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Black stuff on silver coins-Toning or scuz?

BillyKingsleyBillyKingsley Posts: 2,661 ✭✭✭✭
in U.S. Coin Forum
Several of my very few silver coins have black stuff on them, and I am wondering if it is toning or scuz, AKA, dirt or other foreign substance. I've got Mercury dimes, Roosevelt Dimes and Washington Quarters with it. My one and only Barber dime has something that looks the same but is brown instead of black. Is this toning to the extreme or?

Here's a shot of my 1956 Quarter. I have only 4 pre-65 Quarters and two of them have this on there.
image

All of the coins with the black stuff except for one have been in my family for at least two generations-likely pulled from circulation by my mom and dad in the 1950s. The other dime I found in the CoinStar return last month. The brown Barber I purchased at an unknown date, sometime between 1995 and 2005.

This only seems to affect genuine silver coins. Sorry for the poor photo. I took 6 shots and this was the best one image

Thanks!
Billy Kingsley ANA R-3146356 Cardboard History // Numismatic History

Comments

  • notwilightnotwilight Posts: 12,864 ✭✭✭
    Toning is just attractive scuz....
  • Steve27Steve27 Posts: 13,275 ✭✭✭
    looks like toning from your pic. Does it resemble this:





    image
    "It's far easier to fight for principles, than to live up to them." Adlai Stevenson
  • BillyKingsleyBillyKingsley Posts: 2,661 ✭✭✭✭
    It doesn't really look like that. It's all solid black, there's no variation and no other colors. That shot you posted looks like it had gotten completly dark and then worn back to metal on the high points. The ones I have have the black over everything and it's a dull flat texture.
    Billy Kingsley ANA R-3146356 Cardboard History // Numismatic History
  • UnknownUnknown
    This content has been removed.
  • PerryHallPerryHall Posts: 46,891 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Soak it in acetone. If it's scuz, it should disolve or at least soften enough to remove it with a toothpick. Let us know what you do and the results.

    Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
    "Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
    "Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire

  • rickoricko Posts: 98,724 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Anything on a coin is basically scuz.... Does your scuz have texture? i.e. can you 'move' it with a toothpick? If so, it is collected grime.... not toning... Cheers, RickO
  • nicetoning42107nicetoning42107 Posts: 1,162
    From your picture I would guess it is some sort of scuz. The stuff doesn't sit right to be toning. Like you said, it isn't just worn metal on the high points. Even if it is uncirculated with no wear the black doesn't sit right to be called toning.
    A lie told often enough becomes the truth. ~Vladimir Lenin
  • pursuitoflibertypursuitofliberty Posts: 7,335 ✭✭✭✭✭
    All black, dull, flat texture ... very well could have been heated up to hot for too long ... I've seen coins recovered from fire damage
    that are that way and also a few coins where the owner told me they tried to heat them to experiment with toning but left them
    on/in?? too long and they turned black




    “We are only their care-takers,” he posed, “if we take good care of them, then centuries from now they may still be here … ”

    Todd - BHNC #242

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