Possible 1798 Isle of Man Cartwheel Halfpenny Found on the Beach - How to Clean?

[Rogue23]

Hello new friends!

I've always been interested in MDing, but never actually bought a detector until a few months ago, hoping I'd be able to find time to take it to the beach occasionally. I've barely used it until this holiday weekend, when I've started putting in some hours at the local beaches which have shown some decent erosion. I've mostly found clad coins and junk, but am enjoying myself out there for sure. I've learned SO MUCH from obsessively reading old threads in this forum for the past week or two.

Anyway, I found a very interesting item yesterday and posted it here: http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/483546-my-first-post-what-coin-did-i-find-beach-today.html


I think the 1798 Isle of Man Halfpenny is an excellent guess. This size and weight seem about right, and there is that very distinct outer rim.

Obviously this thing is in pretty terrible condition, and I'm not planning to sell it so I'm not really worried about any value it may have (looks like not much in poor condition), but I'd like to be able to at least see what I found. Do you have any suggestions for getting the encrusted parts off without damaging what is left of the copper underneath?

 

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[stefen]

Giving the age and time frame of being in a first-exposure ocean environment for perhaps as much as 217 years, doing anything would result in a unidentifiable and un-salvageable piece of junk.

In 40 some years, I've found numerous SoCal beach coins that were in that condition after being dropped only a year or so, and for the life of me couldn't tell if they were Mexican pesos or a US or Canadian pennies.

The edges were eroded and the coins were toasted.

In hindsight I must of tossed hundreds of historic coins, now I'm wondering if some were possibly Viking or Roman coppers.