# The whitest cement Ive ever had



## Topher_osAUrus (Jul 21, 2017)

Title says it all... It has some darker mixed in, but, look how gorgeous this silver looks.


Stunning.. To me anyways :?


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## UncleBenBen (Jul 21, 2017)

Some pretty stuff! 8)


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## anachronism (Jul 21, 2017)

It's unconverted Silver Chloride dude. :lol: :lol: :lol: 

Only kidding


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## Topher_osAUrus (Jul 21, 2017)

anachronism said:


> It's unconverted Silver Chloride dude. :lol: :lol: :lol:
> 
> Only kidding


  

I wish I could say with certainty how i got it SO white, but, the only thing I did different than usual is use 2 thick copper bus bars with the silver contacts still riveted on. Let it sit in there for a day and a half with no agitation. When i went to decant I was greeted by that.

After doing some washing

It still has a beautiful glow to it.

Generally I use tubing that I beat flat and stir often so it gets cemented quick.

I suppose slow and steady wins the race, er, the beauty contest

Edit to add : dont mind the bucket with a little green foam in the background.. Its in a bigger yellow bucket, added a little too much soda ash a little too fast and it gave a result that was to be expected..


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## Palladium (Jul 21, 2017)

Looking good!
Metallic silver is the whitest metal and reflects 95% of the light that hits it, think about a mirror. Gold only reflects 92%.

The most whitest silver i have ever seen comes from a sodium formate reduction. I have a video about it on my youtube channel.


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## Palladium (Jul 21, 2017)

https://youtu.be/rviDlzrQ2O8?t=8m20s


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## Topher_osAUrus (Jul 21, 2017)

Palladium said:


> Looking good!
> Indeed. Our mutual friend will be quite pleased.
> The most whitest silver i have ever seen comes from a sodium formate reduction. I have a video about it on my youtube channel.


I will have to check that out as soon as I have a free moment. Getting stuff packed and ready to move is a nightmare...
I never wanted to move again, but, after my grandmother passed, nobody else wanted to buy her awesome house, so I did. Between packing, tolls, and my boys, I dont have enough hours in the day... After this silver crystal dries, its back into the 120 degree sweat shop! 

Cheers!


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## upcyclist (Jul 21, 2017)

That is some serious pretty--one of these days I need to get/find some bus bars. I've been making do with tubing pounded flat, as you have been doing.


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## Shark (Jul 21, 2017)

NICE!

Of the few times I cemented silver one really stands out. It was sitting in the sun and soon as it started cementing the sparkly look caught my eye and I watched until it was done. Wasted a lot of time, but it beautiful and mesmerizing to see.


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## Topher_osAUrus (Jul 21, 2017)

upcyclist said:


> That is some serious pretty--one of these days I need to get/find some bus bars. I've been making do with tubing pounded flat, as you have been doing.



The bus I used was quite small, but thick as could be.
I think the deposit was more related to the minimal amount of free nitric and (lack of) agitation. Also, as shark mentioned heat could have been a factor too, as it is incredibly hot in my shop. 

A couple times I have had some smashed tubing have a hard bright deposit on it when I wasnt around to agitate it. But, the difference in that was, for some reason it seemed to stop halfway through cementing. I tested the solution with HCl and all of the silver this time was reduced out. Maybe the last time i didnt leave it long enough... Or..maybe its just one of sciences great, beautiful, mysteries that we arent supposed to be able to repeat and explain in a consistent matter.


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## 4metals (Jul 21, 2017)

My guess is the fact that you used a heavy copper buss to cement with. Flattened tubing is great because it's cheap and available but heavy buss is less available so not used as often. I believe the relatively thin walls of the copper pipe ends up dropping the silver and small bits of copper too so the overall purity is lower due to the copper. 

I have dropped 99% fine silver from spent electrolyte using heavy copper buss but I have also dropped 95% silver using flattened copper pipe. The difference was copper. So my theory, the less copper contaminating the silver from using a stout piece of copper, the more it glistens.


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## Topher_osAUrus (Jul 21, 2017)

4metals said:


> My guess is the fact that you used a heavy copper buss to cement with. ...
> 
> I have dropped 99% fine silver from spent electrolyte using heavy copper buss but I have also dropped 95% silver using flattened copper pipe. The difference was copper. So my theory, the less copper contaminating the silver from using a stout piece of copper, the more it glistens.



