BentRod
Elite Member
I was just curious why you keep it, not why you clean it.
Clad Cleaning questions
- Thread starter GillyWI
- Start date
I was just curious why you keep it, not why you clean it.
Brainworm
Elite Member
I've tested and tried everything from under the kitchen sink to top of line toilet bowl cleaners...... the best results I received was in using white vinegar an salt in a tumbler....It doesn't matter to me what you do with your Clad coins after cleaning....many cash them in....Myself I vacuum seal them after cleaning seeing they don't burn a hole in my pocket like it does for many others.
BentRod
Elite Member
I've tested and tried everything from under the kitchen sink to top of line toilet bowl cleaners...... the best results I received was in using white vinegar an salt in a tumbler....It doesn't matter to me what you do with your Clad coins after cleaning....many cash them in....Myself I vacuum seal them after cleaning seeing they don't burn a hole in my pocket like it does for many others.
Buddy, you and I just speak a different language. I was just curious why keep the coins? Why not put them in the savings account or exchange for cash and store that? No worries if you don't want to answer, again, just curious is all, but I'm going to just let this one go. HH.
Brainworm
Elite Member
Buddy, you and I just speak a different language. I was just curious why keep the coins? Why not put them in the savings account or exchange for cash and store that? No worries if you don't want to answer, again, just curious is all, but I'm going to just let this one go. HH.
Why is it so important for you to know what I do with my finds. Do we have a problem friend...
BentRod
Elite Member
It's not. If I'd known how apparently offensive my intendedly friendly and innocuous question was, I'd not have asked. 
Forget it.
Dirt Nuker
Elite Member
GillyWI
Elite Member
What? Soak them in beer?? LOL. (hmmm, can't hurt to try, and if it doesn't work, you can always pick out the clad and have a kegger, LOL.)
GillyWI
Elite Member
So I have been having a bit of fun trying different techniques I have read about online. Baking soda in water with aluminum strips sort of changed the look of the dimes I tried from a grungy dark brown/rust color to more of a pinkish color, some of which comes off with a toothbrush, in general not what I am after. I don't expect "BU" results but close to what your typical pocket change looks like. WHY I care I don't know, and no I won't save it. Just something to do other than stare at the TV (keeps me entertained, my wife says I am easily entertained, LOL).
Oh I took a pice of the foil as a test and put it in the plastic pan of vinegar I have been soaking dimes in and it ate the foil and turned the dimes in the area a bright pink!
I got a chance to stop at a "dollar store" and they had CLR in stock for $5.50 so got that and also a smaller container of "The Works" which seems to also be the same type of product as CLR (advertised as doing the same types of things), and that was only a buck, so will mess with that as well.
I sure didn't want to raise a big debate over what we do with our clad finds and why. To each his own, I know another long-time detectorist who also keeps his clad in a jar. Not sure what he does with zincs, I have already said I try to spend them a little at a time. You could also put them in a "need-a-penny" dish....
I will turn mine in to the bank, I save up my pocket change and go to the bank with it every year or so, most times it gets turned in just before a vacation to have some extra spending money. I will just add mine to my pocket change.
Oh I took a pice of the foil as a test and put it in the plastic pan of vinegar I have been soaking dimes in and it ate the foil and turned the dimes in the area a bright pink!
I got a chance to stop at a "dollar store" and they had CLR in stock for $5.50 so got that and also a smaller container of "The Works" which seems to also be the same type of product as CLR (advertised as doing the same types of things), and that was only a buck, so will mess with that as well.
I sure didn't want to raise a big debate over what we do with our clad finds and why. To each his own, I know another long-time detectorist who also keeps his clad in a jar. Not sure what he does with zincs, I have already said I try to spend them a little at a time. You could also put them in a "need-a-penny" dish....
I will turn mine in to the bank, I save up my pocket change and go to the bank with it every year or so, most times it gets turned in just before a vacation to have some extra spending money. I will just add mine to my pocket change.
Surfchunker
Elite Member
baking soda and foil only works on silver, vinegar is good for memorial pennies, and a tumbler is the best for memorials and clad, period.
GillyWI
Elite Member
Yeah the stuff I bought today don't do much, that's for sure. Hope I can find other uses for it around the house.
Last year I was impressed with what LimeAway did, any problems I saw I blamed on having zinc mixed in, maybe the coppers did it. Anyways I ran out of LimeAway and will try to get a bottle of that and try again. If that doesn't do it then what I have done so far will have to be good enough.
