# AP turns clear



## Turbulum (Dec 13, 2011)

Hi all !!

It's my second post (the first was in topic Welcome In!! :mrgreen: ). I have been reading diferent posts since I registered on the forum and also the 3 e-books (not ended yet...) that many people strongly recommended to all newbies. I also have seen the Lazersteve videos (Amazing the volume of information in them. It was a bit difficult to me to understand everything  , but I understand the main ideas). I decided to use the methods of HCl/Peroxide to dissolve base metals and HCl/Clorox to refine gold because it's a bit difficult find nitric or sulphuric acid and they are expensive than normal HCl.
Yesterday, I put 70 g. of pins from different motherboards in a soak of 100 ml of HCl (20%) and 50 ml Peroxide (3%, added at little increments) to start practicing all I read. At first my solution acquired a light green yellowish color and many bubbles appeared on the surface of the pins, but after a couple hours bubbles dissapear and the color becames paler. A few minutes later all the sollution turns absolutely transparent. I added a few drops of peroxide and it becomes light green/emerald but a couple hours later the solution turns clear once again.

what's happen? I do something wrong? Too much acid in solution? Need to bubble air thru the solution? CuCl in solution instead CuCl2?

Sorry, I know they are many questions. 

Tanks to all!!
Mike


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## Barren Realms 007 (Dec 13, 2011)

Adjust your volume of solution to 300 ml of HCL and use less perentage of peroxide since your HCL is only 20% insted of 32%.


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## tek4g63 (Dec 13, 2011)

Were any of the pins magntic? If iron is in the mix it will cement the copper out as soon as the peroxide is used up. If there are magnetic pins in the mix they will need to be removed. Then yes you will need to bubble air through the AP to keep the reaction going. I'm not a pro, I just do this as a hobby, so I could be wrong. But a similar thing happend to me once and it was because iron got in the mix.


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## Turbulum (Dec 13, 2011)

Thanks for repply !

Yes, the material is magnetic and as tek4g63 said, I can see copper cemented on iron surfaces. I have a bit of nitric acid so I think I will treat these magnetic pins with nitric acid being careful with red fumes. After christmas I will try to find some sulphuric acid to build a sulphuric cell...any idea is welcome!!

Thanks all, again.

Mike


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## Geo (Dec 13, 2011)

the AP process will work on magnetic pins and will digest steel in small quantities as long as oxygen is supplied. the trick is to use an excess of hcl acid and an air supply, the process will progress a little more slowly with the magnetic pins but with patience the end result will be the same. the small amount of iron in the solution will probably contaminate your gold IF you dont wash your foils exceedingly well. when you digest the foils you will know if iron is present by the red or black color of your solution. if it does report, dont panic as this contamination will be left behind in the following washes and rinses.


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## tek4g63 (Dec 14, 2011)

I'm glad I could help!

Geo,
Thank you for your reply. I am new at gold recovery and I have not yet tried to refine my foils. I plan on using the HCL/CL method and dropping the gold with SMB. While I am still recovering the gold from my pins I would like to reuse my AP. I know that I can add an iron bar to my saturated AP and cement the copper out, but then I'm left with ferric chloride right? If I use this ferric chloride to continue removing base metals I will risk getting iron in my foils corect? So when I go to refine my foils and iron is present do I still use SMB to drop the gold then just wash the powder very well? Or is there a better method?

Alos I have about 2lb of gold plated steel pins and I'm unsure how to process them. Any suggestions? Thank you!


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## Geo (Dec 14, 2011)

tek4g63 said:


> I'm glad I could help!
> 
> Geo,
> Thank you for your reply. I am new at gold recovery and I have not yet tried to refine my foils. I plan on using the HCL/CL method and dropping the gold with SMB. While I am still recovering the gold from my pins I would like to reuse my AP. I know that I can add an iron bar to my saturated AP and cement the copper out, but then I'm left with ferric chloride right? If I use this ferric chloride to continue removing base metals I will risk getting iron in my foils corect? So when I go to refine my foils and iron is present do I still use SMB to drop the gold then just wash the powder very well? Or is there a better method?
> ...



reuse the AP as is with an air supply.the only time you would cement the copper out of your solution is when it gets so saturated with iron and nickle that it stops working to strip copper so its best to keep iron out of your AP if possible. if you want to dissolve iron based pins alone then ferric chloride would be quicker. many people use the sulfuric stripping cell to reverse electro-plate gold plated pins, i mention this as an option but as for myself, i tend to use the AP process even after stripping to insure i get all the gold. a stripping cell is faster by a few days but dont let anyone tell you that its a fast process. the stripping time is limited by heat produced and then theres time for the powder to settle, include several rinses with time to settle powder.where AP can take up to a week or more a stripping cell can strip 2 lbs of pins and be ready to refine in 3 days.


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## tek4g63 (Dec 14, 2011)

Thank you Geo. 
I do use a fish tank bubbler in my AP to keep the process going. I have a make-shift diffuser on the end of the air hose that I made out of PTFE (teflon). But mostly it just keeps the hose from floating. I run very small batches, maybe 500 pins at a time, in a mason jar. I know its not an ideal setup but it works for me. I only cement copper out when my AP starts leaving wole pins in the bottom of the jar. At that time the AP is thick and dark black. I only want to reuse my AP for cost and to have less waste to process. Thank you again for your advice. I will try my steel pins in ferric chloride as you suggested and see what happens.


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## Turbulum (Dec 15, 2011)

Hi all !!



> I'm glad I could help!


 :mrgreen: I'm happy too !!

I've been out a couple of days due to some tests I had to do. Thanks for your reply Geo. I have one more question, you said that ferric chloride can be used to dissolve iron pins, right? So, when you drop the copper using a piece of iron and the solution is saturated in ferric chloride this solution is able to dissolve iron based pins? Thanks again, and I want to apologize if there are any mistakes in the text.

Mike.


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## qst42know (Dec 15, 2011)

Ferric chloride is little more than hydrochloric acid partially used up on iron. If there is some work left in it by all means use it up.


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## Geo (Dec 15, 2011)

yes, you can continue to use it but the only benefit the air bubbler gives is to keep the solution agitated. once the solution turns completely black it is no longer suitable for reclaiming gold as it will be saturated with iron and the copper etching will stop.


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## Iamdrainbows (Jun 14, 2021)

Geo said:


> tek4g63 said:
> 
> 
> > I'm glad I could help!
> ...




If my ap isn’t turning colors is it bad


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## Geo (Jun 15, 2021)

It depends on the color starting out. If it started green and stays green, that's good.


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## Martijn (Jun 15, 2021)

View attachment Peroxide-Acid-Method-1.pdf

Explains it all.


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