# Gold melting questions



## Slaughlin79 (Mar 21, 2018)

I’ve done a few silver melts and pours so I’m familiar with the process but in no way an expert. I’ve tried to melt gold powder I refined 2 times and both times I failed.

The first time there was a lot of smoke and some of the material kinda disappeared but the gold that did melt just kinda flows around but won’t collect or come together. There will be a bunch of small bb’s when it cools but upon heating to a melt again they flow around in what reminds me of a lava flow. I’ve tried more and less heat to no avail and I can’t find where anyone else has had this problem. 

The second time I made sure material was perfectly clean and all material melted down with a tiny bit of smoke and formed a decent sized B.B. and a bunch of small ones that will not stick to each other. It’s driving me crazy. Also both times the melting dish has a gold shine coating it.

What would would happen if say a small amount of Dawn dish detergent wasn’t completely washed out and was melted together? I’m not sure what it would be once dehydrated and maybe no one would unless you know the ingredients of it? Maybe that has something to do with my problem but if any was in the gold it would be minute traces. Im stumped at what is the cause of the gold like repelling itself from the other gold in the dish. 

If this has been discussed before I can’t find it and ive searched and read thru 30 or more different melting related posts. Thanks


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## Slaughlin79 (Mar 21, 2018)

I think I found my answer or at least I found a guy having the same problem on here. If i can’t answer I’ll be back


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## kernels (Mar 21, 2018)

If your Gold is pure and your crucible clean, you don't really have these problems. Heat up the glazed crucible, add the powder, apply heat until it is all molten. If there are 'outliers' just carefully tilt the crucible to 'grab' them with the main blob. Add a couple of pinches of borax while applying heat. Take away heat and wait a few seconds for the Gold to solidify. Grab button with tweezers and drop in bucket of cold water. 

Make sure you have some insulation around your crucible to contain the heat, 1 MAPP gas torch works fine, 2 torches together work better.


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## artart47 (Mar 21, 2018)

Hi Slaughlin!
I remember when I first started learning to refine I had some melting problems. When I seasoned my melting dish I didn't get the whole surface coated with borax. There were some areas up the sides of the dish that had no shiny coating and beads of gold were sticking there.
The button I just melted this evening had four of five small beads like that away from the center and what I do is very carefully lift up the dish with a plyers and tip it back and forth to roll the large button around to collect the small ones.
Make sure you have a large pan under your dish so if you drop it or it cracks, your gold isn't rolling across the floor.
Also, make sure you're getting enough heat to your gold powder. I have a small piece of high-temp insulation with a small divit in the center that I can set the melting dish into.
Another thing you said. "it smoked" There will be no smoke coming out of pure gold powder. Smoke can be salts left in the gold from insufficient washing of your powder. some contaminant in the gold or the melting dish. I have never had it smoke.
Hope I was of help my Friend! 
Art.


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## Slaughlin79 (Mar 23, 2018)

Thanks to both of you for your replies. I thought I might have found my answer but upon reading much more I still can’t find an answer.

I’ve trued melting in 3 different dishes and all the same thing. It will form bb’s and they will move around easily but won’t collect for the life of me. So I took another members advice that I read and added a small piece of silver as a collector and low and behold nothing. I preheated my dish,added the silver and heated it up and then out my gold in. All seemed good until I turn my flame off and let it solidify and it was silver but around the edges where the silver sits there’s is gold that flows outward. The dish like the other is like a purple red color and upon heated this up it forms little gold bb’s. 

When the silver is in a ball and moving around I can move it directly over one of the bb’s or towards one and it will either slide right over it or just push it out of the way.

I have boiled the powder in HCl for all together probably 4 hours and rinsed with hot water upwards of 15 times and I still get this. It is gold I know it is. I’ve got a few tiny bb’s from the first time I melted by just using tweezers to pluck them out. When it’s melted it’s like lava just flowing and I’m afraid that I’m burning it off somehow because from what I’ve put in and what’s come out just doesn’t look right. I understand from when I would melt silver powder that when it starts to melt it gets smaller as it basically draws in on itself to form the molting ball but this is not doing that. My dishes are fluxed well but I only have store bought 20 mule and maybe that’s my problem? I don’t know. As for as heat Ive used MAPP,Propane and oxy acetylene so more heat makes no difference. Here’s a couple pics of the current dish. One of them I tried a small piece of copper too and that’s the top pic.


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## snoman701 (Mar 23, 2018)

Are you precipitating your lead and filtering before precipitating gold?




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## snoman701 (Mar 23, 2018)

Please describe your refining process and source material as well.

Before any metal goes in the dish I glaze with borax, even though borax is unnecessary for pure gold. In that, the dish is so hot that I can cause waves in the borax by moving the flame around. If your borax isn't moving around, and your bead isn't mobile, it's not hot enough.

The micro beads will glow, and your just chase them around with the flame until they join together. If they aren't bouncing around, you aren't hot enough.




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