I had the LimeAway for a old game I have which is called a Pachinko machine, you can research that if you are interested but is sort of like a Japanese slot machine (works sort of like a pinball game but no flippers, it is a game of chance). So I restored this old one my brother in law brought back when he was in Japan and Vietnam in the air force. There are forums for peole who restore these things and LimeAway was recommended for cleaning the Pachinko balls (they pick up dirt or oils from your hand and they should be cleaned from time to time, which always leads to tongue-in-cheek comments about "what do you clean your balls with?"LOL
Last year I was impressed with what LimeAway did, any problems I saw I blamed on having zinc mixed in, maybe the coppers did it. Anyways I ran out of LimeAway and will try to get a bottle of that and try again. If that doesn't do it then what I have done so far will have to be good enough.
I had the LimeAway for a old game I have which is called a Pachinko machine, you can research that if you are interested but is sort of like a Japanese slot machine (works sort of like a pinball game but no flippers, it is a game of chance). So I restored this old one my brother in law brought back when he was in Japan and Vietnam in the air force. There are forums for peole who restore these things and LimeAway was recommended for cleaning the Pachinko balls (they pick up dirt or oils from your hand and they should be cleaned from time to time, which always leads to tongue-in-cheek comments about "what do you clean your balls with?"LOL
samandnoah
Forum Supporter
I just want to 2nd towzilla's recommendation for the Conklin gel. Amazing stuff.
Rich
GillyWI
Elite Member
How does it work for just soaking (no tumbler)?
GillyWI
Elite Member
OK, so at least a step forward that even warrants taking a picture!
I was researching online and found a thread detailing using a plastic bottle as what I would call a "poor mans tumbler", just using a plastic bottle. Maybe even worked a few arm muscles to get me ready for detecting this spring!
The threads I saw recommended using a wide mouth plastic bottle such as an orange juice bottle. All I have right now is a water bottle, but that worked fine for dimes (smaller hole size like a 20 oz soda bottle).
The threads also discussed vinegar and salt, so decided to try that again (am learning what I have read is true, not the best for clad, probably OK for pennies, I am considering my pennies "done" this year, good enough).
So I worked a fist full of dimes for awhile and was getting them much better looking this way than just soaking. I realized after a good 10 minutes of shaking that I also have some aquarium gravel around the house, so added that to the mix and that also made a big difference. The one thread stressed the importance of rinsing the coins, so I flushed the vinegar solution out a lot and shook the coin and gravel mixture, rinsed again and did this a few times, then decided to add a little dish soap and shake it a while longer and they started to look really pretty decent, although still a goldish stain to them, but decided I'd had enough and drained everything out and kept the gravel to reuse. I dried off the dimes I cleaned and set in a pile and decided I would finish the dimes I hadn't cleaned yet.
This time I decided the vinegar had to go and instead used the gravel and some of the chemical I had bought for $1 called The Works, which sound like it does about the same job as CLR or LimeAway. So put the remaining dimes in the bottle (gravel was already in the bottle) and put in The Works to cover, also added a bit of water, and started shaking, again a good 10 minutes or so, drained the now greenish-water off and I could see they were getting cleaner without the goldish tint. Experimented with a few other handy items i had in our laundryroom cupboard. One thing I thought of was a pumice hand cleaner (pasty sort of goop), squeezed a bit of that in there along with some dish soap and did that for awhile too, not sure if it helped all that much, probably the extra water and gravel time helped more than anything. Rinsed that all out (some of the pumice seemed to remain though) and then noticed a cardboard container of Borax, also a hand cleaner, decided to see if that would help, and again i am doubtful if anything was accomplished other than more time spent shaking might have helped.
At that point I just went through a little more dishsoap and water rinse, I could tell many of the dimes looked good and others I think may have been affected by the previous attempts at soaking I had made (bad copper stains i think caused by reaction of the inner copper clad material with the vinegar or other chemicals i had tried) and are still stained in varying degrees. So anyways i rinsed the bottle well and again dumped the entire contents out and dried the dimes off and have the gravel drying (man is the inside of that bottle getting hazy!).
Posting pics of the results, the left side is the first group which I used salt and vinegar to start with, and the right side is the last group starting with The Works and also a few other things used as an experiment.
I was researching online and found a thread detailing using a plastic bottle as what I would call a "poor mans tumbler", just using a plastic bottle. Maybe even worked a few arm muscles to get me ready for detecting this spring!
