Dont Spend Hours Tumbling Coins

Make certain that you separate ther pennies from the other clad or you will have copper colored clad.
 
I tried this today. The coins are clean, but they are pink. Is there any way to get rid of the pink color?

Make certain that you separate ther pennies from the other clad or you will have copper colored clad.

Yes... separate the copper!

As long as the crud is off, they'll work in machines. I've never had one rejected because it was pink.

R5
 
For some reason the coin counter at my credit union will reject any coin that is discolored in any manner. I can usually get most of my clad to be accepted but I have to run the rejects thru the machine multiple times. So I clean all my clad as good as possible.
 
Can't resist: I kill 2 birds with one stone [NOT really PETA!] by mowing my lawn with a home-made tumbler attached to my lawn mower wheel. Can do 200-300 coins in a mow! I placed a flex copper pipe in the plastic jar to help churn the coins. No sand needed because lots of the coins already have sand on them (beach hunter). Just make sure the lid and jar are secure - otherwise you might be using your detector for a long time in your own back yard!

Presently going thru 10,000 coins, from 2014-2019, with 50% cents (+/-2%).

Happy Hunting
 

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I see all kinds of posts on here all the time of people tumbling coins for hours on end, using all kinds of media etc.....I spend a total of 20 minutes period !! Banks arent giving prizes for the prettiest coins.

Separate silver clad from pennies first. Fill canister 3/4 with coins, add water just over coins, two table spoons regular morton salt, and lastly add a few splashes of CLR.....Tumble 20 mins and your done...No stones, no media of anykind...just coins and ingredients...works just fine, clean as can be in 20 minutes...Give it a try.

Dude you are the man. I'm using a slight variation of your method but I got rusty cad shiny again! Can't hardly believe the results, didn't think it was possible.
Thanks for posting that!

Edit to add: I have a two drum Thumbler's tumbler and I cannot keep the lid on a drum with rotten zinc pennies and CLR mix. It always pops off. Not so with the clad. I think there is a reaction going on that generates gas enough to pop off the lid. Is this crazy or has anyone experienced this?
I guess I should actually throw away the rotten zincs....
 
Last edited:
arw40,

I have the Harbor Freight Dual Drum Tumbler shown in the attached picture.

So I'll be cleaning zinc and all-copper pennies in one Drum and clad Nickels, Dimes and Quarters in the other Drum, to prevent clads from getting pink.

How many U.S. fluid ounces = "a few splashes of CLR", would you say ?

Thanks !
ToddB64
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A little extra below for the mathematically inclined, is the volume of one Drum shown in the attached picture, expressed in three different U.S. units, step 1: ounces, step 4: gallons and step 6: cubic inches, for your use.

#1..One Drum filled with water = 3.5 cups = 28 U.S. fluid ounces
#2..1 gallon = 128 U.S. fluid ounces
#3..1/128 = 0.0078125 ratio (or 1 is 0.0078125th of 128)
#4..28 oz. x 0.0078125 = 0.21875252 gallons
#5..1 gallon or 128 U.S. fluid ounces = 231 cubic inches
#6..0.21875252 gallons x 231 = Drum volume of 50.53183212 cubic inches
 

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Follow up----I figured out how to keep the Thumblers tumbler lid from popping off from gas buildup tumbling zinc pennies. I was using too strong of a CLR solution. Now that I have diluted it down the lids stays on for the duration. I still run much stronger solution with the clad and no issues.
 
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