This is mainly if you plan to PSA glossy japanese promos from the 90’s.
Since PSA reworded their N7 description this year I decided to find a way to dust off the card cleanly and safely without harming the card or gloss.
N7 Evidence of Cleaning - When a whitener is used to whiten borders or a solution is used to remove wax, candy, gum or tobacco stains. Additionally, when any foreign substance is applied to the surface of a card such as cleaning spray or wax. Note that this designation can qualify for encapsulation as “Authentic Altered” at the grader’s discretion and if “AA” is listed on the submission form as the desired minimum grade. You will be charged the applicable grading fee in either case.
Now I performed a test on 2 different copies of the same card. Japanese promo computer error. I wore clean gloves without any dust or anything on them(fresh pair). On the left side you will see one labeled as “Chemical Residue” to make it clear i used “gem mints card spray” to perform this test although all card sprays have chemicals in them as far as i know. Otherwise, it would just be water. I also used a very small microfiber cloth shown below.(Orange)
On the right side I only used this tool without any liquid or chemical or any other tricks. We’ll label it “Duster”. I is made out of a glass(originally a card display) handle, some cut up card side cardboard with rounded edges and a cut to fit in the glass display. I fit it around the circular edged cardboard card sized edge along with 2 “Kim Wipes”(Professional glass/lens wiping cloth*Credit to @brendantheclayboy for telling me about these wipes). Rubber band around the top to make it snug and changeable if needed, that’s it. I then used a gentle scraping motion at a 45 degree angle as to soften the edge of the cardboard and allow the clothes to boister it evenly removing dirt and dust.
I think I am not the only one a little confused about your process here. I’m really lost as to what’s going on in that setup in the first image…
It seems like you used a chemical cleaner to remove dust from the one on the Left. And used only a cleaning cloth, no chemicals or additives on the Right. The Right appears more normal, HOWEVER, without a before and after of each, I don’t know what the effect was.
Yes left is chemical card cleaning spray and microfiber cloth in circles.
Right is only 2 kim wipes+small microfiber cloth. I made a “Duster” as to alleviate pressure with putting them on a piece of cardboard and just making my own handle basically.
To me the right side, just “duster” use worked a lot better and can be used to PSA GRADE.
Look i did the experiment but forgot to post a before pic of the cards having a little dirt on them.
If you want to nitpick okay. All im saying is this method worked for me. I did not recomend it to anyone. I did not aay you have to so this. The information is cleqrly present. I did not include my end goals because this is not the card i will be working with.
I don’t think we’re trying to nitpick, but rather some of us were confused. BUT
I think I understand what your aim is: You’re trying to find a consistent way to remove dust and grime from a glossy card, which you want to send to PSA.
And you figured you’d share your results. Thank you.
Some of us are not so picky about condition and would rather submit cards we do nothing to, BUT if you want to try to safely and legitimately remove dirt from the card, this is good information.
I would venture a guess that a chemical will not evenly cover the card, and so may cause a slightly uneven sheen, consistent with what you found.
Side note: I see you used PSA as a verb ‘to PSA’ something, meaning to grade it. Interesting. Nothing bad. I’ve just never seen it used that way. Kinda cool, like how ‘to google it’ is an understood phrase today.
Thank you sorry if i had any attitude there, just my dog has been interrupting me a lot had to feed him. but yes to get it graded by psa is the goal since a lot of these cards are old and not freshly peeled from the inserts or lotto’s. they come with an original gloss but the card usually has been handled many times or is slightly damage or stained or dirty etc. so helps with hopefully getting a higher grade with PSA basically.
edit: also PSA added the phrasing of basically no chemicals this year. So i wanted to show the difference in gloss/sheen between the two
2nd edit:
on the left one we can see the gloss is like… how you say uh… blotchy. almost over saturated in liquid?
on the right you can see the glossy sheen to be smooth and almost like a radiating fade
Yeah! My first thought, was that it looked to me [left card] like it has been treated with plastX.
It’s funny (though unamusing) how many “cleaning sprays” are actually applying a finish. We don’t call car wax, “cleaning spray”, but card wax IS “cleaning spray”.
I think there is some cleaning sprays that have wax. Some have isopropql alchohol. Which dries out the card over time. Some use soap or windex which are more cleaning agents but still it leqve behind a layer of liquid on top of the gloss if thqt makes sense
And just 1 more complete test to be 100% sure. I received both cards in mail today from japan. You can tell the chemical damage not only by the glossy sheen difference but by the edges rising from the surface.
This time the one on the right was cleaned with chemical u can tell. I did not use chemicals onlynl dusted them both off using my duster tool.
