A crusty Merc; dime resurrected!

[Goldstrike]

A short swing in the park this morning gave me a really crusty mercury dime. Maybe the most encrusted merc I have ever come across! I could not read the date and gingerley started to clean it in a lemon bath. As soon as I was able to see the date (1942) without the overstamp that happened that year, I was able to do a rigourous cleaning. I think with an overstamp, it could have been worth a few hundred buckaroos!
I also dug up the lump of lead with the nail in that I think is used as some kind of marker?....not sure. The Forever isn't silver but still cool! Happy hunting all.

 

[ARAWORN]

Phenomenal cleaning job on that merc!! Congtats on the finds.

 

[Goldstrike]

Thanks ARAWORN!! I enjoy bringing things 'back to life'!!!

 

[kschae4]

GS , that was a great clean up on the merc. The lead item item is quite interesting.

 

[Cos]

I'm curious--What was the "rigorous cleaning" you used to do such a nice job on that crusty Mercury dime? To date, I have always retained the coins I found with a metal detector. However, recently I sold some other silver coins to a reputable coin dealer, and every coin that was "shiny" they claimed it had been cleaned and only wanted to pay me for the silver value in the coin. I am certain the most of them had never been cleaned--not by me or others because I picked them out of bank rolls back in the 1960's when silver coins were still common in change. It seems dealers today are getting real fussy about paying for the numismatic value of old silver coins if they have any microscopic hairline scratches on the surface. The dealer stated that a dirty coin is preferable than a shiny one--And he also said that almost all shiny silver coins have been "improperly cleaned" and thus are worth only their silver value. I just purchased the book, What to do with Granddady's Coins. Chapter 3 states, DO NOT WIPE, BUFF, POLISH OR OTHERWISE ATTEMPT TO CLEAN ANY OF GRANDDADY'S COINS.

So where does that leave us metal detecting hobbyists who like to find buried silver coins? I use the $14 Electro-Clean unit (available on eBay) for electrolysis to my found silver coins. I do not use this process for longer than 1-2 minutes at the very most. This is enough to get most of the compacted dirt off and loosen the black blotching you have on most buried silver coins. Most of this will come off in warm water with a brushing with a soft tooth brush and a gentle patting with a soft cloth. After electrolysis, I used to rub the coins with baking soda which made really shiny like new coins. Apparently, this is a no-no these days with coin dealers and collectors. It is better to leave the silver coins a wee bit dirty, than to make them nice and shiny. I need to do some more research on whether electrolysis is an accepted cleaning method for silver coins.

 

[Goldstrike]

Cos.......as soon as I determined it to be just another mercury dime and not a rare date/overstamp etc; I went ahead and used a couple of Q tip's with straight lemon juice. I initially had it in a 50-50 lemon juice and water solution.
I have a lemon tree in the back yard so I have plenty of fresh lemons and juice! I had to get the crud off the date to make sure before I went further. It cleaned it without the shiny-ness that you see on cleaned silver coins. If I did get a rare date coin, I would leave it to the professionals to clean