1912 2 1/2 Indian Head Gold Coin 2 2

[GoldBear150]

Hello I'm new to the forum. I bought this gold coin just face value due to the solder on the obverse of the coin. is it possible to remove it?

Thank you.

[JKK]

Face value is $2.50. If someone sold it to you for that, something is amiss.

[Big Nub numismatics]

It's every collectors dream though...

[GoldBear150]

I have tested the gold coin with my sigma metalytics machine and it came out fine. I bought the coin what it's worth in gold.

[Henri Charriere]

The only thing I see encouraging here is it is gold and gold is on a meteoric rise.  Even if you were to restore this coin, somehow, some way, I believe a telltale mark would be left of the indignity visited upon it. It was sold to you at or about melt value because someone deemed it to be worth nothing more than scrap. I just don't know if it is worth salvaging in the condition it is in.

 

[Coinbuf]

I do not know as I have never tried to remove solder from a gold coin, however, you can let the coin soak in pure acetone (not your wife's nail polish remover) and see if it will lift.  The acetone is safe and will not react with or alter the gold coin in any way, that is the only safe/neutral method that I would attempt.  If you have no success with that a trip to NCS for them to evaluate and perform any other possible actions would be the next step.

[kbbpll]

I wouldn't recommend trying it, but I wonder, if it's really solder, if a pro could melt it off. Gold melting point is 1064C and solder seems to be 90-450C. It's always going to be a damaged coin though.

[Conder101]

It is probably silver solder (they don't use lead or tin based for jewelry, too weak) it's going to have a melting point between 640 and 740 C.  One thing you could probably do is to soak it in 18K gold testing solution (which is basically nitric acid)  It will dissolve the silver and base metals in the solder but won't affect the 900 fine gold alloy.  You could use 14 or 10K testing solution which would take longer but would be even less likely to have an effect on the gold.

[GoldBear150]

I never soak a gold coin with gold testing solution before. I have 10k to 22k gold testing solution made by JSM which i rely on testing jewelry but not for gold coins.