Greetings all,
First let me say I've found quite a bit of useful info here.
I am in the pawn business I process a fair amount of old and scrap mixed karat jewelry. After studying hokes book, or at least the sections concerning what I am doing. I feel pretty confident I am on the right path. Made a few mistakes the first couple times but was able to recover, learned from it and now I am within a half % of calculated weight in the end. With that said I have a buddy in the same business that has decided to try his hand at it.
This is how it happened as relayed it to me.
He started with 1250 grams of mixed karat jewelry. AR solution as best he can remember 400 ml of Nitric acid 1200 ml hydrochloric acid said he had good reaction everything dissolved. This is where it went off the rails for him. I am not sure why but he diluted it several gallons of water 8 plus gallons at this point said he used urea to try and kill off nitric acid doesnt know how much he used exactly. ( I dont use urea I get the silver chloride out reduce d it down with heat then precip the gold) He then used about 5 pounds of SMB in two five gallon buckets he got some gold out but based on my math is about 7 oz troy short. He called me asked me what to do and I have no idea at this point so told him to stop until he can get some proper help. Any thoughts would be appreciated.
First let me say I've found quite a bit of useful info here.
I am in the pawn business I process a fair amount of old and scrap mixed karat jewelry. After studying hokes book, or at least the sections concerning what I am doing. I feel pretty confident I am on the right path. Made a few mistakes the first couple times but was able to recover, learned from it and now I am within a half % of calculated weight in the end. With that said I have a buddy in the same business that has decided to try his hand at it.
This is how it happened as relayed it to me.
He started with 1250 grams of mixed karat jewelry. AR solution as best he can remember 400 ml of Nitric acid 1200 ml hydrochloric acid said he had good reaction everything dissolved. This is where it went off the rails for him. I am not sure why but he diluted it several gallons of water 8 plus gallons at this point said he used urea to try and kill off nitric acid doesnt know how much he used exactly. ( I dont use urea I get the silver chloride out reduce d it down with heat then precip the gold) He then used about 5 pounds of SMB in two five gallon buckets he got some gold out but based on my math is about 7 oz troy short. He called me asked me what to do and I have no idea at this point so told him to stop until he can get some proper help. Any thoughts would be appreciated.