# What should I do next?



## ssy (Nov 26, 2017)

Hello everybody. I am new to this forum. 
I'd be happy if someone could help me with the following:
I've attached pictures of my gold chloride solution (yellow color) & the subsequent powder after drying (a mix of white, blue...green...yellow fades). Got it after treating circuit boards with HCl & Sodium Hypochlorite. 
My problem is: what should I do now to remove the base metals?
Thanks in advance.


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## jimdoc (Nov 26, 2017)

ssy said:


> My problem is: what should I do now to remove the base metals?
> Thanks in advance.




Study this forum, a lot.


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## FrugalRefiner (Nov 26, 2017)

Many members refine their gold a second time to improve the quality.

Dave


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## kernels (Nov 26, 2017)

Did you just dry out the Gold Chloride solution without precipitating the Gold first ? I also don't see any pictures?


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## ssy (Nov 27, 2017)

Thanks a lot.
I just separated the yellow stuff out of the solution. It was precipitated with Zinc powder. Then I just dried it. Oh! The pics. I just faced problems uploading. Will try to fix it asap!
Many thanks again.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

Gentlemen, 

I have three big batches of gold powder that I have already mixed borax in and then did test smelts on all 3. Each seems to be contaminated with base metals. My thoughts are to dissolve the gold again in AR and remove the base metals and wash again repeating the washing several times. My concern is what to do with the borax. It has not been melted yet so it is still in its original form. What do you recommend as the method of removing it first or do I need to? I know, I should not have mixed the batches with borax before the testing phase. I won't do that ever again. These lessons are getting expensive. Please help as I am being humbled at every turn.


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## jason_recliner (Mar 15, 2018)

I do believe borax powder is soluble in water.


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## Palladium (Mar 15, 2018)

Water will remove the borax as he said.
Did you try washing the gold powder in hcl to remove the base metals before you tried melting it?


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

No, I have not boiled it in the HCL yet. I was going to do that after I removed all the borax. I really appreciate your help. I know for the experienced refiner these questions are redundant and likely annoying, but I really do appreciate the help. I have been studying the Hoke book and other sources to educate myself but sometimes the answers just aren't in the books. 

Thank You again.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

An update,

I have broken the borax prills, and gold powder into a fine powder again. I divided the powder into two batches as they were large batches to start with. I placed each in separate 5 gal buckets and filled with hot water. Since the borax was in prill form I stirred well and then pour off each bucket thru a screen and into another 5 gal bucket for each and added fresh hot water again. The borax has either dissolved as you said it would or was caught in the screen when entering the second bucket of hot water. After a few minutes I transferred again with more fresh hot water and discovered the borax is 98% dissolved. I have what appears to be a massive amount of black powder that is settling very quickly. I am not assuming it is all gold by any means and expect there will be a pretty fair amount of base metals that need to come off next. So, any more suggestions. I heard boil it in HCL, are there any other ideas or is that the best option for me at this point? Thanks again Gentlemen. If we all lived close I would take us all out for drinks when I succeed with this endeavor and all thanks to you. Thank You for the help.


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## kernels (Mar 15, 2018)

My normal was procedure with fairly clean Gold powder is a boiling water wash (boil the powder for a couple of minutes in a flask) then a very hot HCl wash for a few minutes (no need to vigorously boil the HCl) then two more water washes like the first. I have consistently produced 99.8%+ with this, but probably started with reasonably pure powder. I don't bother washing powder from a very dirty drop, I just go for a re-refine straight away, it is difficult washing dirty powder because it just doesn't settle like clean Gold.

If you are concerned about purity, you can always do another refine, at that point you will have almost no baser metals left. 

