# Evaporating HCL/Bleach solution



## kevin316 (Jun 2, 2017)

I have a dirty HCL/Bleach solution that contains gold. I just want to make sure I can evaporate it down to a sludge without losing any gold. I use a coffee pot warmer to heat it so not close to boiling.

My plan it to reduce it, add fresh hcl, filter and then use it to dissolve any other gold as needed. 

Sorry if this seems like a simple question but I am the type of guy that measures twice and cuts once, sometimes I still cut it to short but at least I tried. 

Thanks in advance.
Kevin


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## nickvc (Jun 2, 2017)

Normally you heat a HCl bleach solution to rid it of any free chlorine so you can precipitate the gold, I can see no advantage to what you are now attempting, if your solution is free of chlorine then filter it now, you can then either drop your gold or store it and add further material to dissolve later by adding more bleach to start.


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## kevin316 (Jun 2, 2017)

I have ended up with more solution than I would like so I am wanting to get it to a smaller volume. I know there is not a lot of gold in it so I would like to add more before trying to do a drop. Is there any risk of gold being lost by evaporating off 3/4 of the fluid?

On another note, will HCL/Bleach dissolve filters? I have seen others do it with AR so I tried it with AP. It broke down the paper but did not dissolve it.


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## rickbb (Jun 2, 2017)

Did you dilute the solution with water first? If not then you are at that point of concentration where you won't be able to evaporate any more water off. Or not much anyway.

Drop your gold, filter out any solids and bottle it for future use.

Edit to add:

I use coffee filters and have never had HCL dissolve any.


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## goldenfrog (Jun 19, 2017)

kevin316 said:


> On another note, will HCL/Bleach dissolve filters? I have seen others do it with AR so I tried it with AP. It broke down the paper but did not dissolve it.



Hot HCL will break down the papers to a pulp, but I agree, it wont completely dissolve filter papers.


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## ARMCO (Jul 9, 2017)

kevin316 said:


> I have ended up with more solution than I would like so I am wanting to get it to a smaller volume. I know there is not a lot of gold in it so I would like to add more before trying to do a drop. Is there any risk of gold being lost by evaporating off 3/4 of the fluid?
> 
> On another note, will HCL/Bleach dissolve filters? I have seen others do it with AR so I tried it with AP. It broke down the paper but did not dissolve it.



Boiling will cause gold losses, careful evaporation will not.

If there is enough gold to drop, you can drop it (dirty or not) and after you filter it and catch the gold powder in the filter, just go ahead and re-refine it. It will be a lot cleaner at that point. If not evaporate as you have stated and save it. 

I have even seen it evaporated to a dry powder (AgCl powder) that can be reconstituted later.


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