'Doctoring' a Challenge to Define

Two cents from the newbie who doesn't know much about this issue...

They're coins. They travel from press to bags to pockets to shipwrecks through machines to God knows where else. Over a period of many, many years. They're going to scratch, ding, etc. Why is that such a travesty -- a "problem?" At the end of my years, I hope people don't value me less because of my visible wear and tear.

I wouldn't consider it doctoring to wash a coin as you'd wash your dirty hands. If a coin is covered in something, why can't you clean it in soap and water? Is that against the rules? If you wipe the coin off, well, I'm sure that would add to the wear and tear, but what's unnatural about it? I would leave the coin alone simply for fear of being accused of doctoring it, but I think the questions are still valid.

But I don't approve of trying to repair and improve coins. Enjoy the natural wear and tear of a coin's honest journey through life. Would a coin mistakenly end up in your oven, baked in oil? Not likely. Would you naturally touch it? Likely. Would you accidentally paint it with chemicals to create artificial rainbow toning? Very, very unlikely.

I guess my thoughts are 1. this issue is a pretty common sense one and 2. it's being nitpicked to death to include or exclude, depending on who is doing the doctoring (as some mentioned/inferred).

Anyway, what do I know? Enjoying the discussion! :silly:

Mary Elise, You bring up some good points and some good buzz words that have been in the community for a long time.

Wiping, for example. It was very common years ago to wipe a proof coin with a cloth. This leaves hairlines on the surface. Generally, these coins can be slabbed by the TPGs, but will be downgraded to something less than PF63.

Some time ago, a couple numismatists were invited to examine the coins in the Smithsonian Collection. John Dannreuther might have been one of them. It was confirmed that many of the coins had been cleaned, wiped and even polished to a point where the coins were ruined. The visit was written up in Coin World.

Whizzing, described in the Numismaster article, moves metal on the surface and essentially changes the surface and ruins the coin. Washing a coin with soap and water might leave soap residue on the coin and probably is not advisable for something the owner considers valuable.

One method I and others have used to remove residue on coins is a rose thorn. It is sharp and does not scratch the metal if used carefully.

The use of acetone to remove PVC residue is acceptable. I have done that on a few coins and exonumia I own. Washed off with distilled water, it leaves no trace. There may be other ways to acceptably clean coins that I am not aware of.

There is alot of controversy about toning too. That is a subject unto itself. Artificial toning, if one can detect it, is not acceptable. One way this can be done by heating a coin. Some people claim that you can quickly tone a coin by wrapping it in a Taco Bell napkin. Is that artificial? I dont know. But this is a very controversial subject right now and TPGs are examining coins for artificial toning. But I do not think that they can even define it consistently. I hear the PNG is trying to form a committee to do just that.

Anyone that wants to jump in here, feel free.

The Coin Talk forum has a thread that involves some guy, who was toning coins...get this -- that were slabbed! I never got to the "how he did it" part. I found the thread while I was researching AT. It was really, really long and involved, but should be interesting. I'll locate it again and post.

Garryn, thanks for the feedback. I should respect the respect shown to coins.

But sometimes it feels like...you can only do this...when there's a full moon...if it falls on a Tuesday...in a month that begins with J... And so on. I would lean toward just doing absolutely nothing at all to a coin. Of course, then if you accidentally sneeze on it, you'll be in trouble for using saliva to...to do what exactly? I read about it somewhere...