Greetings from Norway

[Trond]

Hi.

I've been lurching around here for sometime, reading and studying this great forum.

Have recently posted a "before" post in the cleaning contest, so I tought the proper thing to do now, would be to introduce myself:

I am new to ancient coin collecting. I have allways been interessted in history, epic films, historic novels etc, so some ancient coins was  actually a gift idea  from my wife.

And I have to commit, I'm totally "lost", what a great hobby.

I have bought more history books and learned more history and geografi, than I tought possible already.

I have, of course, also bought some coins as a start, both expensive and unexpensive, cleaned and uncleaned, a microscope, scale, a gallon of olive oil, constructed a electrolyze bath, and to be honest, my wife could be regretting starting this interest of mine...  

I'm a former engineer in Research and Development at a big University, disabled at 49 years age with a chronic Cluster headache, so it have also been great to find  something meaningful to fill my good days with.

As the subject states, am living in Norway, and I hope that will pardon my sometime uncorrect English.

Best wishes to everybody from:

Trond

[Molinari]

Welcome to Forvm, Trond, and greetings from America!

Glad to hear you are enjoying your new hobby.  I hope you'll consider starting a gallery so we can see your coins, once you've aquatinted yourself with the site!

As a tip, be careful with electrolysis because you will strip the patina right off the coins, which in almost all cases is undesirable.

Nick

[Jay GT4]

Welcome!

I can't say it any better than Molinari!

[carthago]

Welcome to one of the greatest hobbies in and of history!

Don't worry about your English as I bet few of us speak Norwegian (though I love lefse and ate a ton of it as a kid). 

Nobody is born knowing anything about ancient coins.  Learning is about 95% of the enjoyment of this hobby.  You can fill more than a day with this madness...you can fill a lifetime!

As for cluster headaches, I've had intermittently in my life.  It's one of the most painful things a human being can be subjected to so you have my well wishes.   Fortunately for me, I'm one of those that go through a few weeks of them and then they go away for several years. 

Chris

[Paddy]

Trond - I am a fellow scandinavian, and I am very happy at this forum. You have come to the right place to learn about ancient coins.

Welcome.

[Trond]

Thank you for youre warm welcome,

 and thanks for the tip about electrolyses. I have tried a couple of sollutions(NaCl and Na2CO3) and different voltages. Just testing on really cheap coins , and you are of corse right, it is not a very good way to clean coins, takes a lot of dirt, but off goes the patina as well.

Then I'm back to olive oil or destilled water, and patience, patience patience.........

As a comment to the virus and deasese: after reading history and handling coins for some days now I actually dreamt about getting the "Black Death" from these historic artifacts burried from before the big pandemi.
It was just a nightmare but certenly a sign that my mind even in sleep is occupied with my new hobby.  

To Chris: sorry to here about youre CH even if you are a periodic, do you need any advice or tips about this, just give me a PM anytime.

And to Paddy: another Viking thats great.  

Trond