Cleaning green from silver coins

[lisfisher]

Hello,

I have a couple coins that I found on a saltwater beach and both have this stubborn green substance on them. I do not want to damage the coins from a harsh cleaning method but then again I would tend to think there would be more eye appeal being lightly damaged and NO green crud vs encrusted with green and left alone. One coin is a 1944 Standing liberty half and the other is a 1922 peace dollar, so although they are very cool finds, they are not rare and valuable either so I am leaning toward at least trying to get this green crud off somehow. Any suggestions??

 

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[Pointman]

Biggest thing on silver is scratching it and you don't want to use something too harsh such as bleach or acid on it.

Light tarnish you can soak it a couple of weeks in a salt/baking soda solution and a folded piece of aluminum foil. It basically does a very weak electrolysis reaction that will lift some of the tarnish. It is sometimes hard to tell how well it works unless you take a before and after pictures. You will have to pull it out every day and clean it with a soft brush under water and then put it back in a clean solution. If the coins are valuable, this may diminish their worth a bit, because it removes a very thin layer from the surface of the coin. I've cleaned silver this way, but it will not make them sparkle and you can still see where the crude was at in some cases.

A number of folks beach hunt and they may have a more educated idea then me on how to clean your coins. I would wait for them to chime in before I would do anything. My suggestions are for ground coins.

 

[Thorne]

Hot.watter aluminum foil and baking soda. Cleans em up in a few minutes but takes away almost all numismatic value

 

[Rick (Nova Scotia)]

Here you go Lisfisher.
And don't worry about "ruining" the value, for starters most stuff we find is probably VF, and when you add a HORRIBLE appearance that comes from salt water, there's no place to go but UP.

I just posted a new thread on the subject of salt water coins here.
http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/cleaning-preservation/407277-salt-water-silver-coins-cleaning.html

 

[Joe1944]

I found 2 silver quarters, a Merc, and some pennies and nickels in a hole once, and they all left really stubborn green on the silver. I soaked them in acetone for days, which did practically nothing. Someone on this forum suggested a soft pencil eraser, which worked really well at getting the green off of 2 of the coins, but essentially polished them a bit. They still look good, and show detail, but seem... "soft" if you know what I mean, not really sharp, but detailed. I'd like to hear how you go about it for future reference.

 

[Johnnoh]

To remove sand crusted green silver coins, I use a mild lemon water solution. Squeeze 1 lemon wedge in 1/2 cup warm water and soak for 1 hour - overnight. Follow up with a light rub with baking soda paste try not to strip all the patina.