Cleaning Silver Coins

Stop right there!

Yes, collectors prefer uncleaned. Cleaning will greatly lower the value. There are rare exceptions when there is so much crud on a coin that a mild restoration is needed, but even this should be done very carefully (there are other posts that describe how to go about it). I'd be especially careful if you have any harder-to-find dates or coins in particularly high grades. What are the years of the halves?

You should just spend them. Imagine my excitement from finding a classic coin in circulation, it would be well worth it.

The real problem with cleaning a coin is that they lose their "Original" state, and become a cleaned coin. Depending on the method used, cleaning only hurts and degrades a coin's value.
Another point is the unscrupulous sellers who foist these coins on less-knowing buyers who think they have a pretty coin, only to be shocked that it has been cleaned, meaning altered, meaning it's not worth much.

I'm going to hope that Franklin was very circulated and so dirty it wasn't recognizable.

A good example of a coin I've cleaned was a common date, circulated Morgan that looked like someone had splattered some paint on it. It had some yellow splotches that I figured it would be better without (or at the minimum, the value would not be affected cleaned vs yellow paint). But this was a rare exception!

I assume these coins are all circulated? If so, have you looked to see if you have any key dates with the walking liberties? (If they are circulated, the key dates will be the only ones worth a lot more than melt).

The only I would do is soak them in acetone. That will dissolve the oils and gunk. It will float to the top. The coin stays at the bottom.

-- Boris

You know I went to a local coin dealer and asked him about "dipping" a coin and he state 95% of the time don't do it. But he gave me an example of a coin that he dipped. Was a 1917 type 1 that was in an NGC holder at MS 65....the coins toning was so bad and unnatractive that he was unable to sell it for 25% under wholesale. He cracked the case dipped it twice lightly and then sent it in to pcgs. Coin came back as an MS 65 and the next coin show he went to he sold it for 15% above wholesale. I guess this can either go both ways.....grading companies should not be held in such high regard.....or in some circumstances it is "ok" to dip a coin.