how to clean copper pennies without damaging them

Pennis that were made prior to 1982 had more copper in them, which can lead to a more intense reaction chemically while cleaning. If wikiHow has helped you, please consider a small contribution to support us in helping more readers like you. But, when you combine vinegar with other ingredients, it will become a cleaning agent, not a tarnishing agent. Simply run the water over the coin, or let it soak in the water. It may take a few treatments, so work gradually and wash the coins off each time to avoid damaging them. After 24 hours of drying time (72 hours if you live in humid conditions), use a soft cloth like an old T-shirt or washcloth to buff up all sides of your penny until it has regained most of its original shine! The application of taco sauce is another simple method of cleaning these pennies. This eliminates the possibility of abrasions to your investment. Its best to wear rubber gloves when handling the ketchup and penny because they can both leave your hands stained red if you arent careful! Rinse off the ketchup and inspect the condition of your coins. It does this by using the low levels of acids that are contained naturally in vinegar and lemon juice to remove the patina (brown oxidation) on the penny. After applying, give it a couple of minutes and then rinse using distilled water. Thanks to all authors for creating a page that has been read 438,144 times. For many pennies, one tablespoon (15 g) of salt in 1/2 cup (4 oz) of vinegar will get the job done. Rinse your pennies well with water; otherwise, if any of these cleaning agents remain on the coin, the coin will turn blue-green. One of the most important aspects of cleaning old coins is to know the value first. Dont leave them in a bowl of water, since the vinegar solution and copper oxide will end up in the bowl and on other coins. Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. They will not pay you until you have shipped the coins. It can even be used as a metal polishing solution. But if you do really want to get stuck in and have a go at cleaning some coins, we recommend that you experiment on some modern loose change instead. If you need to remove dirt from your coins, remove the worst of it with a tooth pick. Let them air dry or wipe them with a soft, microfiber cloth. On average, a quarter-cup should be adequate. Wait a few minutes, then check on the quarter. While you're grasping the coin firmly by its edges, use a clean toothbrush to lightly scrub the flat surfaces of the coin. An alternative is to use vinyl erasers, but they do not contain abrasive, which is typically found in pencil erasers. Many professional coin collectors and coin valuers recommend leaving the coins as they are. Copper is a soft metal, so copper coins are prone to degrading over time. Abrasive cleaning, using a brush and an acid or alcohol solution, can leave the coin with hair lines and discrepancies in the metal that may only be seen under the right lighting and magnification. Abrasive cleaners, like using a brush along with an acid or alcohol-based cleaning solution, can leave minuscule hair line discrepancies on the metal that can only be seen under magnification and in the right lighting. If needed, use a soft towel or soft-bristled brush to scrub the coin. 2. If this does not bother, you and you simply want to restore the coin for yourself you can use a baking soda paste. Mouthwash not only helps with dental health but can help you clean up dirty coins. Mix cup vinegar with 1 teaspoon of salt in a bowl that is non-metallic. When in doubt, refrain from cleaning anything older than those. Soak your pennies for five minutes in vinegar to dissolve any copper oxide . In many cases, cleaning a coin can lower the value of the coin as a collectors item. Drop your coins into the mixture and let them sit for about 5 minutes. Hot sauce and brown colas are some other household substances that work well on copper coins. Some are damaged by contact with other coins, general circulation, or being buried in the ground for many years. To prevent grime buildup, it is imperative that collectible coins be stored in a safe, secure, airtight place. Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. Be patient and try not to get frustrated. Wipe down the surface of your penny with another clean cloth or paper towel until all dirt has been removed from its surface. Wheat pennies are a relatively common find when metal detecting. You can also clean pennies with a combination of salt and lemon juice or salt and orange juice. With your paper towel, clean the pennies carefully and watch how they start getting clean and shiny. Place the coins in a plastic container and cover with mouthwash. Be extremely gentle! 1 How do you clean old copper coins without damaging them? Place your pennies in the vinegar or the lemon juice. Garret ACE 400 Review Use a stronger acid like ketchup or cola to strip away the green patina that forms when copper is exposed to salt and water. Gently scrub them with either a soft toothbrush or your fingers. Last Updated: November 9, 2022 Follow these steps to make your pennies completely clean: Step 1 Pour a small quantity of vinegar into a bowl. Fisher F22 Review This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Step-2: Mix dish soap with water in a bowl. If you do have hard water or highly acidic water, try using distilled water. Dish soap is another good cleaning method and is very gentle. