Lunchtime Park Hunt .925 Or An Imposter?

[CoilToTheSoil]

Digging the sidelines in a local park today at lunch. Popping tabs, nickels, pennies, dimes, quarters, everything above foil. Get a nice 91-92 in 18khz on the deus and out pops this little guy. Pretty ring ring up right where it should for silver, check for a mark .925, Great!
I get back and the rings dry, seems to have a crust on it. I'm thinking, "Great a fake. It's not crust, it's flaking."
I look closer and it's not flaking. It's actually crust on it. So I'm still on the fence about its authenticity of .925. I do a little very light wet polish on 400 grit sandpaper figuring I'll be exposing the metal underneath. Only the metal underneath the crust seems to be silver.

Thoughts?

If it is real only thing I can figure is the fertilizers and junk they coat the field with must've interacted with the metal or alloy?














And after a light polish on the bottom of the outside




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[ScubaDetector]

SOME sterling rings are rhodium plated.

Read here:

Rhodium Plated Sterling Silver | eBay

So it is possible your ring was plated with a more expensive metal.

I would also see if it is even slightly attracted to a magnet.

 

[CoilToTheSoil]

Good point! The sizing joint is very slightly magnetic. The rest of the ring is not.

It's got "weight" to it too which one would expect from the real deal.

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[trapperart]

Congrats on a pretty ring

 

[dirtlooter]

still a ring find and a nice one. acid test?

 

[vpnavy]

If you are going to keep the ring - declare it real and put it in the box!

 

[CoilToTheSoil]

Ordered an acid test kit. Looking at it under a jewelers loupe it does appear that the high spots are the corrosion and the low spots are the clean bare metal. The opposite of what a plated ring looms like where the good metal is usually flaking or plated and the corrosion begins to show below. We'll see, never seen one like this before hah. And yea it made its way to the box

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[Trezurehunter]

Congrats on a nice looking ring.

 

[JerseyDigger19]

That's a nice ring with a beautiful stone. I've found Mercs in parks that come out black (usually from lots of road salt from nearby paths). That ring sure looks like silver Shiny Bingo to me. Congratulations!

 

[SusanMN]

I strongly doubt it fake, looks like a nice silver ring to me. If it has been exposed to enough moisture or other chemicals silver rings and coins can come out of the ground black with thick tarnish.

 

[CoilToTheSoil]

Yea this was on the sidelines of a football field so there's an untold amount of chemicals in the way of fertilizers and herbicides that this thing may have been exposed to. Got some felt wheels on the way with the acid kit and looking forward to getting this thing Purdy & back to its former beauty for the display box

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[CoilToTheSoil]

And thanks

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[CoilToTheSoil]

Well look here... that's disheartening. The plating polished up great!
Turns black with bleach, but dissolves in the acid test. Bit of conflicting data there....

Ring on the right was a known 925 ring used as a comparison.

*shrugs*



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[DeepseekerADS]

Test it again with the 18k acid. I had difficulty ID'ing silver with the silver solution a few times. With 18k solution, it'll shine a very pretty blue if it is silver.

 

[CoilToTheSoil]

Great tip, I'll try it out tonight. Thanks!!!

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[neodetectorist]

Test it again with the 18k acid. I had difficulty ID'ing silver with the silver solution a few times. With 18k solution, it'll shine a very pretty blue if it is silver.

I did this on an un-marked silver ring I just found and it turned a real pretty Teal color so I assumed I had some grade of silver.

Very nice ring you have there though.

 

[xr7ator]

I found the exact same ring a year or two ago. I was ready to chuck it in the junk jewelry pile but decided to check it with the loop and sure enough, 925. I thought maybe it was fake but saw a little crack in the plating and shiny underneath. There was a fingernail file there on the table so I filed the side of the ring and sure enough, plated sterling.
It hit midtone but a very high VDI and I was 90% sure it was a ring before I dug.

 

[BallsDeep]

Nice!!!

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[CoilToTheSoil]

I found the exact same ring a year or two ago. I was ready to chuck it in the junk jewelry pile but decided to check it with the loop and sure enough, 925. I thought maybe it was fake but saw a little crack in the plating and shiny underneath. There was a fingernail file there on the table so I filed the side of the ring and sure enough, plated sterling.
It hit midtone but a very high VDI and I was 90% sure it was a ring before I dug.

Plated Sterling meaning it's Sterling underneath or plated with Sterling? That's some good info!

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[CoilToTheSoil]

Here are the acid results with 18k and silver solution without cutting into the ring but with giving it a good solid rub on the stone. Nothing.

When you filed into it did you test the shavings or test the ring itself? This ones a tough cookie to prove. I've tried both methods thus far with no positive results although I haven't filed into the metal just tested where the plating was flaking.



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