So you've got a bunch of old dirty pennies. Few things seem to age as poorly as pennies, and it's amazing that they can stay as dirty as they get in circulation. So, you may decide you would like to try cleaning your pennies.
First things first. Make sure that your pennies are not valuable or collectibles. Get a copy of a coin guide, or take them to a collector or coin dealer. If you've got some valuable coins, the last thing you want to do is clean them. This will destroy their value, and you would be left holding just pennies.
After you've determined that the coins are not worth more than the face value, then determine if you have copper coins. Basically anything minted since 1982 is actually 97.5% zinc, with the remaining 2.5% being copper. If you have zinc pennies, you need to stay away from any cleaning technique that uses acid, and the zinc is generally more affected by those than the copper pennies. The zinc is used in coins these days since the value of the copper in a penny started to surpass the one cent mark.
Once you've decided that it's alright to clean your pennies, you're faced with the choice of cleaning methods. If you look around the web, there is a surprisingly large number of ways that folks suggest to clean copper coins.
For example, one suggestion is to use a pencil eraser, and simply rub them with the eraser until they are clean. This sounds like a lot of work, and the abrasive in the eraser probably is not the best thing for the penny.
Similarly, there is a suggestion that a Dremel tool with a wire brush attachment, coupled with the use of Brasso can be effective. Once again, this sounds like it will be pretty hard on the coin.
First, the best thing is to step back and make sure you want to do anything at all. Some of those old coins can be fairly valuable, and cleaning them will devalue them as much as 90&. They like keeping that old patina in place. So take the time to look at them enough to identify them, and then use a coin guide or take them to a coin dealer to make sure that you don't have the family heirlooms in the bag.
There are at least a half a dozen ways to go about cleaning a penny. And obviously some are going to be easier on you and the coin than others
Jay Ruppel
Original source: http://www.articlesbase.com/diy-articles/how-to-clean-pennies-some-things-to-know-about-cleaning-copper-pennies-341755.html
