Washing circulated silver coins with mild soap and water

I think you're missing something. Your seem to indicate that you believe you made a profit BECAUSE you washed them. This couldn't be further from the truth. The profit you made selling your coins WAS NOT because you cleaned them.

And you missed @-jeffB point completely. He made a profit, but would have made MORE of a profit if the coins hadn't been cleaned.

The only way you were going to prove that washing the coins improved their value was to sell some washed and some in their natural state. Without that data, it's just your opinion

Remember, there are new collectors that access this site through Google searches etc. It is extremely irresponsible to leave them with the impression that cleaning will improve the value. Experienced collectors with knowledge of the coin market and a good background in chemistry can pull it off in some very specific cases, but there is a high probability that a newbie will screw it up. That is why experienced collectors always tell newbies "don't clean coins". It has nothing to do with being a contrarian (this isn't the stock market) it's about facts. And the fact is that for every coin that has value added due to conservation (the high falutin' term for cleaning), thousands and thousands have been damaged permanently.

 

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The new folks do like a little informed tech so you they can come to their own conclusion:
They make like your opinion, or
They may like my opinion.

It may help them if you could provide them with pictures? Here again is my pictures of PC coins:


Here is my former gold Saint Gardens collection (it's now +2):


I think the new generation is much more intelligent than you give them credit. They know more than we know. They will inherit around $4T in funds very soon (5% of individual assets).

They are smarter and more prepared to challenge the future than we ever were. We need to talk in real terms with them.

 

And hopefully they are smart enough to recognize the inaccurate recommendations you're making when you tell them that they will make a larger profit by washing their coins rather than leaving them in the natural state.

It really doesn't matter what you do. I think it's apparent to most of the experienced collectors on CT, where you fall on the knowledge and credibility scale. I just want to make sure that some new collector doesn't believe your "contrarian" opinions and think that they will profit by cleaning their coins.

Search through the CT archives and you'll find discussions on removing carbon spots from high grade copper, or the advantages and disadvantages of removing copper spots and alloy anomalies in gold, or the how chemical dipping affects the microscopic flow lines that generate luster. Those will help people learn.

Do not consider this a personal attack. We are free to chose to believe whatever we want. I just want to make sure that a new collector doesn't read your thread and think cleaning their coins is a good thing. Initially, they may not be able to determine that many of the people who posted not to clean are experienced numismatists (some who posted even make their living through numismatics) while others who insist that cleaning has helped increase their profit have not demonstrated any credibility and are only offering a misguided opinion.

 

One thing I’ve noticed — besides trolling — about many of these cleaning threads: the OP is going to clean his coins and argue with us no matter how many, proven reasons he’s given for not doing so.

Clean away!

 

Truth. If they want to clean away it's their money to waste so I don't really have a problem with it. I just wish they wouldn't keep trying to convince people that don't know better that they should be doing that as well

 

Yes. I did wash 200 coins of the 9,700,000,000 that were produced in the 50 Cent coin.

In addition, I washed 6 Morgan coins today (they don't look different). They made over 305,000,000 Morgan dollars. I am not sure how many Peace dollars were made but I have two excellent examples.

My main thing is the stock market where I trade blocks of 1000 shares. It's been great since 3-9-2009.

 

You still haven't explained how cleaning your coins INCREASES their value.

Nobody cares if you clean your melt value silver. It's just irresponsible to claim that it is beneficial. New collectors already have too much confusing and inaccurate information to sort through on the web. They shouldn't have to be confused on Coin Talk wondering if they should believe opinions from long term collectors and numismatic professionals or some guy that says these people are wrong and provides his stock market skills as credibility of his numismatic knowledge.

Just because I made money on my 401k since 2009, doesn't mean that you should believe me when I say that Sears common stock is good long term investment.

 

I've been a collector for some time, but not at the level of many of the posters here. The smart thing to do is to listen to those who have made their living in the business.

I'm not a dealer by ANY stretch, but I do examine my coins under high magnification, and even to my less experienced eye, when cleaning has taken place, I can see it.

When I say that, the follow up question from those prone to clean would be, "How do you know you see ALL the cleaning? If it was done "properly" then you wouldn't be able to see it."

That I will concede. But I'm not sure without magnification that you could tell whether it was "proper" or not. So try this, take a COMMON CIRCULATION coin, say a shield penny, recent date, out of pocket change, a corroded one, and experiment with that coin instead of an older more desirable coin that may have numismatic value. Photograph the coin before cleaning, examine it under high magnification and make notes concerning details and luster. Compare it to a proof example or a high MS coin grade to make sure you take everything in.

Then go about your cleaning regimen and make notes and take photos and observe in high magnification afterward. If there is any evidence of scratching, even fine scratch lines, diminishing details, loss of natural luster, then you know the method you chose is not effective.

I may be able to save you some time. I can tell you by my own experimentation that I haven't found a single method that wasn't observable, and in a negative way. I've been all over the place looking for the "proper" method, and as far as I can tell, it doesn't exist for the common collector.

For a coin with layers of crud on the top that hides the details below, it's tricky. The coin's details cannot be appreciated by the owner, and potential buyers are purchasing blindly, which would naturally lead to lower prices. In some instances, like digging it up from the ground, the coin may not even be identifiable or other key details such as the date or mintmark may be obscured. It is a dilemma in those cases and some sort of soaking or cleaning may be necessary in order to identify the coin, but that's not what we're talking about here.

The best advice, and the most common among those in the know who appreciate coins and make their living from them, is don't clean period. They would every one want to have better coins if available, yet they say don't clean. I take them at their word.

 

Your stock market trading and your gold coins have absolutely nothing to do with the issue you raised.

But I would like to know more about your clad gold coins.

 

The OP is "hell bent" on washing them. After many numerous opinions , "Don't do it!" let it go. The horse was led to water...

 

You know what? I'm new at this collecting game, and I have a number of coins that could use a good cleaning. Why don't I sell them to you as is but at the premium I think you might realize once you clean them. I think that's fair.

 

Try this.

 

I was talking about mildly washing melt silver. I think it may be beneficial for people that own them.

Is it ever worth more than melt after a simple mild washing? No. Will it ever be worth anything more in the future? Maybe, due only to it's silver. It's simple in that most silver coins (I'd say 80%) are worth melt.

Today that is X 12 face. So, a 1964 or before coin is 12 times coin or a 1964 half-dollar is $0.50 X 12 or $6.00. It will be worth that lightly washed or original.

If the price of silver goes back to historic values compared to gold, it should go to back to X 47 of gold (the 100-year historic value). The U.S. said 15:1 in 1792, and it went of 100:1 in Jan. of 1991.

I like going back to the 100-year historic value of $28 oz. to 1300 oz. of gold (47:1).

The stock market is up due to current intrinsic values today (but no room for error). I am a player in gold but mostly like silver today since it has a lot more of upside potential.

 

Great tech.

 

Not sure how that happened.
Here is was I said.

It is never worth it to clean a coin, and you have not shown any benefit to doing so. please stop.

 

Hahahahaa..I just had some great findings with my cousin who is a chemist and I had her test before and after effect of washing coins with mild soap and water vs. other cleaning agent and her findings is that mild soap and water doesn't damage the coin. My cousin said avoid using any other chemical or even baking soda. The result of the cleaning restores luster on the coins and it will also reveals how much damage cause by circulation of the coin. Scientific evidence. Now the rest are all irrelevant....

 

+10 some folks just don't get it!

 

Scientific evidence...hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha