Soaking E Series

[fkw]

The card was not issued with dirt on it...

I have on many occasions used a damp tissue to remove dirt from the surface of a card... the same thing they do to old paintings, they remove the grime to bring out the original color. Its not altering the card or painting, its cleaning it and leaves no residue.

But I wouldnt soak the whole card to remove a stain... its a bit risky, and some stains will actually spread more.
I would only soak a card completely if it were glued into a scrapbook..... to remove the back paper and as much of the glue as possible.
To me the risk of a little water damage is much nicer than a huge paper pull from "dry pulling" a card from a scrapbook. If a grader cant tell there was water used, its all good by me. Even if they detect a water stain, they only downgrade, they dont reject.
Heck many Cuban cards have been rained on and have mildew stains from the humidity too. Water is natural, but can damage too.

Altering = trimming a piece off, recoloring a bad spot or print defect, rebuilding corners, filling in pinholes, or gluing rips or a paper pulls back down, rebacking (ie N172s), or chemical bleaching out stains (ie E145's), etc.

[barrysloate]

You can make the argument that the person who originally glued the cards into an album altered them by adding glue to the backs, and by removing them wouldn't you be reversing that alteration and returning them to their natural state?

[Frank A]

I find this kind of funny. Million dollar paintings are washed, restored in many different ways and just plain made to look better, and thats OK. But a penny baseball card is soaked and my god what have you done? Soak em all you want. Your making them look better and more original, like the painting.

[vintagetoppsguy]

is removing a wax stain altering as well???

[rarerookies]

you guys are alterning the cards specifically to increase the value of the cards. Do you disclose to the buyer that the card they are buying went from a 6 to a 7.5 because you soaked them in water?

[barrysloate]

We're just having a theoretical discussion. I don't see anybody on this thread offering any cards for sale. And for the record, soaked cards are still genuine baseball cards; aged reprints are not. Don't you see a distinction there?

[rarerookies]

But they are being "saoked" to get a higher grade and increase the value.

Do you let people know when they buy a card from you that it has been soaked?

Would you buy a soaked card?

Originally Posted by barrysloate

We're just having a theoretical discussion. I don't see anybody on this thread offering any cards for sale. And for the record, soaked cards are still genuine baseball cards; aged reprints are not. Don't you see a distinction there?