How did you precipitate the Gold ? Was the solution absolutely crystal clear before precipitation ? How much of what kind of material did you start with ? This will give us a good idea of how much Gold you should expect.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

It actually came from 3 batches of 3 lbs, for each batch of reverse electroplate using the standard cell with sulfuric. Precipitation was in the water as it was diluted and allowed to settle. Then ammonia was used to clear the base metals and I don't think it did a very good job. The quality of the items stripped is high and expected yield is suppose to be in the 3 to 4 grms per lb range x 3 lbs per batch x 3 batches and all are combined now in the 2 5 gal buckets waiting for the next step. There looks to be a large amount of black powder and when I did one batch of smelting, (small batch) I saw a large amount of gold in the flux but it also had the base metals and so I stopped everything. The display of gold was exciting until it wouldn't gather. Not wanting to lose it all I stopped and asked for help.


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## kernels (Mar 15, 2018)

Mountain Man said:


> It actually came from 3 batches of 3 lbs, for each batch of reverse electroplate using the standard cell with sulfuric. Precipitation was in the water as it was diluted and allowed to settle. Then ammonia was used to clear the base metals and I don't think it did a very good job. The quality of the items stripped is high and expected yield is suppose to be in the 3 to 4 grms per lb range x 3 lbs per batch x 3 batches and all are combined now in the 2 5 gal buckets waiting for the next step. There looks to be a large amount of black powder and when I did one batch of smelting, (small batch) I saw a large amount of gold in the flux but it also had the base metals and so I stopped everything. The display of gold was exciting until it wouldn't gather. Not wanting to lose it all I stopped and asked for help.



Ahh, I see, I read the top post and assumed you had worked with a Gold Chloride solution, I understand better now. 

Are you set up for a normal re-refine ? If not, are you able to hook up with someone local who can do the re-refine for you ? That would be the easy way to clear up your powder.

There is probably also not much reason to smelt the black powder from the cell, have you tried simply melting it ?


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## mls26cwru (Mar 15, 2018)

Mountain Man said:


> The quality of the items stripped is high and expected yield is suppose to be in the 3 to 4 grms per lb range x 3 lbs per batch x 3 batches and all are combined now in the 2 5 gal buckets



I think your expectations are a bit out of line with the general reality of yields from boards... do you have picture or know where these boards came from? Even gold fingers don't average this high... knowing what you started with might help us help you.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

I did try to melt it. That was the little batch to make sure everything would go okay for the big batches. That is the one that I saw a large display of gold in the beginning part of the melt. Then it would not gather and so I stopped and asked for help. I thought I had base metals remaining when it would not gather and so began my journey to try and correct what I did wrong. I used the ammonia per the instructions and washed it several times afterwords to make sure all base metal and ammonia traces were gone. I just looked at the buckets and it is settling again with what appears to be a large amount of black powder. I feel there may or likely is still base metals in with it but, I kept my temperature down in the optimum range during the stripping process so I would expect the base metals to be in the low range but they seem to be very prevalent in the fluid. I was thinking that I should now treat with another dose of ammonia and try to clean more base metals out and then re wash several times again before trying to melt. What are your thoughts in light of what I just told you?


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## kernels (Mar 15, 2018)

Cool, so, I would try to melt half a teaspoon of the black material in a crucible, but not pre-mix it with any flux (borax ?), then when the black material has melted into a ball, add a teaspoon or so of borax to it. (Obviously coat the crucible with borax before adding the powder)

Whenever I have recovered Gold with a Sulfuric cell, I have always done a normal refine after just to ensure there are no base metals. I don't think any amount of washing will improve your situation much at this point, without knowing what is in there, it is very difficult to know how to wash it out.

The ammonia would have been to wash out AgCl, HCl will wash out CuCl, water will wash out water soluble salts. The problem is if you have metal in there and not metal salts, washing will not help much, you end up having to remove the contamination with acids, so you may as well re-refine. 

