Despite your opinion of the scan, it looks like a beautiful example!
Yep, gold wash is certainly an economical way to a little gold go a looong way :)
An obvious way to see if it's plating or wash is to scratch it ... a pretty destructive way to test! That's why some gold orders, such as Orders of Lenin and the Order of the Great Patriotic War 1st Class, have scratches on them; they scratch deep enough to get through any plating, then apply acid to look for a reaction. Obviously, If the item is made of a yellow alloy, you wouldn't see any difference inside the scratch from the outside. You'd just apply the acid without the scratch, and look for a reaction.
There are portable testers that are used to determine if an item is gold or gold-plated by testing the conductivity, but they're not casual purchase items!
Yep, gold wash is certainly an economical way to a little gold go a looong way :)
An obvious way to see if it's plating or wash is to scratch it ... a pretty destructive way to test! That's why some gold orders, such as Orders of Lenin and the Order of the Great Patriotic War 1st Class, have scratches on them; they scratch deep enough to get through any plating, then apply acid to look for a reaction. Obviously, If the item is made of a yellow alloy, you wouldn't see any difference inside the scratch from the outside. You'd just apply the acid without the scratch, and look for a reaction.
There are portable testers that are used to determine if an item is gold or gold-plated by testing the conductivity, but they're not casual purchase items!