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. The right materials will effectively clean your pennies and will also be safe for your hands. Over time, coins of all sorts can and will collect grime and gunk. Cleaning these will absolutely devalue them if they are not cleaned properlyso just be mindful of this. Rubbing or scrubbing a coin (even with non-abrasive liquids) will leave microabrasions on your coin and cause a severe reduction of value or elimination of any collectible value. In this case, 100% of readers who voted found the article helpful, earning it our reader-approved status. (So before you start using baking soda, vinegar, toothpaste, or ketchup to clean your coins at. Rinse off any excess liquid with water and set aside to dry. Next, soak the coins in the solution for 5 minutes, making sure theyre spread out so theyre all submerged. This should be enough to get them clean. Finally, take the pennies out and rinse them off using distilled water. If you dont have ketchup or another acid, try using a metal polish from a general store. The acetic acid in white vinegar can help remove contaminants from your coins. You must remember to use these at your discretion. Pennies are normally made of copper, which is a shiny, bright metal, and more recently Zinc. Water is one of the best and safest ways to clean your wheat pennies. You can also use baking soda and salt to clean your pennies. [1] 2 Add enough acetic acid (vinegar, white vinegar is most recommended) to moisten the salt into a paste. If it works for you, stick with it. Subscribe To Me: http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=TheBoxUnboxed https://twitter.com/TheBoxUnboxed Use Promo Code TBU for 10% off GFUEL http://www.gammalabs.net Use Promo Code TBU For 5% off Custom Pc's at http://lostlegionpcs.webs.com/ Use Promo Code tbu for NoScope Gaming Glasses or use the link below https://www.noscopeglasses.com/demon-glasses?tracking=tbu The level of water in the container should determine when you stop adding pennies into it because they must all get totally submerged into the solution for this process to work. Should the oil start to look discolored, change it out. 6 Can hydrogen peroxide be used to clean coins? These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. The Minelab Equinox 800 is another of my favorite metal detectors. You must be gentle. In fact, 99% of coins do not increase in value after you clean them. You do not want to leave behind any residue that may further degrade the pennys condition! Use it to try out great new products and services nationwide without paying full pricewine, food delivery, clothing and more. Let them soak for about two hours or so, though if they are extremely dirty, you may want to let them sit for up to a week. However, you may visit "Cookie Settings" to provide a controlled consent. You can also use just a touch of olive oil for polishing older coins that have become tarnished. When a rare coin is found, it is often submitted to professionals, such as those at PCGS, or Professional Coin Grading Services. This service does not come with a grading protection guarantee. In fact, it would probably be extremely wise to do so, at least from a sanitary perspective. The olive oil is good at separating the dirt from the surface of the coin for a thorough cleaning experience, though it takes substantially longer. The best thing about using rubbing alcohol is that it will remove the tarnish from your copper coin without damaging its surface. Keep your coins in a stable, cool, dry location. This article was co-authored by Alicia Sokolowski. Paper Towels This process can get a bit messy. Start with a mixture of warm, soapy water when cleaning silver coins. Use Water Sometimes the simplest methods are best. Method 1 Removing Dark Spots with Vinegar Download Article 1 Pour 14 cup (59 mL) of white vinegar into a small bowl. 5. The effect is immediate and obvious. Repeat the treatment with more oil as needed. Cheap Metal Detectors In this article well take a look at the top 10 tips for cleaning a copper penny. Different types of coins require different cleaning solutions, so ask an expert if you are not sure. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. You can also find protective books which have individual sleeves for each coin. How to Clean Wheat Pennies Safely and Without Damage, How to Clean Corroded Pennies Safely and Effectively, How to Clean Gold Jewelry With Vinegar Without Any Damage. Elias Weston is a Cleaning Specialist and the Founder of Seatown Cleaners in Seattle, Washington. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. If youre using lemon juice, be sure that the penny is very well-cleaned beforehand and that its completely dry before applying the lemon juice. Remember, you dont want to use anything that has abrasive qualities to them because they can scratch the coins. This is the important part: rinse with distilled, not tap water. Dry them off with paper towels. wikiHow is where trusted research and expert knowledge come together. I go from light cleaning, to using soap and water, to using olive oil. What is the best solution to clean copper? Your email address will not be published. You can clean as many pennies you want with a single pencil eraser. These coins range in value from a few cents to a small fortune, if you are lucky enough! That means a lot more options for getting them clean enough to use again. tb1234. Pennies get dull and dirty because the copper in the pennies reacts with oxygen in the air to form copper oxide. Coins made of nickel and silver will be easily cleaned; however, coins made out of copper will be harder to clean as copper reacts to more materials than other