I was under that impression as well, until a cement I did last week, or was it beginning of this week?, I dont remember.. Recently, I had some VERY nice melted silver, I didn't do a titration on it, or have it XRF'd but,... Well.. Look at the pretty-ness


This silver, was cemented with a 2ft section of 1 1/4 tubing, beat flat, that had already been used to finish cementing a previous batch. I cleaned it, dried it, and put it in a bag, but it still had bits on it that were oxidized. I didnt worry about it since all my silver sees my cell. But, it required no pickling to remove firescale or slag, as there was none what so ever.
I wish I would have saved a piece or two to test it, but, that takes time, and time is money.

I just melted a dish of the OP silver, and it is just as beautiful



Both batches were rinsed more times than I can count. Using boiling hot water. Dried slowly, then incinerated to red heat before I let it cool down a bit, then thrown into the dish to melt.
Even though I rinse until the wash water passes the ammonia test, there is *always* NO2 fumes that get driven off when i bring the cement to a light red heat. That, to me, is perplexing..


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## Shark (Jul 21, 2017)

I don't want to high jack the thread, but is it possible that difference between the make up of copper water pipe and a copper buss bar be the cause for the change in silver quality? Until recently I had no clue there were so many different combinations of metal involved in making various copper items.


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## Lightspeed (Jul 31, 2017)

I have processed only 2 kilos of cement in 4 separate batches. My very first batch was refined from .500 Australian pre decimal coins, this was also the whitest batch of silver cement I have filtered to date. Batches processed after this were predominantly either .925 scrap from hallmarked cutlery and .925 Australian pre decimal coins. The entirety of the latter batches produced a much darker cement, so much so I re-processed this cement again in a chloride process, the cement obtained from this process did not change in colour to a great degree.

My deductions from observing the filtered cement from dropping the first batch with copper precip revealed larger silver crystal formation from solution this (whitest) batch produced with .500 Ag.

These next three copper precips that produced the darker cement and finer grain crystal were re-refined in chloride process, this produced an even finer but just as dark cement of which a large percentage compared to the first batch floated due to surface tension and grain size when rinsing before vacuum filter rinse. I should add it was impossible to gravity filter due to the fine grain and simply blocked the papers.

I could only deduct that the first batch was whiter and crystal size larger due to less free nitric, this was also confirmed with the amount of copper consumed in exchange.

Regarding the Chloride process, this was the very first time I have attempted it so I cannot compare to other reductions made by this method. Nor have I had the poured shot assayed, the colour of the shot looks very clean despite the colour of the cement, in fact the cement from the chloride(darker) looks more white/reflective as shot than the copper precip shot (cement whiter)

N.B. I do not have a wealth of experience in Silver refining, from the small amount I have done so far this has been my observations from the two chemical processes used. Also the copper used was electrolytic 8mm thick cut from a stock roll.


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## Topher_osAUrus (Sep 1, 2017)

Well, I ended up replicating the result of "whitest cement ever"
Except this time, was a bit different.

I was removing the last bit of silver from the electrolyte of my breakdown cell with a graphite anode, and my stainless bowl cathode.

When I initially hooked up the graphite anode, it formed some small dense crystals, after a few hours and the silver content fell further and further towards zero, it started producing thin flakey platelets (thats really the only way I can think of describing them)
They very easily get airborne, even slightly stirring them seemed to make a silver snowglobe.



First time, after drying, it ended up not being as white. Assuming because it mixed with the regular looking silver cement.

This time, it ended up staying quite pretty.



After cleaning this out last night and drying it.
I set up the cell again with the graphite anode, so I could "revitalize" it, and push out as much copper as possible. It still had a good bit of silver in solution, so I left the amperage quite low all night. This morning, it was a bowl full of flakes.

Im cleaning and drying them now, and will be setting it up to kick out the copper next


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## geedigity (Sep 2, 2017)

I grew about a pound and a half of what I termed "silver glitter" a few months back. My voltage was low (about 1.5 volts), but I believe the root of the glitter flakes was related to contamination of the electrolyte. I am not sure what contaminated the solution but a few possibilities were either sulfuric acid, sodium carbonate or borax. 

Maybe there is a market for silver glitter. It sticks onto everything but can be a pain when the air is real dry and full of static electricity. I ended up redissolving the silver glitter and making a new batch of electrolyte. The silver crystals from that batch were nice and dense.


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## Owltech (Aug 29, 2018)

Reduction with sodium formate:








vs

cementation on copper bus bar:


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