How to clean EK

[Indy]

Hi guys

Lately I found some of my EKs were not shining any more. Some of them got black spots...how to clean the black spots on the frames of EK? thanks

best regards

Indy

[Michael Kuligowski]

Well.. I guess there is couple views at this problem - I dont clean my crosses at all - and my most favourite cross is one that wasn't cleaned science many.. many.. many years (maybe science war) - there is nothing more beautyfull to me than oryginall old patina.. it gives a unique charm to crosses

[GELIS44]

Ezest coin cleaner

I know a couple of guys here that use Ezest coin cleaner. You can purchase this at www.brent-krueger.com for $2.96 a bottle. I ordered some but it hasn't arrived yet. I'm going to give it a try.

Nate

[hagwalther]

I tend not to clean but if the item is covered in crud I tend to brush off with an old tooth brush and warm water followed by a drying via a hair dryer.

Regards ...

[VonLuger]

Good Luck Indy
This is the Most Misunderstood Question that comes up on occasion here...
The purist say don't clean leave it be-patina is natural
others say its OK to touch up......if dirty
I never get a straight answer, because the question is "THE BADGE IS NOT DIRTY" - ITS MINT, I RECIEVED IT MINT, NOW IN MY POSSESION IT IS NO LONGER MINT IN APPEARENCE, ITS BEEN MINT LOOKING FOR SIXTY YEARS-HOW CAN I MAINTAIN IT IN THE CONDITON I RECIEVED IT IN...LIKE THEY DO AT A MUSEUM?????????????????????????????..............

I don't do anything to my badges because I never heard this simple question answered in this context with a safe effecive method...better safe then sorry ... would love to hear how to maintain a mint badge through safe and sane cleaning after one notices discoloring that didnt use to be there?

[Indy]

Thanks guys

I just tried one thing to kill the black spots.......guess what..soemthing first grade students have.....eraser(white soft one). This is so efficient. Now...my lovely EK1 becomes "shining" again .

[chris clark]

if its the dullness on the silver or black on the silver another tried method is silver dip. i have seen the results of this and found them quite amasing. its a decision you need to make either to leave or clean no one else can make that decision for you.

[Indy]

that's an interesting question, isn't it? I tried to clean another EK1 (mm L/13) , and I used cotton swabs. I just used 3 sticks of cotton swabs....it became" shining"

EK1 MM26 was easy to be cleaned by using eraser, but I used earser first and then cotton swabs.

[Tiger 1]

Indy!

Please stop with the eraser! An eraser is nothing more than a sanding grit suspended in a rubber matrix. You are ABRADING the surface of the metal. That is removing the surface thru friction. Once you do this you no longer have an original finish. Sorry, but your mint finish is forever impaired. Shiney now, but impaired forever. That's a harsh accessment but very true.

If you need to do more than just a careful cleaning with a soft cloth or a cotton swab dampened with some rubbing alcohol you can use a commercial silver dip or at the most simichrome polish. Again please remember that both the dip and the polish will remove some of the surface also, but not as drastically as an eraser will. The dip does it chemically and the polish with much finer grit than in the eraser. Either way, you will not in the true sense have an original finish. Mint or otherwise.

An original 'mint' finish is had only once. Kind of like virginity. Once you do anything to the finish, it's altered forever. You cannot put back what is gone. You may be able to 'restore' a finish but it will not be original. Seasoned collectors will easily see that a piece has been dinked with.

I'm sorry to be so forward but too many good collectables get more 'attention' than needed by good intentioned but poorly understood and excecuted 'preservation' methods.

Remember that what we collect are at least 60 years old. They will show some age.

Tony

[Dietrich Maerz]

Indy,

if you clean a cross or whatever, you erase all the traces history has left. You would be ugly astonished if you could see your cross under a microscope! With whatever medium you clean, and especially an eraser, you will destroy those traces. If you could see what your erased did to the finish and how it might look under magnificattion you would be horrified.