If you are able to melt some of the black powder using the method above, you may be able to have the blob XRF'ed and at least know what the contamination is and whether it is worth removing.

edit - sorry, I just read above that you already have the borax mixed in, that makes things quite a bit harder than it has to be, but it also looks like you have dissolved the borax away with water, so if you now have just black powder, you can try as per above.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

Oh, and yes I am set up to refine.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

Okay, that is pretty much what I was thinking I would likely have to do next if the base metals are still in there. Having you say it makes me feel much better, and that maybe my line of thinking is starting to follow more experienced refiners like yourself. I will continue to let it settle out and wash until I can get it down to powder that I can dry. It likely will take until tomorrow, but I will let you know as soon as I get to that point. Unless you feel like I should go ahead and just refine with the HCL and move forward that way.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

Update, 

I just checked the buckets again, and it is still cloudy but, I shined a very powerful spot light into the bucket. The fluid is now a medium chocolate brown. I can not see the bottom of the buckets yet, because of the choc. color cloud in the bucket. I think I should continue to wait and see if it settles, but, if you think I should pour it off then I will. I don't know if that is the base metals and or borax or if it is gold. If it is borax and impurities shouldn't I pour it off and wash again or should I wait it out. What do you think about it all now? 

Thank you very much for your help and input.


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## kernels (Mar 15, 2018)

Can you post up a picture of what you are seeing ? is your powder in water because you were washing the borax out ? The powder from a Sulfuric cell is very fine and will definitely take a while to settle


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

Yes, you are exactly right. I am washing the borax out. I have never seen a color like this. It is a med chocolate brown color cloud. I will try and get a good pic of it to send you.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 15, 2018)

I tried to get some pictures for you to see, but the camera is broke. It appears to all be slowly settling and the best way to describe the color is like hot chocolate or coffee with creamer. It is settling also though. Using the big spot light I can see further down into the bucket now. I want to wait until morning and see what has transpired by then. That won't hurt anything will it? I was thinking the worst case scenario is I have to stir and settle the gold again. If it doesn't clear by settling and still is the hot coffee look by morning my guess is, and I am likely wrong since that seems to be my current trend, is that the borax is still suspended. Does that sound right to you?


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## Mountain Man (Mar 16, 2018)

Could you walk me through your method of refining. I want to be sure I am not missing anything. After looking at my buckets again today, I think I need to follow your council and go to a refinement. 

I am still going to try and get some pics for you. 

Thanks again. I really appreciate this. I am learning a lot.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 16, 2018)

Okay, I just checked the buckets and it is settling. The color is still a choc. brown but more transparent do to the settling. I decided to siphon the excess fluid off so I could see the bottom of the buckets. I did siphon the fluid which does contain the still suspended brown cloud into 2 other buckets so I can watch the progress of them. The two buckets that contain the settled mud are quite interesting. They both are covered with a fairly large quantity of very fine brown mud. Both seem to have the same amount in them and they look identical. I expect the two containing the siphoned fluid will settle out with more of the same brown mud as the first two. If it is gold, there is what would seem to be a lot in each one of the first two. Both are very fine mud. 

Your thoughts?


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## Mountain Man (Mar 16, 2018)

Upedate, 

I just checked the 2 pour off buckets. Recall I said they were not all settled yet so I kept the water and they are settling also. They have almost completely settled out and have the same brown mud accumulated on the bottom of the bucket. Both are doing it so now I am not sure what to make of it. I did manage to get a picture of the brown mud in the bottom of one of the original buckets.


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## kernels (Mar 17, 2018)

In terms of refinement, I mean to take your brown mud (as dry as you can get it), and dissolve it in Aqua Regia, then precipitate the Gold using Sodium Metabisulfite or Copperas. 

You cover you brown mud with concentrated HCl, heat that up to 75 degrees Celcius, start adding HNO3 in small increments (how small the increments need to be depends on how much stuff you have to dissolve) but probably about 0.5ml to start with is good. You should see a vigorous reaction after a few seconds, let the HNO3 exhaust itself, and repeat until everything that will dissolve is dissolved. 

The idea is to use no more HNO3 than you need to, any excess HNO3 causes problems later on. 

If you added too much HNO3, you will want to use Sulfamic acid to 'remove it' (by converting it to H2SO4)

Then you want to use the SMB to precipitate the Gold (1g per expected gram of gold roughly)

You want some Stannous Chloride to test solutions as you go.

