Ultrasonic Cleaning Of Coins..

Hi StupidSid

You will some folks on both sides of that questions !! My personal feeling is that cleaning is cleaning , unless it is to save a very rare valuble coin from destruction , and then only by professionals.

Rick

I like the tone of old coins so I would not be looking to remove that... but at the same time I don't want dirty coins.

I have a large collection (8,000) of lose coins and I am looking to organize them, and clean the dirty ones in the process.

Having them cleaning by a pro might be to expensive and I am sure not worth the money for lower value coins.

I am just worried that Ultrasonic cleaning will damage the coins, is that possible, can it scratch or pit the coin?

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I am just worried that Ultrasonic cleaning will damage the coins, is that possible, can it scratch or pit the coin?

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I have no experience cleaning coins,but I know a little bit about ultrasounds and how they work on anything ( including coins I guess) :
Ultrasounds will not scratch the coins( only you scratch them when you throw them in)
Ultrasounds will not pit,that is unless the dirt sits on a pinhole in the coin.If the whole is there already,then yes,it will be revealed.
Ultrasounds just generate a rupture(and excitation)between the layers( in this case your coin and whatever stuff is on top of it)
It could be argued here that if the ultrasonic emits powerfull enough waves might loosen particles of the original material (which are weakly held on the surface,and in extreme instances even disrupt the material).But as it stands,you are talking about a little cleaner which I don't think it will do any damage at all.
As a side line,our technicians use in the repair department a big ultrasonic cleaner for very hard to remove clearcoat coatings(harder than concrete when dry).It works with a special fluid,not water.The coatings come off,but the stainless steel of the respective part to be cleaned never gets attacked.
You can always try it by putting in a few coins you really don't care about and see the results.

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Originally posted by Abyss

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I am just worried that Ultrasonic cleaning will damage the coins, is that possible, can it scratch or pit the coin?

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I have no experience cleaning coins,but I know a little bit about ultrasounds and how they work on anything ( including coins I guess) :
Ultrasounds will not scratch the coins( only you scratch them when you throw them in)
Ultrasounds will not pit,that is unless the dirt sits on a pinhole in the coin.If the whole is there already,then yes,it will be revealed.
Ultrasounds just generate a rupture(and excitation)between the layers( in this case your coin and whatever stuff is on top of it)
It could be argued here that if the ultrasonic emits powerfull enough waves might loosen particles of the original material (which are weakly held on the surface,and in extreme instances even disrupt the material).But as it stands,you are talking about a little cleaner which I don't think it will do any damage at all.
As a side line,our technicians use in the repair department a big ultrasonic cleaner for very hard to remove clearcoat coatings(harder than concrete when dry).It works with a special fluid,not water.The coatings come off,but the stainless steel of the respective part to be cleaned never gets attacked.
You can always try it by putting in a few coins you really don't care about and see the results.

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I did just that and tried a few coins, it did not do anything to clean the coins, so I guess all my coins will stay the way they are, and if they are going to get cleaned somebody else is gonna have to do it.

The cleaner did not dammage the coins it also comes with a plastic basket to prefent metal on metal contact... but results were very very limited and not worth the trouble.