Found my first gold ring, its old, how do I clean it?

[cam9457]

Today I found my first gold ring. I found it at a home built in 1848 about 6-8 inches down. It looks to be pretty old, has what looks like a diamond in the middle. The dirt I found it in was pretty hard, does anyone have any advice on how to clean it without damaging it? Thanks in advance

[cntrydncr1]

Congrats Ryan!!! I would just clean it up with water and a very mild dish detergent with a soft brush.. If it has a diamond you can then use jewelry cleaner on it . some stones can't be cleaned with jewelry cleaner but diamonds will be ok. Both my gold rings came up very nice this way. How exciting! Are you gonna post a pic?

[cam9457]

My hoopdie of a computer won't let me post pics for some reason. I let it soak overnight but it didn't get all the dirt out of all the crevises. There aren't any markings or anything saying it's real either? I'm still happy with it though. Thanks for the advice Deb!

[Ant]

I use the standard cleaning solution for jewelry at home. It consists of household ammonia, dish soap and water. I also use toothpaste or baking soda as a scrubbing agent and scrub the item with a tooth brush and cotton cloth. Then I rinse the item with water and repeat a time or two, after that I buff the item with dry cotton cloth.

[cam9457]

Ant that is a cool way of doing it. I made a risky choice to clean it with aluminum jelly and it came out beautiful! I have a feeling "jewelry cleaning solution" is just watered down aluminum jelly? I took it with me to Alderfer auction because I was having them look at an old album I have and asked them to tell me if the ring was real or not as I was walking out the door. The guy took it from me and was looking at it in the light then took out a small monocular and looked at it some more and said IT'S REAL!!! He said it was probably made sometime before 1900. I will take it to a jewler soon to find out the carat of the gold and what the carat the diamond is.

[beaverdigger]

Try a good, strong, magnet on it. If the magnet picks it up, it's not gold. The jeweler may do a scratch test to determine the karat of gold. Do not let them apply the acid directly to the ring as it will leave a spot on it. Do not clean it with any kind of bleach or clorine solution as this is hell on the base metal and will eventual cause it to crumble like cornbread.




Hope it's the real deal.

[boogeyman]

If you find more, as I'm sure your hoping. Harbor Freight has a little ultrasonic cleaner that is reasonably priced. They also have jewlers cleaning powder too. I have a bigger commercial ultra sonic cleaner, but use their cleaner since it's a lot cheaper and does a very nice job on everything I've thrown at it. The only problem I've ever had was vibrating a stone loose which was an easy task of resetting the stone. If you buy the cleaner at Harbor Freight look in the automotive section (!?!?) They always hide it there (!?!?!)