# Silver in Nitric growing Crystals



## Nopyrite (Nov 26, 2009)

Hello to all. Phil here from Port St Lucie, Fl. I am a new guy here on the block and I have a problem. I mixed up a batch of N/A using battery acid (NAPA Auto) and S/N dissolved in distilled water. I let the S/N sit for a day, then poured off the liquid leaving the white mud behind. After adding the bat acid, I was ready for a trial run. I put into the solution a single 24 gram hollow Sterling knife handle (I cleaned all of the junk out first). I let it sit in solution un-heated for a week. The mixture turned aqua green, (I thought Sterling was supposed to turn dark red in N/A) but nothing much was happening, so I heated for several hours (hot, but not boiling). The only thing I see now is the handle is bristling with long thin clear spikes like a cactus. Where did I go wrong? Any help would be greatly appreciated.


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## lazersteve (Nov 26, 2009)

The crystals are likely silver nitrate. They should dissolve in water. Test the water for silver by adding a drop of HCl, if you see a white curd substance form, you have silver nitrate. If it is, add some distilled water to dissolve the crystals then filter out the solid material. From here add a bar of solid copper to precipitate out the silver as seen in the silver videos on my website. 

The cold nitric recipe works best when the solution is cooled below -5C for 3-5 hours while the crystals are growing.

You will have water, sulfate, nitrate, copper, sodium, and silver all in the mix. Check out a solubility table to see which salt formations are soluble at various temperatures and pH. This will give you a good idea of what side reactions to expect and how to precipitate the unwanted salts. These side reactions will help you determine which tests to perform on your unknowns to identify them.

Steve


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## Nopyrite (Nov 27, 2009)

Lazersteve, thanks for the reply. There is a lot of info on this great site to absorb. I plan to go into the "sponge" mode and soak up as much as possible before any further refining activity. Thanks also for the guidance.
Phil


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