If you start a thread and ask questions as you go, with accompanying pictures, we are happy to advise as you go.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 17, 2018)

Thank you very much for the instructions. It all makes perfect sense. I have only one question at this point. HNO3 is very hard to find in my area. I have looked for it without any success. The AR system I have used and had pretty good luck with uses sodium nitrate, in pryll form to disolve unwanted materials. I have had good luck with it so far. It calls for mixing 1/2 lb of it in 16 oz's of hot water. Stir until dissolved and added to the Ar solution for stripping gold off fingers and boards. It has worked pretty good for me so far. Your Thoughts? I do have some pics but have to upload them. 

Thanks.


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## goldsilverpro (Mar 20, 2018)

Mountain Man said:


> Thank you very much for the instructions. It all makes perfect sense. I have only one question at this point. HNO3 is very hard to find in my area. I have looked for it without any success. The AR system I have used and had pretty good luck with uses sodium nitrate, in pryll form to disolve unwanted materials. I have had good luck with it so far. It calls for mixing 1/2 lb of it in 16 oz's of hot water. Stir until dissolved and added to the Ar solution for stripping gold off fingers and boards. It has worked pretty good for me so far. Your Thoughts? I do have some pics but have to upload them.
> 
> Thanks.


If you let us know where you're located, someone could probably help you find nitric. I don't think you looked hard enough.


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## Mountain Man (Mar 21, 2018)

I would like to get some opinions on the best way to dry the gold powder before refining or melting? I can get it dry but it sticks to what ever kind of dish I use and is really tough to get it unstuck. 

Thanks


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## Smack (Mar 22, 2018)

There is a point in the drying process that as the gold powder is starting to dry, it will try to stick to the beaker or whatever you're using. So you have to keep an eye on it and try to keep it moving freely in the beaker as it passes this stage.


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## butcher (Mar 22, 2018)

As the clean pure gold dries it will begin to clump, this is where it can stick to glass, the moisture will cling to the glass with surface tension.

As the gold begins to clump pick up the warm beaker, swing it from the rim in one hand, and bump the palm of your other hand ( at the bottom edge of the beaker) compacting the gold clump shoving out water, forming a ball, roll the ball to pick up more of the gold, bump the gold to remove moisture packing the ball, or balls, using the balls to clean the gold from the glass. You may have to keep the gold moving until the gold is fairly dry, returning the beaker to the warm hot plate as needed ( an electric coffee mug warmer and a 150 ml beaker works well).

The gold balls can hold moisture, so drying is important, the balls can be melted after being well dried, for those who may have trouble with melting the fine gold powder, the balls are not as easy to blow out of your melting dish with a wrongly handled torch.

The cleaner the gold and better the washing procedure, the easier this works


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## anachronism (Mar 23, 2018)

A fine brush helps too.


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## goldsilverpro (Mar 24, 2018)

The purer the gold, the better the gold powder is rinsed, the cleaner the beaker, and the newer the beaker (no scratches), the less the gold will stick. I rarely dropped gold in a beaker because I had too much. I usually used a super clean white 5 gallon bucket. The gold, clean or not, always stuck to the bucket. I rinsed the bucket and then, while it was wet, I used a piece of new green Scotch-Brite, cut about 3/4" square, on the tip of my middle and index fingers, to scrub the gold off the plastic. Took about 30 sec. Then I rinsed it down with a squirt bottle into a beaker and then into a filter. The bucket almost always came out sparkling clean with no evidence of gold on the plastic, even in the scratches. Occasionally, I had to repeat it. Simple, quick, and efficient. My motto.

I never liked rinsing gold powder in a beaker, by rinsing/decanting, unless the gold is super pure, heavy, and it completely settles, with a crystal clear solution in, say, 30 seconds. Rinsing in a beaker is many times less efficient than in a filter and, especially for slow settling powder, it takes forever to really clean it up. Do the math. If the gold is quite pure and light colored, not much will stick to the paper. Harold liked rinsing in the beaker, but Harold's gold was super-pure, I would guess. It doesn't work as well when the gold is slightly off purity.


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