How Do You Make Pennies Shiny Again

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Today, not much is available to buy with a penny; and then many people tend to toss them into a jar, saving them until they are worth dollars. Or worse, they pile upwardly in your cup holder and offset getting pasty. However, if you want to Coin Stack a Penny Bridge or Play Penny Ante, information technology may exist nice to have clean, shiny pennies at your disposal. Notation: For pennies minted after 1982, refer to method 5. For pennies of whatever possible value, do non make clean them!

1. 1

   Put plenty ketchup in the cup to comprehend upwards the coin or coins. For the record, with this method, y'all may be able to scent the ketchup on the penny when yous are finished. Tabasco, on the other hand, may exit an orangish tint. Nonetheless, they volition be clean!

2. 

   2

   Put the coin in and await 3 minutes. If you have a toothbrush handy (preferably your roommate'south), after the three minutes are up, scrub the penny, working into the fiddling ridges.

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3. 

   iii

   Wash the coin off in hot water. And if you used your roommate's toothbrush, wash that off, too!

   • If the pennies are clean, merely non shiny, mix a paste of blistering soda and water and rub into the pennies. Wash it off and tada!

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1. i

   Put i tsp (5 g) of table salt into 1/four c (two oz) of vinegar. For many pennies, 1 tablespoon (15 g) of salt in i/ii loving cup (4 oz) of vinegar will get the job done. Stir the mixture to dissolve the salt.

   • If you don't have vinegar, use lemon or even orange juice. Copper oxide (the gunk on your pennies) dissolves in weak acid, and that's just what all 3 of these liquids are.^[ane]

2. 

   ii

   Place your pennies in the vinegar or the lemon juice. Make sure they are not directly on top of each other.

3. 3

   Leave the pennies for around five minutes in the drinking glass of vinegar or lemon juice. If they're extra dirty or if y'all're cleaning a lot simultaneously, give them a few more minutes for good mensurate.^[2]

   • For those peculiarly nasty pennies, scrub them with a scrubber or toothbrush afterwards they've been resting in the solution for a bit.

4. 

   iv

   Have the pennies out, and wash them off. Let them dry out for around five minutes so they will no longer be moisture. They will now sparkle.

   • If you don't launder them off, a blue-green sheen volition develop on your pennies. That'south what happens when the copper, oxygen, and chlorine (from the salt) combine (called malachite).^[1]

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1. 1

   Go a can or bottle of Coca Cola. It doesn't take to be Coke per se; a generic brand will piece of work, too.

2. 

   2

   Gear up the pennies in a dish so they are not sitting on top of each other. The acid in the Coca-Cola needs to piece of work into each penny direct.^[3]

3. 

   three

   Put just enough Coca-Cola in the dish to cover the pennies. More is not necessary, so grab a straw for the rest!

4. 

   4

   Let sit for well-nigh four-five hours. For best results, flip over halfway through the process. While this method works well, the downside is that information technology takes much, much longer than the others.

5. 5

   Accept the pennies out and launder them off with warm or hot water.

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1. 1

   Obtain some Bar Keeper'due south Friend. This cleaning solution works on all copper chop-chop, like pennies and copper bottom cookware. If you don't have this brand, another metal cleaner (similar Brasso) should work as well.

2. 

   2

   Wet the coins and put on some Bar Keeper'south Friend. The oxalic acrid takes away the gunk. Let it sit down for a few minutes.

3. 

   iii

   Rub lightly and rinse off. Your pennies should now be and so shiny you could signal planes, phone call Batman, or invoke temporary incomprehension. Doesn't get much easier than that!

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1. 1

   Take hold of a dirty penny and an eraser. While this method should work on whatever penny, information technology's safe on the more than recent ones, while the previous methods are not. The acidity of methods 1-4 will plough your zinc pennies black.

   • After 1982, copper became also expensive to justify using on a coin just not worth annihilation. Therefore, zinc (a much cheaper metal) started being used.

2. 

   2

   Rub the penny with the eraser as if y'all were trying to erase a mark on paper. ^[4] If you lot are handy (or if you have a thousand pennies to clean), y'all could attach a pencil (with an eraser) to a drill and accept it practice the work for you lot. There is also, incredibly, such a affair equally electrical erasers. Who knew?!

3. 3

   Flip the penny and repeat above steps as needed. This will take near x seconds per penny. The merely downside to this is at the cease, your hand may exist tired, and you will be out a pencil or two! Other than that, it is a quick and like shooting fish in a barrel path to shiny riches.

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Add New Question

• Question

  Will soap make clean pennies?

  

  Yes it will remove most clay and oils. A expert first stride in cleaning.

• Question

  How tin can I make clean pennies with baking soda?

  

  Combine it with apple cider and scrub information technology clean. An old toothbrush works slap-up.

• Question

  How fast does the lemon juice react?

  

  Information technology takes about v minutes for lemon juice to react to the penny.

• Question

  Exercise you take any other methods of cleaning pennies?

  

  Soak pennies in vinegar for about 10-30 minutes, depending on how dingy it is.

• Question

  What are pennies made from?

  

  In the USA, in 1982 and before pennies were made of copper. Since 1982, the pennies have been made of zinc.

• Question

  What happens to pennies if I wash them in a washing machine?

  

  They normally stay the aforementioned. Still, if you put zinc pennies in a wash for too long, they might commencement to lose their impress.

• Question

  What can I utilize to make clean pennies that will not cheapen them?

  

  Acetone or xylene. They will remove organic thing only and volition not damage the coin.

• Question

  I have over 5 gallons of pennies. What would be a good way to clean big amounts at once?

  

  Get a large bin and add warm soapy water, and so let the pennies soak before drying them.

• Question

  Will whatsoever of these methods damage the penny?

  

  No, none of these methods should exist damaging to the penny.

• Question

  Volition Brasso clean oxidation off pennies?

  

  Aye, but vinegar and salt is cheaper.

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VideoRead Video Transcript

• Endeavour cleaning your quarters, dimes, and nickels using these techniques.

• You tin even utilise tamarind juice instead of vinegar or lemon juice.

• Utilise 1, 2, five, 10, twenty, 50ps and pound coins and two-pound coins.

• Wash them with Dawn if y'all have no vinegar.

• Paw sanitizer works on most Pre-1982 pennies.

Cheers for submitting a tip for review!

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• If y'all do this with any collectible coins, yous will lower their value and tin can even ruin them.

• Do not mix coins. Clean pennies only without whatsoever other money or the other coins will become discolored.

• Vinegar dissolves zinc. If your pennies are scratched and newer than 1982, they may cease hollowed out.^[5]

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Things Yous'll Need

• Pennies (note the year)
• Dish
• Slightly acidic liquid or eraser
• Water (for rinsing)

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Article Summary Ten

To brand pennies shiny once more, fill up a small glass bowl with ¼ loving cup (60 mL) of white vinegar If you lot don't have any vinegar, you tin can use lemon juice instead. So, stir in 1 teaspoon (6 g) of salt. Pour your pennies into the basin and stir them gently with a spoon. Let the pennies soak for 10 minutes. Next, hold a strainer over your sink and pour the pennies into information technology to bleed the vinegar and salt. Requite the pennies a good rinse, dry out them in a towel, and they should be shining similar new. Keep in listen, if you have a rare or antique penny, cleaning it may destroy its value, so look the penny upwardly online if yous suspect information technology's worth something! If you want to learn how to use a commercial metal cleaner, keep reading the article!

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Source: https://www.wikihow.com/Clean-Pennies

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