vibratory vs. electrolysis/tumbling

bbqfreak

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Sep 22, 2018
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east central ohio
have been reading alot on here about cleaning methods for coins. don't see anything on vibratory cleaning. does anyone use them? and what are your thoughts on them
 
My son uses a vibrating tumbler to clean his clad. He uses (don't laugh) Poultry Grit as the abrasive. No liquid needed. Poultry grit is fed to chickens to help them grind up their food. It works well for him.
 
no, vibratory is a kind of tumbling sorta kinda

I had one, but never tried it, others claim they don't work too well with typical loading media. I believer the action would be too tight. But it might Work better with the more aggressive poultry grit.
 
I tried my vibratory cleaner for cleaning dug clad but it was terrible. Maybe it just takes longer, but compared to a rotatory tumbler, there was no question. As for electrolysis, that is something you wouldn't use on a broad scale.
 
I tried my vibratory tumbler on clad, walnut shell, corn cob and even sand. It does not work nearly as well as the rock tumbler with fish tank gravel and water.
 
Ahh...now I know what a vibration tumbler is.

I would think that the medium needs to be heavy or as dense as the coins, else the coin just sit on the bottom.

Chicken grit, I have some that is crushed granite and heavy, could work whereas the lighter medium would not.

If you have a vibration tumbler then try it.
 
I just got a used one, I have the harbor freight double tumbler which works good but does not hold a lot. I wanted something bigger.
I ran a bunch of quarters in the harbor freight, took several days. Washing, rinsing & drying is a PIA.
But when I went to put them into the coin machine at the bank it kept jamming.

I put them all into the vibratory tumbler with ceramic & stainless shot they came out clean but not too shiny. This was about 1 hour and did not require any water or rinsing which was great.

Ran them through the coin machine and all but a couple bent or foreign coins made it.

~1800 quarters or ~$460

I am going to run to my dimes & nickels from scratch in using the vibe. Its a mix of 60% beach & 40% dirt. They all had just the inital washoff after being found. I'll post how it goes with pictures.

Just need to get them through the machine, not a beauty contest.
 
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