Can This Large Cent Be Saved?

Sure couldn't hurt it! I vote to give it a shot.

Did you wash off the Verdicare? It should look a little darker and shinier. You're right, more time in the acetone won't do much. I'd be tempted to take a sharp toothpick and pry off a small piece of gunk on the reverse somewhere out of the way and see what's underneath. Otherwise you're pretty much left with it as is. That would fill a hole very nicely in my book.

Not a big deal, you can wash it off if you want. That's one of the good things about it. I usually leave a little on if I'm keeping the coin.

This is a good start, some excellent advice from others in this thread!

You can actually see the extent of the corrosion problem now. A lot of it was "hidden" under the surface gunk. For that reason- it's OK that you did a post VC rinse. We can at least honestly see the verdigris. Unfortunately, it's quite heavy around the devices, it looks like mix-mode residue, i.e. organic residue AND verdigris.

Our very CC-own nohope587 is the resident expert with coins like this. If you search the forum, you'll find some of his experiments with similar-problem 2 cent pieces. I highly recommend studying his procedure as he was surprisingly successful in his methods.

First off SuperDave is absolutely correct about acetone. It's a weak and safe solvent for ALL coins. Normally, 10 minutes is plenty of time. The only time I typically see the need for longer times is with PVC residue...but that's a different problem.

Since the residue appears partially organic and heavy, the best "first" solvent would be xylene. This is one of the solvents used by nohope587 and it was quite effective. He used it with sonication but I am not recommending that - just a straight 24 hour soak.

At the end of the 24 hours I would lightly poke around the devices with a toothpick (while under fluid) to see if anything could be freed. You have to be VERY VERY careful doing this - it can be surprisingly easy to rub off the patina!

Side Tip - When I'm trying to be extra delicate, I pinch off the end of the toothpick and pull the fibers down to make it into a "broom" - then gently swirl it on the surface.

Lastly, 24 hour soak in VC - each side, total 48 hours in a sealed container (VC is plastic safe).

This is going to take some effort and I honestly don't think you'll make much progress....but....at the end of the VC soak- while the coin is under fluid - use the toothpick method around the devices. This will take a lot of patience to keep from rubbing off any patina but it's as far as you can go before damaging the coin.

After your done toothpicking, pull it, rinse it with fresh VC and let the coin air dry for a week - both sides. Put it into a 2x2 and be done with it.

I recently bought an 1832 LC and am having the same frustration so I'm soaking all of this up like a sponge. Thanks BadThad.

OK, here's the follow up. I followed BadThad's expert advice - extended soaks in Xylene and then Verdi-Care again. When I started picking at it with a toothpick amazing things happened! Here are the most recent pictures and you can judge for yourself.

I've learned a lot and that's no surprise as this forum is so amazing. My first mistake was thinking that after the crud was removed by acetone I would see a beautiful coin - wrong. There is a lot of progress made and thank you to everyone.

One more comment. I made a bad decision and brushed the coin lightly with a tooth brush on the reverse and you can see that I removed some of the patina on the highest area.

OK, I was under a lot of pressure as my wife was leaving for work and she needed her toothbrush back.

The N in united might have some deep corrosion that might not be able to be taken care of. That's a possibility.