The threads I saw recommended using a wide mouth plastic bottle such as an orange juice bottle. All I have right now is a water bottle, but that worked fine for dimes (smaller hole size like a 20 oz soda bottle).
The threads also discussed vinegar and salt, so decided to try that again (am learning what I have read is true, not the best for clad, probably OK for pennies, I am considering my pennies "done" this year, good enough).
So I worked a fist full of dimes for awhile and was getting them much better looking this way than just soaking. I realized after a good 10 minutes of shaking that I also have some aquarium gravel around the house, so added that to the mix and that also made a big difference. The one thread stressed the importance of rinsing the coins, so I flushed the vinegar solution out a lot and shook the coin and gravel mixture, rinsed again and did this a few times, then decided to add a little dish soap and shake it a while longer and they started to look really pretty decent, although still a goldish stain to them, but decided I'd had enough and drained everything out and kept the gravel to reuse. I dried off the dimes I cleaned and set in a pile and decided I would finish the dimes I hadn't cleaned yet.
This time I decided the vinegar had to go and instead used the gravel and some of the chemical I had bought for $1 called The Works, which sound like it does about the same job as CLR or LimeAway. So put the remaining dimes in the bottle (gravel was already in the bottle) and put in The Works to cover, also added a bit of water, and started shaking, again a good 10 minutes or so, drained the now greenish-water off and I could see they were getting cleaner without the goldish tint. Experimented with a few other handy items i had in our laundryroom cupboard. One thing I thought of was a pumice hand cleaner (pasty sort of goop), squeezed a bit of that in there along with some dish soap and did that for awhile too, not sure if it helped all that much, probably the extra water and gravel time helped more than anything. Rinsed that all out (some of the pumice seemed to remain though) and then noticed a cardboard container of Borax, also a hand cleaner, decided to see if that would help, and again i am doubtful if anything was accomplished other than more time spent shaking might have helped.
At that point I just went through a little more dishsoap and water rinse, I could tell many of the dimes looked good and others I think may have been affected by the previous attempts at soaking I had made (bad copper stains i think caused by reaction of the inner copper clad material with the vinegar or other chemicals i had tried) and are still stained in varying degrees. So anyways i rinsed the bottle well and again dumped the entire contents out and dried the dimes off and have the gravel drying (man is the inside of that bottle getting hazy!).
Posting pics of the results, the left side is the first group which I used salt and vinegar to start with, and the right side is the last group starting with The Works and also a few other things used as an experiment.
Attachments
Surfchunker
Elite Member
see a tumbler is best even if it is hand operated ... the gravel and soapy water does the trick
GillyWI
Elite Member
Yeah I sure see it now, LOL.
I think for the level I am at now, talent and time, this probably will suit me. If I found lets say twice what I found this year I might break down and buy a tumbler, but for the amount of clad i have, I can do it this way (I have all winter, LOL) and can do this while watching TV, as long as my wife isn't watching with me (shaka-shaka-shaka-shaka))
Gilly
I think for the level I am at now, talent and time, this probably will suit me. If I found lets say twice what I found this year I might break down and buy a tumbler, but for the amount of clad i have, I can do it this way (I have all winter, LOL) and can do this while watching TV, as long as my wife isn't watching with me (shaka-shaka-shaka-shaka))
Gilly
Hannibal Nectar
Elite Member
those came out nice!
Surfchunker
Elite Member
and the good thing about tumbling is if you don't use chemicals you can do pennies and clad together.
DirtyNeckJesse
Elite Member
DON'T REPEAT DON'T do this if you have the vinegar in your solution! It will make your non-penny coins look like a pair of white boxers washed with a red dress!
Seriously.
GillyWI
Elite Member
Yup, I am lucky I got rid of most of the red ones, turn a cross between rust red and pinkish color.
GillyWI
Elite Member
I ordered a bottle of Conklin Multi-Surface Gel, I only have a dirty pile of quarters left now, I will wait until I get this stuff and then maybe do a step by step using my "bottle tumbling" method and post results as I go. Some of the quarters are really black.
Last night I stopped at a convenience store and bought a bottle of juice with the wide mouth opening, which is what I saw as a recommended type of bottle to make this easier.
Last night I stopped at a convenience store and bought a bottle of juice with the wide mouth opening, which is what I saw as a recommended type of bottle to make this easier.
