Hi, i recently picked up some silver 3 cent pieces at an estate auction. I hadn't seen them before, their tiny size grabbed my attention. I'm no Jimmy Olsen so I apologize for the weak photos. The coins are 1851-O,1852, 1852 and 185-can't tell with a hole in it. I've got several questions if anyone can help, - there seems to be a fair amount of surface dirt or grime on these. I read everywhere that you can't or shouldn't clean coins. Is it is accurate that I should do absolutely nothing to these coins? I don't want to damage or alter the coins, but I don't like leaving things dirty. - would you suggest having the coins graded and if so, what service to use? Even if they aren't worth that much, I'm curious to see where a pro would grade them. - are there any rough guides to what a hole in a coin does to its value? I've seen some trade dollars with chop marks and I think they look neat, but certainly seem to meaningfully decrease value. thank in advance for any thoughts
At those low grades I would not clean them or not get them graded. It would not be cost efficient to grade those. If the grading costs more than the coin then no to getting them graded.
The cost of grading would surpass the value of the coins. At least two are damaged, so would not grade. Not knocking them, nice old pieces of history, but the value just isn't there to have them graded. Post clear close up pictures of each coin and the people here could help you with the grades.
Thank you for the feedback. All I have for photos is an older android phone. I was looking online and saw a Plugable USB 2.0 digital microscope on Amazon - for $35 it seems like a decent investment if it works for the purpose of taking adequate coin photos. Does anyone have experience or advice with that? I'm interested enough in this that I'm willing to invest a bit in equipment but I'm not a big tech guy. FYI, I got the PCGS Photograde app on my phone and to my untrained eye I think my best coins in this lot are probably around a 10 or 12 but it seems like they'd look better without the grime. In terms of selling the ones I don't want, would you say ebay is best, and would I just put the lot together rather than list individually. thanks
You could try an acetone rinse (search this forum for instructions) to remove the grime, but if it's actually just the toning and tarnishing of the silver itself, acetone won't do anything.
