First Restoration Attempt. How Did I Do?

Fantastic. Makes me wonder what is in your water.

Hard to believe that was just with water!

That's a very legitimate question, Webster and one that is very worthy of a debate! I'll make my point short and sweet and then let others chime in. I didn't use any abrasive chemicals. Just hot water and acetone. IMO the appearance of the coin afterwards is much better than before.

But let's hear what others have to say.

The hobby tends to define a coin as "cleaned" when there is metal removed by chemical or polishing/rubbing etc. Removing dirt on the surface is conserving. You are not altering the metal of the coin itself.

I agree.

It depends if I'm feeling lucky. I did use a tooth pic after the acetone soak but upon close inspection, I don't think It created any hairlines. This coin still has cartwheel luster and it retained it's light-gold toning.

Obviously no one is going to spend the money to send it in. It's an xf album Franklin half and that's all it will ever be unless silver explodes to the upside.

I see it this way: If somehow I accidentally got a drop of melted butter on a coin, removing the butter is not going to make a "numismatically" cleaned coin if I simply put some warm water & mild detergent, to cut the grease, on the coin to remove the butter.

I would then rinse the coin thoroughly in purified water. Lastly it would have an acetone dip to remove any organic molecule that somehow escaped the above process.

Conservation...not cleaning; hence no details grade should be given.


However, the coin would be "numismatically cleaned" if I use the soap and water, with a wire brush to remove the butter.

OK - a bit extreme there. But even if I did perform the first scenario to get rid of the butter (conserve the coin), and then used a paper towel or tissue to wipe the coin dry, the tissue would actually leave hairline scratches on the surface and the coin has then been "cleaned" and should earn a details grade.




Just sharing what I use - porcupine quills. They have a much smaller diameter tip that will even get the dirt out of cavities of a mint mark; The quills also seem to be softer than a toothpick. My dissecting microscope (a whole 35.00 on ebay) and a porcupine quill make for an easy time of removing dirt from inside fine details.

Yup - unless you see them road kill, you can get the quills inexpensively on ebay.