metals. Pull the coins out of the liquid and gently wipe them with a paper towel to break apart the tarnish and dark spots. You may even want to take the same steps you learned from here to help clean other dirty pennies that you come across in the future. This article has been viewed 438,144 times. Be gentle: A penny is a delicate coin and you dont want to scratch it up in the process of cleaning it. Submerge the coins in a shallow bath of vinegar and let them soak for at least an hour. This detector features multiple search frequencies and has 2 different coin modes: one for foreign coins and one for U.S. coins. Remove the coins and dump out the lemon solution, and then pour the olive oil and one teaspoon of lemon juice into the container. It removes various materials including organic material. So at the very least you need distilled water as a working medium. The presence of salt and vinegar as its ingredients explains why this method works. Make sure that any cleaner you use is rated to clean pennies prior to 1982. You will not need to clean your coins repeatedly if you know the best way to clean pennies and how to preserve them properly. From there, use your brush to gently get the grime off of the coins before putting them back into the water again. Use a small plastic container full of hydrogen peroxide. It does not store any personal data. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. This way, you can take any preventative measures necessary to clean the coins and retain their value. Baking soda and vinegar have proven to be one of the most effective ways to clean tarnished coins. Wed love to hear from our readers! Enjoy! If there are still some stubborn stains on your pennies after rinsing them with water, try using baking soda next time instead; this should help get rid of those stainsand if not then maybe some hand lotion would help soften up those stubborn spots too! Try not to rub the coin too much with your fingers or the dirt, silt, and other residue on the surface can damage the coin. [3] 4 The key is to first know what kind of coin you have. Fill up two plastic containers with distilled water and a tablespoon of mild hand soap. Because the effect is achieved only where the mixture has been in contact with the coin, this allows one to get creative with the contrasting features of the coin itself with your choice of different colored copper. An easy way to clean copper pennies and coins to remove the build-up of grime is with soapy water and a little elbow grease. Leave the pennies for around five minutes in the glass of vinegar or lemon juice. So how do you safely store your wheat pennies? The amount of vinegar used to clean the pennies depends on the number of coins you wish to clean. Some of these have relatively sound science behind them, but they should be used at your own risk. For coins that dont have collectible value, you can use sand, olive oil, and even isopropyl alcohol to get the job done. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. Since we are also concerned about safety, it is important for you to know that the acidic substances that these rust removers contain could be harmful to your skin, so you should protect yourself with gloves and a mask when using them. Fill the bowl with enough lemon juice to cover the quarter. Anyone can use this simple technique. But do notenothing is 100% safe or 100% fool proof. For a more gradual treatment, leave the coins out of the bowl. The more contact the coins have with one another the more damage they take on. Rinse them off after soaking them in vinegar so they dont reabsorb any of that dirt onto themselves! If you are not worried about damaging the coins as much, you can continue down the list and use some of the more abrasive cleaning methods. In that event, you would want to avoid anything highly abrasive that could damage the surface of the coin. But we recommend the vinegar or lemon juice approach because the materials are safe for your skin, overall quite very effective, creates little to no mess, and the risk of damaging the pennies is fairly low. Let the coins sit in the mixture for about 10 or 15 minutes so that the soap can break down the grime. Step 2 Add a teaspoon of salt to the bowl full of vinegar, and stir the mixture until the salt is completely dissolved. First, gather your supplies. Include your email address to get a message when this question is answered. Rinse with warm water and dry thoroughly. This happens because the vinegar and salt dissolves the copper oxide layer of the penny. This may be true in certain aspects, such as uncirculated monies. Drop your coins into the mixture and let them sit for about 5 minutes. Which is correct poinsettia or poinsettia? This is what gives some pennies their odd bluish hue. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. With -cup of ketchup, just dip your old toothbrush in and scrub the surface of the coin. Dip one penny halfway into the liquid. Start by adding a quarter cup of white vinegar, or lemon juice, into a cup or glass. