What Is Considered A Cleaned Coin?

The word "cleaned" is used when metal has been removed/altered. This includes things like the micro-but-visible scratches made by a paper towel or facial tissue when it is rubbed on a coin.

The word "conserving" is used when something can be removed from a coin without altering/marking the metal. The most simple form of this is if you spill coffee on a coin, then rinsing it off with water is not "cleaning."

Some chemicals, such as acetone, cannot cemically meddle with the metal and so are also not considered "cleaning," but is used to remove residue such as marker, tape, glue and others.

@ OP
You say that the PVC is very bad on your silver coins . After giving them a long soak in Acetone I would also give them a good application of Verdi-Care . I've never used it on silver before, but pretty sure it will do the job .

If stuff like Acetone will not remove something from coins, the next step is to leave them alone. However, I've spent many hours not following that by continuing with other chemicals. I've used almost everything imaginable such as Tomato or Lemon Juices, Lacquer thinners, Mineral spirits, etc. Eventually anything on the coins were removed but the end results are usually a harshly cleaned looking coin.
Cleaned coins are a sort of mystery. People clean old cars but don't clean old furniture. People clean old oil paintings but no one cleans an old Egyptian Mummy.

I do not think this is entirely correct. Bad Thad will need to fill in the details here, but I think it only chemically reacts with the verdigris salts (to remove them) and not undamaged copper metals. Of course, verdigris is chemically altered copper and removing it will show the altered areas. However, Verdi-care does nothing bad to the copper surface and can actually be rinsed away.

Time to read through the development process again...

http://goccf.com/t/62434

Hum... I'm a noob at collecting but paranoid by nature (in a healthy not freaky way), so I'm wary about declarations made by a product's own makers. Now, if such a declaration was made by a professional grading company, this would be a different story... Although Verdi-Care may say "Coins will be conserved and not cleaned" is this guaranteed ? Has anyone had issues with professional graders regarding their previously Verdi-Care treated coins? I'm going through the forum trying to find if all coins should be dipped in acetone and then Verdi-Care-d in order to stop any ongoing/occurring reaction. I have Morgan silver dollars inherited from my father's aunt. I think they are gorgeous, but they were kept in PVC holders for many years and some have a kind of cloudy haze on them when looked at with a loupe. I didn't clean them and just re-stored them with proper (modern) numismatic products. Was I wrong to do so? Luckily there is little to no green on the 97% of them. I'm scared to lose possible maximum value (remember the"...but if ...it would have been worth..." moments on Antiques Roadshow?).

Here are a few pics of one. It's not the worst of the lot or the best. I took the pictures with my iPhone (the close-ups with "laser-pointer lens macro with iPhone). I took the close ups because I was trying to determine VAM (but was unable to). I don't know what the striating is. At first I thought it was circulation damage, but the same striae lines are on the lower flat fields too, although there is no gouging in the lower fields but it just looks striped? Any help/info/counsel appreciated. Should I acetone or not? What grade could it be?... There is one line of what may be verdigris under the 8, but only visible with "microscope", so could be just a lighting issue. Also, it looks like the coins got " a little extra" metal here and there... Coin is shinier in reality, but I was trying to minimise direct light to avoid glare.

No worries on Verdi-Care as to cleaning or conserving, the stuff is mythical and unavailable.

PVC - or rather, the acidic plasticizers embedded within PVC that slowly leach out over years and decades - reacts with the metal to create the "green goo". The green goo can be removed with acetone, but the underlying metal will be hazed and stained. The damage is already done, the acetone simply removes the goo and reveals the damage that has taken place.

A coin cleaned with acetone may not be graded by the TPGs, but this is because of the underlying damage caused by the PVC, not by the acetone itself. They will similarly refuse to grade a PVC-goo coin that hasn't been washed with acetone. The TPGs have conservation units that clean and restore damaged coins using acceptable methods, but I don't think even the TPG conservators can do anything about making a PVC-hazed coin gradable.

Sadly, in such cases, the "if only" clause is actually "if only the previous owner hadn't used a PVC album".