The same goes for the Medal of Nakhimov. I had one recently authenticated by McDaniel, he said that the gold wash had been worn off. I never was aware it had one!
I can honestly say, I've seen many but never with the complete gold wash like that.
In my humble collection I have only one "October Revolution" which looks bright and radiant and has good visible traces of the original gold plating (86.619); my others are rather dark fellows. In the Putnikov-booklet from 1990 we can find the full-gold-picture Tal shows us in his posting and Putnikov writes, that the order contains: silver, gold (hammer&sickle) and gold plating....
My question is: Might it be a shortcoming in production why the goldwash is so extremly poor and non-resistent against wearing the order? This order was established in 1967 when the SU-economy was in a sharp decline and the quality of products was already extremly poor - our Generalissimus had died 14 years before and under his government every order was of superior quality (poor goldwash - 5 years Siberia!).
Possibly, it could be a little of both economics and (dare I say it) poor design? It seems as if this period in time several alloys had undergone drastic changes..the Border Guard medals and the Irreproachable Service medals all went from silver-->silver plate-->german silver. Also, perhaps the gold wash was simply to thin to keep its luster. I'm not very knowledgeable with metals, but I'm wondering if there is a certain minimum thickness the gold wash has to be in order to "survive".
I think the 1960s was a terrible time for most awards. The silver-brass-bronze age of awards of the 1920s-1950s was curtailed greatly in the 1960s with the utilization of the "new" metal of aluminium in the 1960s through the fall of the USSR. Only higher ranking badges (deputy badges, etc.) seem to have continued to be made from silver into the Brezhnev era.
Not possible, under the patina there is usually very little gold left. I've learned this the hard way, after one of my customers had his purchase cleaned. The only way to restore it is to take it to a goldsmith to have it replated.
To bad..I guess a specimen with the original gold completely intact is something that may raise the rarity of the piece. I know I'll be keeping an eye open :)
