# Melting platinum for the first time...



## AJB (Mar 20, 2013)

Hi all... I managed to come across a few platinum crucibles and was thinking about melting them down into a button. I have no experience working with PM's but I got the Pt super cheap at a thrift store so I figured its worth a shot. I stumbled upon this forum randomly and it gave me a lot of good tips thus far, but I was just wondering if I was missing anything. Ok, so I guess I'll start from the top... The crucibles total about 47g in weight, I used the acid test and all passed for platinum. I also calculated (crudely) the specific gravity of each and found that each were consistent with Pt. I purchased an 8 oz wesgo fused silica melting dish, shade 10 welding goggles, and plan on purchasing a oxy/map torch setup (from home depot) this weekend. From breezing through the web I found that this setup should work.... If anyone else can give me some advice it would be greatly appreciated!!

AJ


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## jimdoc (Mar 20, 2013)

AJB said:


> Hi all... I managed to come across a few platinum crucibles and was thinking about melting them down into a button. I have no experience working with PM's but I got the Pt super cheap at a thrift store so I figured its worth a shot. I stumbled upon this forum randomly and it gave me a lot of good tips thus far, but I was just wondering if I was missing anything. Ok, so I guess I'll start from the top... The crucibles total about 47g in weight, I used the acid test and all passed for platinum. I also calculated (crudely) the specific gravity of each and found that each were consistent with Pt. I purchased an 8 oz wesgo fused silica melting dish, shade 10 welding goggles, and plan on purchasing a oxy/map torch setup (from home depot) this weekend. From breezing through the web I found that this setup should work.... If anyone else can give me some advice it would be greatly appreciated!!
> 
> AJ



If you plan on selling, you may be better off selling as crucibles.

Jim


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## AJB (Mar 20, 2013)

Not sure about selling.... From reading some reviews online about refineries ripping people off it makes me nervous. With such little weight I feel I would be more likely ripped off...


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## jimdoc (Mar 20, 2013)

Can you post pictures? You should hold off melting them until you see if you get any offers from the members here. They are identifiable as crucibles, if you melt them they just become a blob of unknown metals.

Jim


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## AJB (Mar 20, 2013)

I am open to offers...


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## jimdoc (Mar 20, 2013)

The lid looks like it has the Engelhard "E" logo.
You are better off not melting in my opinion.

Jim


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## Lou (Mar 20, 2013)

Look a wee bit dirty. Let me know if you want to sell them. They're about 98-99% pure, usually stabilized with Rh or zirconia.


Run 'em all the time.


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## jimdoc (Mar 20, 2013)

There you go, Lou is top notch. You can't go wrong dealing with him.

Jim


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## lazersteve (Mar 20, 2013)

Did I miss the pictures or something?


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## jimdoc (Mar 20, 2013)

lazersteve said:


> Did I miss the pictures or something?



Looks like he deleted the picture and some posts. Don't know why?

Jim


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## Lou (Mar 20, 2013)

Dunno.

At least he found out it's at least 98% pure and doesn't get ripped by whoever he sells it to! I've seen a lotta crucibles.


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## AJB (Mar 21, 2013)

Thanks for the advice guys! But with another year and a half of Quantitative Easing and a bubble in the Dow forming bigger than the last one, I think im just going to hold onto it for a few years. Don't really need the $$ at the moment so ill save the Pt for a rainy day.


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## jimdoc (Mar 21, 2013)

AJB said:


> Thanks for the advice guys! But with another year and a half of Quantitative Easing and a bubble in the Dow forming bigger than the last one, I think im just going to hold onto it for a few years. Don't really need the $$ at the moment so ill save the Pt for a rainy day.




No problem. Just to let you know, editing posts for any other reason than to fix an error is against forum rules. Once you post a picture like you did it should stay so the rest of the thread makes sense.

Jim


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