Olive Oil Removal / Hot Peroxide Bath

[Th3Offspring]

Hi, the dilemma i am currently facing is that i was wondering if there is a way to remove olive oil from a coin's surface so that a dip in hot peroxide will clean a coin. Last summer i found an 1833 large cent, but i was new to metal detecting and my knowledge of coin cleaning was olive oil, soap, and water. I had no idea or no intentions of using anything else because i was afraid to destroy a coin. Now that i have had some time to experiment with cleaning methods i can make a green IH penny (not caked on green, but copper that has tarnished green) turn back to a healthy circulated brown look where it looks like it was never in the ground (i may post pics of some I've done). Well, my Large Cent has a layer of olive oil on it so that makes the hot peroxide useless and i would like to further clean my LC so i was trying to figure out how to remove the olive oil. If anyone has any advice or has done this before, i would greatly like your expertise. Of course, i will not be trying any method directly on this coin, but will test on some wheaties or IHs first. The pictures don't really do the coin justice. For reference, there is no corrosion whatsoever on the coin, it's not porous, no caked on green gunk, and every detail is very well defined. The date is perfect, just has more caked on dirt. When i originally cleaned it i let it soak in olive oil for a week or so and got most of the dirt off with a toothpick, but there were some stubborn areas that i was afraid a toothpick would scratch (novice).

 

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[fistfulladirt]

That LC looks good as is, thats just my opinion. I'm not one that think's it taboo to clean any coin, period, athough I am curious as to why you would want to strip the patina off a "greenie" IH, but cautious regarding the Large cent.

 

[boogeyman]

A dip in MEK should remove the olive oil. I've used MEK in an ultrasonic cleaner to remove oily gunk before replating / repairing with silver. Might try it on a few other coins before using it to get your soak time down pat.