Which Coin Do You Prefer?

I voted for coin A
I don't care all that much if a coin has been dipped or not but it depends on how much toning and how dark the toning is whether or not I like it. This one looked OK before being dipped to me.

Thanks for all the comments so far. They've been great. Please keep them coming. I would like to hear from some of those who prefer the cleaned one also. I am sure no one here will attack you for your opinion. (Although they might!). You can always send me a PM.

I especially like Eaglefoot's "I voted that way almost BEFORE even looking at your coins........just the mere "idea" of a dipped/cleaned coin is a dastardly horrific calamity of a thing to do." It show's how ingrained the mantra "Don't Clean" is. Even if the coin in question is not for resale, only for the owner to enjoy the look of.

I cleaned this one as I am doing some research in to the whole cleaning thing. From inside and outside the coin collecting fraternity.

This looked a good candidate, I got it cheap as frankly it was very dirty. Had that big patch of black stuff you can see in the inner circle and such. What the don't clean fans like to call "patina" or "toning" was definitely "dirt" and "crud" as coindexter said, (but still prefered it to the cleaned one!)

Keep 'em coming!

I choose B because I like shiny stuff and would put that one on an easel in the curio cabinet!

what the heck is that coin?

I voted A, because unless I entomb coin B in a slab, airtite or 2x2, in less than 50 years time it'll most likely look just like A again, or even worse.

The only advantage in picture A is that you can see the details better; these are scans, so I'm not sure how this difference translates to a difference in actually seeing the coin in hand before and after.


Scans are normally pretty good at telling apart tarnish/toning/patina from adhered dirt/goo/gunk. That looks like regular tarnish/toning to me.