Artificially Aged BYOAC token

[tetsujin]

Hey,

So I was lucky enough to get a great deal on 500 of the brass BYOAC tokens...  The tokens are still incredibly shiny.  In fact, a little too shiny for my tastes.  They seem almost artificial, like metal-plated plastic or something.  So I decided to play around with a few of them to see how they might look after they've been used for a few years:




The one in the middle was just handled a lot over the period of a few days.  It's hard to tell the difference in the photos, but it's accumulated a little grime and lost some of that super-polished shine.  The one on the far right I dipped in acid (a modeler's chemical called "Blacken-It", to be exact), and then cleaned it up and wore down some of the blackened areas so the brass color could show through again.

There's no way I'm going to be hand-weathering 500 tokens...  But I really wanted to see how the tokens would look after some wear and tear - I'm used to T (Boston Subway) tokens and my old Dream Machine tokens having a very lived-in, tarnished brass finish, and I feel like I accomplished that with this token.

I think it really brings out the design - because so much surface area of the token is raised (compared to Dream Machine tokens, for instance, where everything is just raised outlines) the design really "pops" out as most everything else is left dark.  I think the atom side benefits most from that, as it has more detail than the happy player side.

Anyway, I thought I'd share.

[Chris]

And to think I've been trying to figure out how to keep them shiny!    I have a handful stored in air-tite capsules to keep them shiny forever...

I can already see the difference in shine between the BYOAC tokens and the MAME tokens, minted just a few months apart...

--Chris

[telengard]

Hey,

So I was lucky enough to get a great deal on 500 of the brass BYOAC tokens...  The tokens are still incredibly shiny.  In fact, a little too shiny for my tastes.  They seem almost artificial, like metal-plated plastic or something.  So I decided to play around with a few of them to see how they might look after they've been used for a few years:




The one in the middle was just handled a lot over the period of a few days.  It's hard to tell the difference in the photos, but it's accumulated a little grime and lost some of that super-polished shine.  The one on the far right I dipped in acid (a modeler's chemical called "Blacken-It", to be exact), and then cleaned it up and wore down some of the blackened areas so the brass color could show through again.

There's no way I'm going to be hand-weathering 500 tokens...  But I really wanted to see how the tokens would look after some wear and tear - I'm used to T (Boston Subway) tokens and my old Dream Machine tokens having a very lived-in, tarnished brass finish, and I feel like I accomplished that with this token.

I think it really brings out the design - because so much surface area of the token is raised (compared to Dream Machine tokens, for instance, where everything is just raised outlines) the design really "pops" out as most everything else is left dark.  I think the atom side benefits most from that, as it has more detail than the happy player side.

Anyway, I thought I'd share.

Oh man, did you say Dream Machine tokens?  I have been looking for one of those for ages.  I grew up inside of the Dream Machine in Methuen Mass.  They never seem to pop up on eBay.   
Are they still around anywhere?

[tetsujin]

I just have the one Dream Machine token, which I got by bringing in my report card ages ago. 

I do want to keep some of the BYOAC tokens minty fresh...  Makes for good display, and for souvenirs for guests.  But I'd like a lot of them to be "broken in", too...  that'll take a long time, though. 

[M3talhead]

I actually like the dipped tokens. As for keeping a set "shiny" you guys might want to look at investing in a coin book. One used for quarters would be just about perfect, and think, if you're a real arcade enthusiast, you could start a collection of not only the different MAME coins, but of Alladin's castle, Timeout, and the rest (if you can find em).

[Chris]

I actually like the dipped tokens. As for keeping a set "shiny" you guys might want to look at investing in a coin book. One used for quarters would be just about perfect, and think, if you're a real arcade enthusiast, you could start a collection of not only the different MAME coins, but of Alladin's castle, Timeout, and the rest (if you can find em).

The brass ones won't stay shiny that way; they'll tarnish from exposure to air.  I have some in Air-Tite Model T 25mm capsules. (http://store.yahoo.com/airtiteholders/modelt20mm25mm1.html)

--Chris

[Santoro]

Wow, nine months later I find this thread.

[siropa]

I haven't tried any of the methods, but if you go to google and enter tarishing brass as a search, there are a pile of hits. sounds like ammonia based cleaners will tarnish easily. easy off oven cleaner is a suggested product for doing it.  using some easy off the shelf item like that would make this much faster than dipping in acid. assuming its somewhat fast.

time to raid the cleaning cabinet...

[SirPeale]

Oh man, did you say Dream Machine tokens?  I have been looking for one of those for ages.  I grew up inside of the Dream Machine in Methuen Mass.  They never seem to pop up on eBay.   
Are they still around anywhere?

I think I found some in one of our machines the other day.  I'll have to check.

[siropa]

I tried using ammonia fuming on a coin. I put about a teaspoon of ammonia in a small plastic container. put a piece of eggcrate in there and put the coin on top of that so it wouldn't be soaked. the first picture is what it looked like right out of the container after 24 hours of fuming. the 2nd pic is what the coin looked like after about 5 seconds of polishing with 0000 steel wool. It looks pretty good, but is just a bit darker than I wanted. I'm going to try to fume it for less time and see how that works out.  I never thought it would darken so fast.

[iwillfearnoevil]

has anyone tried baking these things yet? i think you should be able to get some pretty cool effects.

[Stingray]

has anyone tried baking these things yet? i think you should be able to get some pretty cool effects.

I baked mine at 375 for 45 minutes. They were delicious.

-S

[telengard]

Oh man, did you say Dream Machine tokens?  I have been looking for one of those for ages.  I grew up inside of the Dream Machine in Methuen Mass.  They never seem to pop up on eBay.   
Are they still around anywhere?

I think I found some in one of our machines the other day.  I'll have to check.

Wow, that would be extremely cool.  Glad this thread was brought back from the dead.   

~telengard

[J-Rod]

as far as preserving them from air, it might be a cool idea to try a resin cast of some sort.

[missioncontrol]

has anyone tried baking these things yet? i think you should be able to get some pretty cool effects.

I'm not allowed in the kitchen. and If I do go in the kitchen I am really not allowed to touch anything. period. Those were my wife's words to me today after I tried to make a snack.  I got really ugly in there

[Roughy]

Awesome thread--anyone thought about lightly doing the acid bit, and then throwing a bunch of coins in a few different bags and taking them to a laundry mat or using an industrial washer on them?

Not only that, but this is pretty cool stuff, so I did some research and found a place that'll do a run of 5000 coins for roughly $400 + around $200 per side for a die cut.

That's not too shabby and brings the cost down to about $.12  per coin.  Factor in shipping and re-shipping and you're looking at somewhere around 20-30 cents a coin, maybe slightly more.

If there's any interest in doing a mass-run from a "community" perspective I'm pretty willing to take a nearly-non profit approach to doing something like this.

You know, community design, etc. pre-commitments, upfront costs, order and re-ship them out. 

Would be pretty cool, and I'm willing to take on the nightmare, put together the web order forms and hosting and all of that stuff.

Sorry if I just thread-jacked here.

[Roughy]

Oops--sorry, I may have spoke completely out of line.

Really hope I didn't step on anyone's toes. 

[Santoro]

Hey, that's a good idea.

[SirPeale]

Wow, that would be extremely cool.  Glad this thread was brought back from the dead.   

Glad I remembered days after the fact!

I found it.  It was just one token, but sure enough it's for Dream Machine.  I don't usually look at the tokens when I clean the bottom of a machine, but this one had a different pattern on it, and it stuck out.