PCGS Express Restoration Results on a 1873-S Chop Mark Trade Dollar

Ntwillia10

Submitted under the Express Restoration service to see what they could do about the green slime globbed all over the devices (see under “God”, inside the “8”, and around the 4th star and denticles). Thought I would share my experience especially as it relates to turnaround time, since it’s more of “Restoration with Express Grading” than “Express Restoration”.

Delivered to PCGS: 6/1/2023
Entered as Received: 6/5/2023
Moved to Grading: 6/8/2023
Email to PCGS Customer Service: 7/24/2023
"Being Imaged" Appears: 7/25/2023
Moved to Encapsulation: 7/26/2023
Moved to Quality Check: 7/28/2023
Grades available: 7/28/2023
Images available: 7/29/2023

Before:

After:

Expected XF Details but was pleased they seem to have uncovered some original luster under the flat, dull look it had when I found it, earning AU Details. Still not sure what to make of the new orange splash on Liberty’s knee and the muddy water but will see how it looks in hand.

PeakRarities

Interesting how the conservation uncovered a lot of roughness in the fields, wondering if the surfaces had been worked on at some point prior. The gunk build up and pvc contamination was pretty advanced, though i'm wondering, was it worth it to spend a decent amount of money on conservation and grading for a coin like this to end up in a details holder?

Ntwillia10

Cost/value is always relative right? Knew it was a problem coin and would remain a problem coin, just wanted to remove the slime and had been curious about this service. I’m sure I could have tried an Acetone bath on my own. A lot of my chopped T$s are Details coins, especially tougher dates. I haven’t seen many 73-S in PCGS plastic so just getting it certified was a plus for me.

may

IMO, great results. 👍

PeakRarities

@Ntwillia10 said:
Cost/value is always relative right? Knew it was a problem coin and would remain a problem coin, just wanted to remove the slime and had been curious about this service. I’m sure I could have tried an Acetone bath on my own. A lot of my chopped T$s are Details coins, especially tougher dates. I haven’t seen many 73-S in PCGS plastic so just getting it certified was a plus for me.

Sounds good! The slime and pvc was really ugly, so you definitely didn't have much to lose as long as you had realistic expectations going into it. Thanks for sharing with us 🙂

lermish

Thank you for sharing, much better results than I've seen with a couple of points that I've sent.

73-S is a tougher one. Yeah it's got a couple of hairlines but overall is an attractive enough coin with nice details.

slider23

PCGS did a nice job on removing the green gunk.

lilolme

@Ntwillia10 said:
Expected XF Details but was pleased they seem to have uncovered some original luster under the flat, dull look it had when I found it, earning AU Details. Still not sure what to make of the new orange splash on Liberty’s knee and the muddy water but will see how it looks in hand.

.
I also agree that this looks like a good restoration for what the coin was / is. The coin had some surface damage before the restoration. The restoration revealed some more. But overall much better. That was a huge amount of haze (thick) that basically covered the coin. The muddy water was there as you can see it in the before restoration photo just below and in the crevasses. There are a few similar areas like reverse from 3 o/c to 9 o/c. The restoration left most of the surface stuff and didn't turn it stripped white. The blobs look like some were 'hard' or a glassy look. I could not get those off on one coin. So good job getting them off.

spyglassdesign

Overall much better to me too. I kinda like the 'muddy water' as you call it. It's not distracting imo. Someone mentioned the roughness of the surface... It looks more natural than before even if the surface is rougher, imo. It almost looks like it was covered in some kind of putty or something before.