I might as well add my two cents worth. (Appropriate
choice of words, I must say). No one will argue that a coin with
good detail and a lovely
patina should be left alone. In the world of uncleaned coins, however, that's not going to be a common sight. Most of the coins we see are covered in dirt over a hard, crusty surface. The question then becomes, how much of this encrustation must be removed to bring out the details of the coin?
Any time we clean a coin, surface material must be removed. If a nice green or brown
patina completely covers a coin to the point of obscuring surface detail, is it better to leave the coin obscured or remove as much of the
patina as is needed? My own opinion is that I'll remove as much of the surface encrustation or
patina as I have to in order to show detail. There are many coins which are so badly encrusted, however, that my normal cleaning regimen of distilled water soaks, scrubbing with nylon and brass brushes, and mechanical cleaning with
dental picks and
fine Dremel tips, just won't do the job. It's at this point where the really difficult choices must be made.
If I absolutely can't get through the coin's crust with conventional means, I will then try lye soaks. I know this will eliminate most, if not all, of any remaining
patina, but I personally would rather have a lye soaked coin, that I can identify, than a green unidentifiable lump of crud. Many of the worst coins I've
had, have come out of a lye bath in surprisingly
good shape. To me, lye is a last resort that can provide
good results if the coin
still has
good metal,
poor results on porous coins. It has the advantage of leaving a brown
patina on the finished coin.
I've used
electrolysis on many of my truly hopeless coins. Sometimes, a coin is so heavily encrusted that even the lye won't break through. In case like this, I will zap a coin. I've
had much less
success with
electrolysis than lye, probably because I only use it as a very last resort on my worst coins.
Zapped coins always require re-patination of some sort. I really can't stand the bright brassy look of the coins as they come out of the solution.
So, in the end, this all
comes down to a question of degrees. How far are you willing to go to uncover the actual surface details that an encrustation may hide? Nobody strips a perfectly
good coin, so all we're talking about here is how we deal with coins that need to be cleaned in some form. I don't think there's any right answer for all coins. I've made mistakes with coins, where further cleaning actually destroyed what little detail was left and preserved in the
patina itself. I've also removed
patina, or even stripped coins, in the cleaning process and wound up with coins that were stunning in their detail.
I wish there was an easy and "correct" answer, but I don't think there really is. We all want to wind up with the best coin we can after all the
work we put into cleaning these things ... how we get there is likely to be an endless debate.
Stan