1918 Mercury Dime. Should it be cleaned?

[rjallen-migration]

Hi.

I was wondering if this 1918 Mercury dime should be cleaned, or if any coin should be cleaned?

Also, what are the most important areas of a Mercury dime condition wise?

Thanks.

 

 

 

[MBA101]

There is no need to clean that coin from what I see. Coins should be left the way they are and not cleaned, except for if there is PVC contamination, then an acetone bath would do nicely.

[rjallen-migration]

Great! Thank you. I am such a newbie to coins. I really love looking throught the posts here.

Thanks for the help.

[MunkyMan95]

Being new to the hobby, my suggestion would be to not clean ANY coins. If you are a person that has been in the hobby for a while, and knows what they are doing, it's one thing. But this new to the hobby, it's better to just leave them alone.

 

To answer your second question, one area that a lot of attention is paid to on mercury dimes is the bands on the reverse. There are three pairs of bands, and they are often used to judge the quality of strike on a Mercury Dime.

[MarkFeld]

To answer your second question, one area that a lot of attention is paid to on mercury dimes is the bands on the reverse. There are three pairs of bands, and they are often used to judge the quality of strike on a Mercury Dime.

Actually, with resect to the bands, the ones at the center of the fasces are the ones that receive just about all of the attention. And, often unfairly so at the expense of other areas of the design.

[PCcoins]

I would leave the coin just like it is. Hard to tell how it looks in hand, but ok to me. I would never clean any coin unless PVC contamination.