I don't know why people need to make their posessions shiny? This is like giving a 60 year old lady several face and whatever lifts to make her look 18 again! It always shows and looks worse than before!

Dietrich

[Allan P.]

That's a good comparison Dietrich

Personally, I would say do not clean.

Allan

[robert60446]

Indy,

if you clean a cross or whatever, you erase all the traces history has left. You would be ugly astonished if you could see your cross under a microscope! With whatever medium you clean, and especially an eraser, you will destroy those traces. If you could see what your erased did to the finish and how it might look under magnificattion you would be horrified.

I don't know why people need to make their posessions shiny? This is like giving a 60 year old lady several face and whatever lifts to make her look 18 again! It always shows and looks worse than before!

Dietrich

Dietrich,

Do you honestly believe that the patina on your EK’s is 60 years old? Just please remember that the original owners are always trying to keep their decorations in the top shape! So unless you bought your EK’s in 1945 there is almost no chance that the patina on them is 60 years old…

Regards

Robert

[Dietrich Maerz]

Hi Robert,

with some of them it might very well be, by the looks of it. But of course I cannot discount that a previous owner, including the actual awardee, did clean his/her medal.
It's not just the rim or the beading, it's also the dirt under the beading, the miniscule growing of rust crystalls and other highly interesting things that tell the stoy of age. It is amazing!
If one cleans, all this is gone and 20, 40 or 60 years of history are gone forever. It's just not right. And just for the purpose of having something "shiny".

But that's just me...

Dietrich

[robert60446]

Hi Robert,
If one cleans, all this is gone and 20, 40 or 60 years of history are gone forever. It's just not right. And just for the purpose of having something "shiny".

But that's just me...

Dietrich

Point well taken! I have to agree with you on that one!

Regards

Robert

[Tiger 1]

Dietrich,

Do you honestly believe that the patina on your EK’s is 60 years old? Just please remember that the original owners are always trying to keep their decorations in the top shape! So unless you bought your EK’s in 1945 there is almost no chance that the patina on them is 60 years old…

Regards

Robert

Robert,

I beg to differ with you. I have many EKs in my collection with various degrees of age and patina. Some even look quite new but still show age. As the Rolloing Stones song so astutely observes....."Time waits for no one....".

While I can't prove that some of them haven't been cleaned at some point. I do know that many have not been and exhibit a wonderfull original finish with some natural age and wear that seasoned collectors appreciate. I have medal bars where the medals certainly have not been cleaned.

Some things age more gracefully than others. This includes medals. A very good friend of mine has a never issued, cased, "mint" KC that still has the cellophane wrapping around the cross. Even this "mint" KC shows some age. Very subtle but it does show age. It would be a great loss for this piece to be shined up "like new" because that's the way it was issued.

These unmessed with pieces are the ones that we, as collectors, learn from.

My point being that with the proliferation of various fakes and copies we, as collectors, should treasure and keep our decorations preserved for the future. Polishing, dinking, improving or otherwise messing with them just reduces the population of good pieces that we all can learn from. How can a new collector know what a EK or KC originally looked like if they get shined up and the finish impaired?

I'm solidly with Dietrich, paraphrasing what he stated that all one does is wash or polish away genuine history needlessly.

As collectors we should study, conserve and preserve instead of redo, restore and up grade. Some pieces benefit from a restoration. BUT the individual must have the sound judgement to know what and when to do this. Otherwise it is best left alone. These pieces have survived many years and will survive many more if not destroyed by well intentions but short experience and even shorter foresite. I am not above these sins myself. In my youthful collecting days I too cleaned up some sad looking decorations. I truly regret having done so as my collecting accumen increased.

There are many lesser pieces that can be had and polished to your heart's content but certainly not "mint" examples which are getting scarcer now a days.

These medals have earned their graceful age thru time. Why destroy it?

Tony

P.S. Sorry about the runaway stream of though here. I am a bit passionate about conserving what we have as collectors. No malice intended.