Tarnished clad - clean or don't bother?

KirkS

Full Member
Joined
Jan 8, 2017
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243
Location
St Pete FL
It seems the clad I find doesn't hold up too well against the Florida sand-soil. Almost every coin I find has a deep reddish brown tarnish. I've tries a few simple things to try and get them to look decent enough for spending, but I'm wondering if it's worth the time and effort. I've tried olive oil, soaking in detergent, mouthwash (alcohol), and scrubbing with a toothbrush, but nothing is helping.

Should I try something more aggressive, or would you not bother? I just want to be able to spend them or roll them for the bank.

Here's a sample of a dime and a quarter, with a surface find for comparison:
 

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cleaning clad to make it usable for spending

I have had some good results with vinigar and salt and putting them in the tumbler for a while. It has been posted under cleaning coins on here before with pictures. I wouldn't use it on any thing valuable i wanted to keep , but got rid of the discoloration for me.
 
Ive cleaned hundreds of dollars in clad with vinegar and salt to make it spendable , but it is a pain and you have to be careful not to over do it or the coins can go past clean and become discolored or ruined all over again from the acid. Get it just right and just long enough and maybe polish them up a little afterward with abrasive hand cleaner and a rag to remove any discoloration.

But I bought one of the tumblers from harbor freight and now I just tumble them , its easier and gets better results. A little ammonia+water and some fish gravel , add coins ( pennies separately ) , tumble a few hours , rinse , done. If any didn't get as clean as you like , put them back in for an hour.

You wouldn't want to tumble just a couple coins at a time , save them up for a while and do a bunch at a time.
 
Ahh Yes..The age old mega cladders conundrum! There was a real good recent thread on the 'General Hobby Discussion' section started by AtProDude about a week ago concerning this dilemma! On page 2 right now you might want to read to get some ideas of what to do to maximize your ROI on dirty discolored clad that simply will not clean up nice and shiney.....
 
Tumble the coins in soapy water and gravel to get the dirt off them for about 30 minutes, then soak them in salt and vinegar for 5 minutes and then tumble them again for an hour. They come out nice and clean and you can run them through a coin machine with no problem. I cash mine at my bank and there's no fee like at coinstar where they whack you for about 10%.
 
I tumble for a half an hour. Do not roll the coins, find a counter. If a teller opens a roll, (pretty good chance) and discovers off-color coins, the bank may refuse them. This is via my own experience.
 
I tumble all my clad in aquarium gravel with some Dawn and a splash of CLR. Works pretty good, just make sure you separate the pennies from everything else or they will all be orange.
 
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