How Does One Preserve A 100% Zinc Cent?

Murphy

How do I stop this cent from deteriorating? It is bad enough already. Is there any way to stop or reverse the corrosion process here? Thank you.

nwcs

An intercept holder would be my first guess.

cladking

Zinc is highly reactive and most zinc coins are very difficult to find
in good condition. Only a few have gotten any collector interest and
certainly the unplated Zinc Lincolns are among these. The damage
can't be reversed but it can be less noticeable. Many people soak
them in olive oil to remove the oxides.

ss350camaro

Seems like once it has started to corrode that any preservation wouldn't be able to remove surface pitting.

Murphy

I treated it in Olive Oil right after I found it in change and I keep it in a new Dansco 8100 with the anti-corrosive plastic slides. I was wondering if that's all I could do. I'm afraid to dip it. Dipping might soften the corrosion so that it could possibly be wiped away. But surely would leave an unnatural appearance - very bright places here and very dark ugly places there. And of course I would have to treat it in olive oil all over again after dipping, because dipping would cause the corrosion processes to become activated.

I thought about experimenting on a junk 1943 steel penny. Is the purity of zinc coating the steel cent comparable to the zinc of the 1995-D cent to justify such an experiment I wonder. And would the two cents react in the same way to the dipping? Hmmm.

coinguy89

Is that a doubled die obverse? I can't even tell if it is or not.

Murphy

I don't think it's doubling. It is more like a dip in the middle of the letters. God knows what causes it. I think it's because of corrosion and can vaguely remember seeing the same thing in another coin that was badly corroded.