# My first BB



## resabed01 (Sep 30, 2012)

I waited a long time for the day I could post my first button. I'll guess I will settle for a BB instead. 
The source was a few hundred glasses, mugs, plates that had gold trim printed on. I stripped them using Hcl-Clorox.
Last year I stripped numerous pieces and when I was done I dropped a measly 0.33g of powder.... not too encouraging.
This year I decided to re-dissolve the powder and continue stripping more glassware.
In the end I dropped 0.75g of powder and today I decided to melt. 

I'm guessing my mud wasn't pure gold because the dried powder has two distinct colors. One was a noticeably darker brown. Then my melting dish was blackened by this darker powder.











I preheated the dish with a propane torch enough so I could prepare it with borax. Then in went the powder and I hit it with the
oxy/acet torch. It didn't take long to melt into many little BBs. The borax became quite viscous and I had trouble getting all the BBs
to melt into one. There are still several tiny BBs still embedded in the fused borax. Any ideas how to recover these?

I'm pleased with the end result but what the others have said..... There isn't much gold on plated glassware, probably not worth the effort
unless one could develop a stripping process that wasn't labour intensive.





0.57 grams with, I'm guessing another 0.05 still fused in the borax.

My first attempt I wanted to try this mostly for learning, I knew I wouldn't get rich from it.

Next I have to process the black mud from my stripping cell.

Thanks to all the forum contributors that have taken the time to post their wisdom and advice.


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## Palladium (Sep 30, 2012)

Hey brother we all have to start out learning somewhere. God knows i've had my learning curve. For you just to have that button is an accomplishment in and of it's self. Great Job!


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## resabed01 (Oct 1, 2012)

Thanks Palladium!

I'm now starting to enjoy the benefits of all that hard work, I think I'm hooked.

Since it's going to start freezing here at nights soon I wanted to clean up some solutions I've had on hold all summer.
Today I processed the black mud from by sulfuric cell. Dissolved the cleaned mud in Hcl-Clorox, filtered once, heated to drive off the bleach, filtered again.




Once it cooled I dropped the gold with SMB then washed the powder with water 3 times. Everything went very well today, much better than my previous
attempts. I ended up with 0.82g of dried gold powder. I was hoping for a lot more. The source was several Kgs of costume jewelry. I still have several Kgs more to strip.

After the melt I had a nice big BB of 0.92g





This time I came in hotter and closer with the torch and played it around to break free all the tiny gold beads I left behind yesterday.
Looks like it worked because I picked up 0.10g on today's melt.


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## Jimmi (Oct 2, 2012)

Glad you're loving this hobby as much as the rest of us. But I would just like to warn you about placing your beaker directly onto the hot plate. This can cause a thermal fracture. You would be better served to either place it on an asbestos pad or place it in another container such as corning ware. After putting in all that work to clean it from the sulfuric cell, it would be sad to see your gold spilled all over your workspace. 
Anyway that's just a thought. Good job and keep up the good work.


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## resabed01 (Oct 2, 2012)

Thanks, I knew a sharp eye would catch that with the hotplate. I placed the beaker there for the photo-op.
After, I laid a bed of sand on the plate before cranking up the heat.
Thanks for the warning though, I do appreciate the reminder.

One of the things I need to do is invest a bit of cash in proper glassware. Using coffee pots defiantly has it's limits.
They are fine for holding liquids for filtering and settlement but I really don't like heating in them. I find they are very thin.
I once picked up a coffee pot to use and noticed a crack in the base. It was hard to see and I almost missed it. Had I filled it
the crack would have been impossible to see and If I had heated I'm sure it would have broke.
Now I inspect all glassware before I use it.


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