Tumbling your clad?

[Bottleman]

I herd a little while back about tumbling your clad to make them shinny and so the bank will take them. I have a

 

[John-Edmonton]

There are so many recipes for what to put in the clad for tumbling. Which ever one you choose, remember to do the pennies separately from the rest, otherwise, you will end up with brown stained nickels, dimes and quarters. Very suspicious looking rolls. I just use soap and water with a very small amount of vinegar for either batch.

 

[allhuntedout]

My buddy had one with copper shavings as the media. Man, that did a bangup job on pennies. We threw years worth in there and they came out awesome. My small rock tumbler I use aquarium gravel and a few shakes of scouring powder, and that works well enough for me.

 

[Bottleman]

Thanks for the information everyone. I will probably just experiment a little until I find something that works for me. I don

 

[Skillet]

Done in about 45 minutes. DO seperate pennies from other clad, tumble clad pennies seperately (no acid with the zincers, (it will cause pressure inside the barrel!) Tumble dimes and quarters together, nickels seperately. Common-date wheat-backs turn out nicely too.

Skillet

 

[Uncle Willy]

Use aquarium gravel, a little concentrated cleaner, and a half of a brillo pad, and they'll come out like new.

Bill

 

[allhuntedout]

I throw all wheats in. If they are from the teens and have a nice smooth green patina (not often), I do not. I imagine the only dates I would pull out would be 1909's, 1914D and 22 plain. Everything else goes in! I usually will put copper or brass tokens in as well if I have some about. If you're not willing to put your pennies in the tumbler, at least consider using some of that copper wire to tumble your copper coins (just keep a cupful aside just for coins). It does better than aquarium gravel, but just for the copper coins.

 

[High Desert Jim]

Wowser ! There sure are a lot of ways to clean those coins. Does anyone have any truly unique ways to clean coins? I had heard of one guy who used saw dust. no water just the saw dust in a tumbler.

 

[Bottleman]

Wow! Last night I put a load of pre 1983 pennies in there and I am amazed how they turned out! I did end up dumping just a little bottle tumbling copper in there with it. I still would have liked to see the look on the ladies face at the bank when I handed here the coins from straight out of the ground.

Thanks for all of the tips on tumbling your clad, Tom

 

[Uncle Willy]

She would most likely handed them back to you.

Bill