Re-toning a cleaned copper-advice please

laurentyvan

I have a mid-19th century French one centime I bought off E-bay which I discovered was cleaned when it arrived. I was going to return it but at a price of $18.00, the fields and strike are so nice that I've decided to chance re-toning it. I would like to hear from any forum members who have tried this in the past, their receipes, their successes or failures. All advice is welcome.

I'm willing to post before and after pictures as well as the procedure-a nice picture post for others who are contemplating this.

MacCrimmon

1. You could always leave exposed to direct sunlight, but that's hard to come by these days (at least the associated heat, too).

2. Same as above but inside of a standard Kraft 2x2 envelope (can you say, sulfur?)

3. You could try Deller's Darkener (~$4.00 for a 3-4 oz. bottle). This has some type of sulfur in the liquid, and you can decide to remove it from the liquid when the copper has "recoloured" sufficiently. That said, I've never used the stuff, so I couldn't give you any pointers on how to use the liquid, how to guess the "right time" to pull the coin, or for that matter, what to neutralize it with....my guess would be acetone....

CIVITAS

I've heard leaving Indian Head Cents outside on a window sill for a few days/weeks will weather the bronze back to a more appealing look, but I've never tried it. Mid-19th century centime should be of a similar composition I would imagine.

MacCrimmon

Yes, I should have said 'window sill'.

Another natural method would be two place it between two pieces of leather and leave on the window sill.

spinaker2000

Aethelred and LM have a potion that works well.