Experience in 'Uncleaned' coins

[Imperator]

Has anyone purchased a load of uncleaned Roman coins?  What was your experience like?  Were they easy to clean?  How did you clean them?  Were you lucky enough to find a valuable coin in amongst the group?

[Philipius Australis]

I have bought a few lots of uncleaned coins. My first experience was very ordinary - From an (eBay) lot of 15 I only got two which had any legible markings at all. The only redeeming feature was that one had a nice counterstamp of a capricorn on it. After that I did a bit of research and found a great coin website: http://www.forumancientcoins.com/. It has lots of usefull info, and if you trawl the forums you can sometime find someone who is asking for people to put in for a bulk lot (supposedly directly from the diggers). I did this at one point and got quite a few nice coins including a Nero. Be warned: caveat emptor - Let the buyer beware, there are always charlatans wanting to fleece you - do your homework. As for cleaning - email me at starwarsphan@hotmail.com and I will send you a cleaning guide that I did up when I sold a few coins on eBay a while back.

[Imperator]

Yes, http://www.forumancientcoins.com/ is a great site for those interested in ancient coins.
The rule of thumb I usually use is if it's too cheap to be true then it probably is.