Okay when you first hear the title I'm sure most of you are cringing but this is a special circumstance.
I found a bunch of pennies that were left in an abandoned shed and apparently at some point the jar broke therefore they had been left the elements for years. I wanted to cry.
After discussing it with a few of the members here I decided I was going to as they suggest try a few things to see what the results were since at this point nothing could harm those coins anyway. I figured what's the harm so when I finally had time I did just that. Last night I researched a few different methods for cleaning them. After deciding what methods I would use and gathering all the materials I needed I got to work.
I would have to say that the paste was the most tedious and abrasive method I chose and it was the least effective.
Vinegar and baking soda was messy only because it wouldn't stop foaming up like a science Fair volcano.
Unfortunately it was not worth it either because it did not clean the coins much better than the paste did.
I thought that 100% pure acetone would be the one to win this experiment and it definitely did better than the previous two options but unfortunately it still came short because of all the corrosion. I'm sure it is useful on coins that are just dirty and not corroded.
Last but not least was the vinegar salt water boil which when I first added the coins to put off a rather foul smell and the water immediately turned milky white which surprised me but either way I continued to boil them for a few minutes anyway and surprisingly enough when I turned the heat off the water continued to fizz for at least 15 minutes afterwards while I was working with the other coins.
When I went to rinse the coins off I immediately noticed a black film all over my hands.
I continued anyways like with the other coins rinsing them off patting them dry. At first I didn't notice that most of the green corrosion was gone but they were still black so I didn't think it was that much of a success. Now I see when I wiped them the black came off of some of the coins.
It wasn't the perfect results but I also did not boil them very long so I'm trying to decide if I should try boiling them again in the same type of solution.
I have already separated the copper from zinc because I did notice that the zinc definitely corroded a lot more for obvious reasons.
What are your thoughts on these results?
Do you have any opinions on what I should have tried,or is there anything that I missed?
Any suggestions on what I should do next?
*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***
Posted 07/22/2021 4:16 pm
