How Do You Tell If A Coin Is Cleaned?

Coins are 'cleaned' in many ways. Sometimes its an obvious, harsh cleaning which will result in circular scratches and hairlines on the coins surface. Some coins were cleaned years ago and have since regained some form of toning that may somewhat cover up the cleaning.

Generally with Morgans you can tell if they've been cleaned or not by looking at their luster but this takes experience as some dates and or mints lacked luster in the first place. An easy way to tell is if you find a Morgan with considerable wear, yet the coin is 'shiny.' Coins like that don't look natural.

Morgans can also be 'dipped' in a solution that removes a microscopic layer of metal, therefore 'cleaning' the coin. If the coin is dipped wrong or too many times it will lose its luster. However, some coins can be expertly dipped and will therefore even fool third party graders like PCGS and NGC who will slab it and not note the cleaning since even they can't tell if it was dipped or not.

Do a search on ebay and look at different Morgans. I think if the photos are decent you will find some coins that are obviously cleaned and you can compare them to other Morgans that look original and natural. The best way to gain experience in looking for cleaned coins is by seeing lots of them in-hand.

Sorry for the long reply, but I hope it helps!

Some of the cleaned silver I have seen is too "white" instead of "silver" in color. As mentioned earlier, the luster is diminished or is gone entirely. The brush marks can be very hard to see. I read somewhere that the coin should be rotated and there should be a cartwheel style luster present on the higher end silver coins. I have seen some copper coins that have been pegged as "altered surfaces", "recolored", etc... which looked very pleasing to me. It just takes practice.

There are quite a few ebay titles with "net" or "details" that will highlight some coins with "issues" such as cleaned.