What should I do?

Hello, I would like to ask your opinion about the coin what I have received from a seller on eBay.
The coin is as described on the listing (circulated old 2gbp) BUT it was fixed to the paper with a sellotape put directly on the coin.
What should I do? Clean it? But how? Put it in album as it is now? Return it? Sell it?
Thank you in advance

When this happens I usually use rubbing alcohol and a cotton swap this gets rid of the residue most of the time.

Baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) will do the trick too. Make a pasta from baking soda and water and gently rub it on the coin with your thumb. The sticky residue of the sellotape will soon disappear without damaging the coin. Afterwards rinsing with water and dry.

I would also give a seller 4 stars and explain why in the comment.

Thank you all

Quote: "Essor Prof"​Baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) will do the trick too. Make a pasta from baking soda and water and gently rub it on the coin with your thumb. The sticky residue of the sellotape will soon disappear without damaging the coin. Afterwards rinsing with water and dry.

​Do NOT do this, you'll damage the coin.

Instead, use acetone and/or Goo Gone, they'll both work but the acetone would be my first choice. Then leave "neutral" feedback and provide the facts (just facts) in the feedback.

When this happened to me I emailed the seller and suggested that they not put tape directly onto the coins. The seller had not realized this could cause a problem. They immediately offered a replacement and changed their packaging methods for all future shipments. Of course, a replacement may not work in your situation - it depends on the coin.
I'd try acetone like the others recommended. but I would also try communicating with the seller.

I don't know what happened with my previous post. I only just saw it is empty. That explains of course why there wasn't a reaction from Steve27.

So this was the original post with a question for Steve27:
In what way will baking soda damage the coin? I don't see any abrasive effect and it's even edible. I certainly won't try to drink aceton.

Baking soda is abrasive. I would never use it on any collectible.

Try it on a circulating bronze coin (i.e. a coin not worth collecting), and you'll easily remove the brown patina, precisely because it is abrasive.

What about toothpaste?

Um, isn't the whole point of toothpaste about being abrasive?

Quote: "Steve27"​

Quote: "Essor Prof"​Baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) will do the trick too. Make a pasta from baking soda and water and gently rub it on the coin with your thumb. The sticky residue of the sellotape will soon disappear without damaging the coin. Afterwards rinsing with water and dry.

​​Do NOT do this, you'll damage the coin.
​
​Instead, use acetone and/or Goo Gone, they'll both work but the acetone would be my first choice. Then leave "neutral" feedback and provide the facts (just facts) in the feedback.

When I see people give a "brand name" for something you can buy at half its price irritates me no end. WD40 will remove any of the tape gum as well, don't go out buying these special brands of "cleaners". I think I am more than qualified to know how to remove any kind of residue without damaging a coin and you certainly do not need these special brands which are nothing more than a few mixed household substances with a marketing logo slapped on them IMO.

Quote: "Camerinvs"​Baking soda is abrasive. I would never use it on any collectible.
​
​Try it on a circulating bronze coin (i.e. a coin not worth collecting), and you'll easily remove the brown patina, precisely because it is abrasive.

​Add boiling water to a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda, mix until dissolved then gently rinse the coin in the water when cooled. Not abrasive or as unforgiving as direct Bicarb in paste form.


​

Just about anything is abrasive if you work hard at it.

Some years ago I posted a complete list of all the "details codes" used by the TPG pirates which included a whole lot of ways to bugger up a perfectly good coin that I'd never even though of. There's even one called "thumbing" which pretty much means that you spent countless hours rubbing away at the coin with your greasy fat fingers. Who the hell has the time for this?

The point being of course is that it's not the toothpaste or the baking soda which does the damage, it's the scrubbing and rubbing. Might as well use battery acid and a rock tumbler.*

Acetone is your friend. Don't use nail polish remover (on your coins or nails) it's simply acetone dyed a pretty colour and with the price jacked up 500%. You can buy a half gallon of the same stuff at the hardware store for the same price. If the min. wage clerk just blinks and gives you a blank stare, ask for paint thinner, if he blinks again chastise him soundly and go to a store which doesn't hire mouth breathing retards. It will remove tape residue and all manner of ugly stuff just by a 10 second dip followed by a slightly longer rinse. Why attack your coins with an abrasive when there is a much cheaper, quicker, harmless alternative ?


*Last time I used this phrase I got a long lecture about it's effects on children from some virtue signalling moral supremacist. So let's be clear, for the benefit of the terminally stupid. DO NOT use battery acid on coins. It's a waste of a great martini ingredient.

I didn't know WD40 was a good product to use on dirty coins, though I should have guessed given that it's mostly fish oil. But I wouldn't be too hard on Steve, as most of us are not experts at the chemistry of cleaning products.

I didn't know either about the way to use baking soda in a non-abrasive way.

As for toothpastes, no, they're not supposed to be abrasive. If they were (and some are, especially if they include baking soda) they would remove the enamel from your teeth ─ ever so slowly, but after a number of years or even months, the damage would become evident.

As a chemist, I know that acetone is clearly one of the best cleaning products when the dirt is purely organic/bio-organic. I never saw a mineral or metallic material being altered by a solvent which quickly dries itself and which have a low affinity with mineral/metallic compounds. However I never tried to use it on oxidized metal, and most coins with such dirt may have been oxidied in surface. I would expect to test it on non-numismatic oxidized metallic materials when possible, but not in my priority for now. Maybe have Phil tested on oxidized coins already?

And I agree to say that these nail polish removers are a real money jacking compared to acetone bottles.

Quote: "chomp-master"​As a chemist, I know that acetone is clearly one of the best cleaning products when the dirt is purely organic/bio-organic. I never saw a mineral or metallic material being altered by a solvent which quickly dries itself and which have a low affinity with mineral/metallic compounds. However I never tried to use it on oxidized metal, and most coins with such dirt may have been oxidied in surface. I would expect to test it on non-numismatic oxidized metallic materials when possible, but not in my priority for now. Maybe have Phil tested on oxidized coins already?
​
​And I agree to say that these nail polish removers are a real money jacking compared to acetone bottles.

​I think that the non human caused problems of verdigris, oxidization and even carbon spots are just a part of a coin's lifecycle. I never been very successful in dealing with any of them. Both of the former are changes to the surface of the metal and I'm afraid permanent ones. You face two choices, either remove the affected material and completely ruin the coin or stabilize the problem. I prefer the latter route. Acetone won't make any difference to a corroded coin, that's why it's such a great tool to use on superficial damage like tape residue and fingerprints. Anything oil based will stop the "rot" in it's tracks but old engine oil is not going to look pretty. WD40 is great, but I prefer Remington gun oil simply because I always have some at hand.

Carbon spots are a different matter. They look like they would be easy to remove with a quick rinse in acetone but they are practically indestructible. Even worse they only seem to appear on very high grade coins. If some enterprising young chemist could come up with a formula to remove these he would be very rich and have the gratitude of the entire numismatic world.

If these spots are really made of carbon, there is nothing to do, as any carbon-destroying reagent may be dangerous for the entire coin. If they're not, there is still a risk of destroying the patina.