% might have some wierd additives.&nbsp; Denatured alcohol is grain alcohol with additives that will make you sick if you drink it.&nbsp; Two of the most popular additives are gasoline or fingernail polish remover.&nbsp; All of the alcohols are poisonous and you should not drink them, it&#039;s just that grain alcohol can take years to do it.&nbsp; The presence of salts in water can make it more corrosive, either through increased conductivity (corrosion is driven by conductivity) or some other mechanism.&nbsp; The safest way is not to clean coins, but if you are determined to, a mild soap and water wash with no rubbing followed by a distilled water rinse and a final acetone treatment and pat dry is not going to hurt anything and I don&#039;t think it would be detectable as &quot;harsh cleaning&quot;.&nbsp; Specialized problems would call for specialized treatment.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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