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Taikonaut

Patina

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I bought a beautiful Roman sestertius in nice condition but it clearly has a fake or artificial patina. I decide to get rid of the fake patina and strange enough in its clean state it actually look more "honest".

I now decide to leave it out exposed in the air to get some natural patination. It may take some time but it wil be worth it.

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2 hours ago, Taikonaut said:

I bought a beautiful Roman sestertius in nice condition but it clearly has a fake or artificial patina. I decide to get rid of the fake patina and strange enough in its clean state it actually look more "honest".

I now decide to leave it out exposed in the air to get some natural patination. It may take some time but it wil be worth it.

Interesting. Before after photos much appreciated. What was the fake patina made of, do you think ? How did you get rid of it ?

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The edge of the coin was clean but both obverse and reverse look like they hav been treated with commercial patinating fluid that I'm already familiar with which gave it a light brown washed appearance. Its now a bit shiney after I cleaned way the fake patina. If I compare with how my polished brass house number took to patinate I would guess about 6 months to get a reasonable look. I find old brass that have been polished seem to get patinated quicker than new brass which is probably treated to resist it. We will see.

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Hmm..   I would have thought that if you left the coin in a city, it would change it's surface far faster than

if it was out in the country somewhere. Any switches in the equipment that I restore

that have silver contacts show this clearly.....

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I heard that if you live near the sea your silver get tarnish faster.

What I notice is coins left on the window sill patinate at a fast rate which makes me think frequent changes in temperature from one extreme to another may have caused this to happen.

 

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5 hours ago, Taikonaut said:

I heard that if you live near the sea your silver get tarnish faster.

What I notice is coins left on the window sill patinate at a fast rate which makes me think frequent changes in temperature from one extreme to another may have caused this to happen.

 

Actually I believe the sunlight has a more significant effect than the temperature. I read somewhere, and have tried successfully, wiping a cleaned copper coin in mineral oil and leaving it on a sunny window ledge. A fair level of colour and patination appeared within a few weeks.

Edited by Paddy
typo

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1 hour ago, Paddy said:

Actually I believe the sunlight has a more significant effect than the temperature. I read somewhere, and have tried successfully, wiping a cleaned copper coin in mineral oil and leaving it on a sunny window ledge. A fair level of colour and patination appeared within a few weeks.

Its call "seasoning". Oil and heat does that too.

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I have a terrible time trying to tone a shiny ancient silver tetradrachm. Tried ammonia dip, egg yoke, etc, all it does it it tones and then it comes off easily.  Eventually I found some success using Goddards Silver Dip. Yes its use for cleaning silver. After dabbinig it on a artificially toned silver I left it outside for a few days and let it toned further. The tone is now more robust.

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