Cleaned Morgans

[carmcollectibles]

I just retired and started buying coins to add to my collection and selling duplicates and so on. Very new to grading coins. I stupidly sent 12 beautiful silver Morgans to NGC for grading. The were all from the 1800's. OMG! 9 came back slabbed marked cleaned, 1 was marked "altered surface" with no explanation, and 2 were graded AU58. What an absolute waste of time and money! These coins have been in my family for several generations and as I said, they looked to me to be absolutely perfect or damn close to it. Obviously, I have a hell of a lot to learn and so I'm going to be reading everything I can here and learning as much as I can from wherever I can. I know it is what it is but hard to understand why any cleaning of an old coin devalues it so much. I have an antique car and I clean it all the time, LOL.

Dan C

[Just Bob]

2 hours ago, carmcollectibles said:

 These coins have been in my family for several generations

Welcome to the forum.

The quote above is very relevant to the subject at hand. Years ago, it was not only acceptable to clean your coins, it was often recommended. Books and trade publication would sometimes print tips on how to clean them properly, and cleaning supplies could be found at coin shows and hobby shops .I'm not exactly sure when it fell out of favor, but now it is anathema. There are, however, still a lot of cleaned coins floating around out there in private hands and dealer showcases, and not all of them are obvious.

Your coins may have been cleaned when they were first collected (or even before), or may have been wiped or dipped by a family member or someone else who handled them.

My best advice is to study them closely, using different powers of magnification and different types and angles of lighting. Try to see what the graders saw - especially on the one with altered surfaces. It is an expensive lesson, but something worthwhile can come from it.

Feel free to post pictures, if you would like the opinions of some of us. Just try to make sure they are as clear and close as possible. (and, preferably with the portrait or reverse design aligned properly - one of my pet peeves. I'm getting too old to stand on my head to view a coin)

Good luck in the future.

[JKK]

As you collect, your concept of a beautiful coin is likely to evolve. That's especially true as you come to see the difference between originality and cleaning. Originality is prized because, once gone, it cannot be regained. Thus, cleaned coins are generally less desirable.

[Conder101]

6 hours ago, carmcollectibles said:

I have an antique car and I clean it all the time,

Do you clean it with a brillo pad?  Comet cleanser?  Anything else that puts thousands of scratches all over the paint?  If you did do you think it would reduce the value of the car?

[asdfgh]

Have you been able to recognize the cleaning once you got them back?  Most often it can be seen by the naked eye. Tilt the coin to the light and you will see fine lines across the coin. Most notable on the face. There are legit lines on morgans from polished dies. These will not go across the devices and are raised.  Altered surface usually means someone attempted to polish the fields or hammer down some bad marks.  On these you can usually see where the polishing stops around the lettering or a denticle mark that is rolled in or flattened.  I collect morgans and bought quite a few many years ago.  I did not have a clue when i was buying them back then other than someone said they were BU. Later on I sent a few to be certified starting with the best ones. I fortunately only got one back cleaned.  After looking at all of them carefully I determine I had at least 20 the were cleaned. Not too bad out of about 400. They just sit in a tube now waiting for a time when i can sell them as circulated morgans. I did get one back "tooled" which is similar to altered surface.