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Place the quarter you want to clean into a small plastic bowl. If you don't have any vinegar on hand, a 1:1 ratio of water to acetone will produce the same effect. After youve cleaned off any grime or other contaminants from your coins surface, its time for step two: cleaning out any crevices that could have collected dust or dirt over time. Something like a penny for example. Use it to try out great new products and services nationwide without paying full pricewine, food delivery, clothing and more. I know it sounds strange, but stay with me. Gently scrub the coin with an incredibly soft brush. Wash each coin gently with a soft toothbrush before rinsing and drying it. Easy & Effective Ways to Clean Dirty Coins at Home, 10+ Ways to Clean Your Clipper Blades like a Pro Barber, https://www.howtocleanthings.com/how-to-clean-pennies/, https://sciencebob.com/clean-pennies-with-vinegar/, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mMp2OYpCq8, https://www.apartmenttherapy.com/how-to-clean-copper-and-brass-with-ketchup-223741, Wie man Kupfermnzen sekundenschnell reinigt, Pulire le Monete di Rame in Pochi Secondi, . So our advice is that if you have found some valuable pennies (and have hopes of selling them for big money), it is actually safer to not clean them at all. Take them out, setting them on the cloth. Therefore, before cleaning old coins, consult an expert on the subject. Coins generally lose value as they get cleaner. Remove tough tarnish on coins by soaking them in hydrogen peroxide or . [1] You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. There will be times when you think your coin is clean, only to discover later that its still dirty. The effect is achieved only where the mixture has been in contact with the coin, so ensure you cover the entire coin! Gold Nuggets Metal Detectors You can also try using a damp cloth with baking soda, which will help loosen any stuck-on dirt without damaging the coins surface. Maintain your coins in great condition through proper care, handling and storage. Can I use isopropyl alcohol to clean the coins? Mix in extra salt if you wish, but keep a close eye on the coins to avoid damaging them. If you are keeping them or do not care if they are damaged, you can use methods like vinegar, peroxide, baking soda, mouthwash or even, dare I say, ketchup! References. Overall, cleaning a copper penny is not that difficult most of the time, and any of the methods listed above will be sure to get the job done right. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. Drop your coins in a bowl and cover them completely with olive oil. If it doesnt work for you, or somehow has hurt or damaged the penny in your eyes, stop using this method and find one you feel is a bit better. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. Vinegar is most effective for cleaning copper. They are too harsh and abrasive to clean wheat pennies with. wikiHow marks an article as reader-approved once it receives enough positive feedback. It is definitely cheaper to clean it yourself, but there are occasions where it would be more prudent of you to allow professionals to handle it. We use cookies to make wikiHow great. Then mix gently until the salt totally dissolves in the lemon juice. The vinegar poured into that bowl should be enough to cover those pennies. How to clean copper pennies using vinegar and baking soda. You can use lemon juice to clean copper pennies, but youll want to work in a well-ventilated area when you do. From there, wipe your finger on your face for some natural oil, made up of sebum, and transfer it to the face of the coin. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously. If your pennies still dont get clean after the fifth step, you can mix baking soda with a tablespoon of water, then use an old soft toothbrush to gently scrub the surface. Stir until the salt dissolves. There are coins worth thousands upon thousands of dollars, all contingent on the condition of the coin. Make sure they are not directly on top of each other. To clean a copper penny, squeeze out a small amount of tomato ketchup onto the face and back of the coin. Before we go into the process of bringing corroded pennies back to life, let us look at the cleaning materials you must have. You may not see these changes with your naked eyes if you clean carefully, but they are there. First, do not every use any type of jewelry cleaner or metal polish on coins. One of the simplest ways to clean coins is by using distilled water and a soft towel. Rinse off excess mustard under running water until all traces are removed from both sides before allowing them dry completely upside down so they wont lose any color fading away while drying out naturally overnight.. Remember, you can always try cleaning a coin again, but you cant reverse mistakes. Copper coins often turn a muddled brown color, and these marks can be cleaned off with salt and a mild acid like white vinegar. No scrubbing necessary at all. When they start to look cleaner, remove them from the bowl. For others, coins can be collected throughout the years, some of which become quite valuable. Dump all the pennies into the liquid. Its important to note that cleaning tarnish off valuable or rare coins can greatly affect their value. Keep reading below for the best methods for safely cleaning your wheat pennies at home. Let them sit for a month though you may need to let them go for as long as six months. This natural acid can be used to clean coins, pots and pans, and more. You can use your finger or an exceptionally fine brush to remove any stuck-on dirt. The concept is the same as white vinegar and salt. So here's how to clean a penny with vinegar: Get a small glass (or another kind of non-corrosive container) and fill it with some white vinegar - just enough to submerge a coin below the surface. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". Soak coins in warm water mixed with liquid dish detergent to clean off light dirt and grime. "Knowing how to safely clean copper is big time helpful.

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