How to grade my coins when adding to my collection

Hello all, thank you in advance for any help. I am new to Numista and I'm interested to know how you choose what grade your coin is when you add it to your collection. I am erring on the side of using a lower grade, because I don't want to deceive anyone if I'm going to swap. What are your thoughts?

Hello 🤖

Without pictures, it will be very difficult for anyone to help you. Could you please post clear pictures of each side of your item?

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Here from the FAQ page;

https://en.numista.com/help/what-do-g-vg-f-vf-xf-au-and-unc-mean-81.html

There are a couple of links on how to grade coins in there.

Thank you very much!

In the early 70’s I bought a book called grading British coins, I used that as my reference and tutorial until I felt that I was proficient in grading my own coins, if anything I have become a little over strict on grading and sometimes look for any minute reason to downgrade a coin 

Thank you, Offa. I have a Red Book for United States coins, and there's grading standards in the front that I am revisiting. I was adding foreign coins to my collection though, and I think I was  being a little strict, too, not knowing what some of them would have looked like new, and also not wanting to deceive anyone that I had something better than I actually do. I will probably go back through my collection and increase the grades on some coins. Thanks again. 

Grading can be subjective especially for edge cases and if you swap internationally you will even encounter differences in grading. The same words might be used but they can mean different things. Good pictures will be the easiest tool so that everyone involved can built their own opinions on the conditions of the objects.

Great advice Idolenz, thank you.

Thanks for the FAQ page link.

This is really useful - thanks to all contributing members.

As another ‘new to Numista’ member, I also struggle sometimes. The one thing I never do is to try and clean coins too much. Especially older ones.

The word “too” implies you clean your coins? I hope only from superficial loose dirt.

No I don't clean coins, but I do remove superficial dirt. 

Like some of you, I have picked up a dirty coin off the street and it gets a quick rinse under the tap.

I appreciate your ‘eagle eyed’ comment though. 

Remember the only difference between “setting something on fire“ and „cooking“ is the knowledge and experience of the person doing the work.

NGC offer „restoration“ services but we shouldn’t „clean“ our coins.

The rubbish old adage of not cleaning coins applies in reality only to high value coins where one wrong step could cost you a fortune. It is like taking a driving lesson in a Ferrari, stupid and could end in an expensive crash.

If you clean a €5, €60 or €100 coin, no one is going to care, as long as you don’t ruin it. Learn how to restore your coins and act accordingly to coins with a higher value. Try out your restoration techniques on low value coins, not on the Royal Mints collection.

It applies to any coin cheap or expensive (the amount of damage financially might be different but the damage to the objects is the same if you don't know what you are doing).

Nobody will cry if you destroy a bit of modern pocket change but then you should also not complain when nobody wants to trade your cheap ruined pocket change for not “cleaned” cheap pocket change.

Idolenz

It applies to any coin cheap or expensive (the amount of damage financially might be different but the damage to the objects is the same if you don't know what you are doing).

 

Nobody will cry if you destroy a bit of modern pocket change but then you should also not complain when nobody wants to trade your cheap ruined pocket change for not “cleaned” cheap pocket change.

You keep associating „cleaned“ with „ruined“ as if that is the only outcome, It isn’t. Take „not cleaned“ dirty, disgusting, sticky coins and „restore“ them.

My point is the wording, no one wants to ruin a coin, but somehow saying it has been „cleaned“ gets up people’s noses - alternately you can pay NGC to „restore“ your coin and it is okay.

Two examples; 

1 I have “restored“ coins myself and NGC has been none the wiser, I know from my knowledge that any damage to the coin was done long before I „restored“ it, and my intervention did not in any way degrade the coin from someone wanting to swap or buy the coin.

2. I picked up a old Arabic (what I assumed was a cupronickel coin) for less than €1, because like many before me who also assumed it was cupronickel and because it was absolutely filthy (and thus being cheap), I bought it because I knew that I could improve this coin visually and thus increase its value. To my surprise under all that filth was actually a rare Saudi silver coin worth around €300-€400. I „restored“ it, some might say I „cleaned“ it, but I certainly didn’t „ruin“ it.

Instead of harping on about „cleaning“ coins we should be teaching new members to the hobby how to „handle“ and how and when to “restore“ their coins correctly.

It is like not letting new drivers on the roads until they have learnt and obtained a license, because saying you „can’t drive“ isn’t true.

Thanks again to all.

This kind of dialogue is both informative and helpful.

Let's have more.