# White Gold Recipe, What's in White Gold?



## kadriver (Nov 24, 2016)

White gold that turns yellow over time, or needs to be plated with rhodium, is NOT white gold. Yellow karat gold is an alloy of gold, copper, zinc and silver. To achieve a white color, the metallurgist will reduce the amount of copper and add nickel or in rare cases, palladium. If you have a white gold ring that turns yellow and/or needs to be plated with rhodium, then the metallurgist who created the alloy of your piece did not alloy the metal correctly. White gold should never turn yellow or need rhodium plating to make it look white.

I found this statement on a jeweler's website. Can anyone tell me if its a true statement? And where can I find a published recipe for alloying white karat gold.

Thank you.
kadriver


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## anachronism (Nov 24, 2016)

Sure. A Google search of the term "white gold composition" will yield a whole host of sites that will answer this. I can happily link a few if you have problems with that.


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## goldsilverpro (Nov 24, 2016)

A fairly definitive book on gold, by Wise, gives the following metal compositions for white karat gold - all figures in percent.

10K - Au=41.6; Cu=31-33; Ag=0-4; Ni=15-17; Zn=8-12
14K - Au=58.3; Cu=22-24; Ag=0-4; Ni-10-12; Zn=6-9
18K - Au=75; Cu=2; Ag=0; Ni=17; Zn=6

Most white karat gold I've seen seems to have a very slight yellow cast, especially when compared with the color of pure silver, which is the whitest metal there is.


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## FrugalRefiner (Nov 24, 2016)

kadriver said:


> To achieve a white color, the metallurgist will reduce the amount of copper and add nickel or in rare cases, palladium.


Palladium is being used more often than in the past as the use of nickel has fallen out of favor due to so many people becoming allergic to it. 

Nice to see you dropping in again. You've been gone a long time.

Dave


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## FrugalRefiner (Nov 24, 2016)

anachronism said:


> Sure. A Google search of the term "white gold composition" will yield a whole host of sites that will answer this. I can happily link a few if you have problems with that.


Hmmm... I'm reminded of what a member suggested to me:


> If it was a first post I would agree, but with over 50 posts, then maybe another approach is warranted.


Dave


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## kadriver (Nov 24, 2016)

Thanks to all. I've been working with a jeweler. When resizing a white gold ring the customer becomes irritated because the gold has turned a yellowish tint when they come in to pick it up and pay for the repair. Since he was last to touch it, the customer is claiming foul, that it's his fault for the color change.

To avoid this conflict, we are trying to come up with way to let the customer know, before doing the repair, that some white golds are plated with rhodium to make them look very white and that this plating will come off when the piece is worked on, revealing a yellow tinted metal under the rhodium plating.

Here is a good article found that describes what's going on with this;

re; 24 kt (pure) gold is always yellow. But jewelry tends to be something like 12 kt -- half gold and half some other metals. If those other metals are copper and silver, the yellow color persists. If those other metals are nickel and palladium, they have a bleaching effect and a white-ish gold results. Depending on the exact formulation, the color can range from somewhat yellowish to satisfactorily white. Your grandmother's ring was high quality white gold. Generally, the whiter, the more costly to formulate.

However, most white gold jewelry today has an additional layer of Rhodium plating on it. It's not primarily about deception: it's that we live in an age of "bling" where most people want the brilliant, dazzling, diamond-like brightness that only rhodium plating, and no other material in the world, can offer. Rhodium plating makes diamonds look bigger and better because from even a foot away it's hard to see where the stones end and the metal begins. Many women today would not be satisfied with grandma's unplated ring. But even the best plating is very thin and won't last forever.

So here's the three problems in brief: 
1). Most people don't realize it's plated and can be shocked and disappointed when they find out; they think in terms of the durability of grandma's solid ring, without realizing that they probably would not have been happy with grandma's white but bling-less ring.
2). Once the jewelry industry started plating rings, they started settling for cheaper, lower quality, yellower, white gold because "it will be plated over anyway". But the need for frequent replating is much more apparent when the underlying gold isn't white enough. For this reason yellow gold rings should never be rhodium plated.
3). The quality of plating can vary greatly. A jeweler applying rhodium from a teacup of solution in a back room doesn't deliver the thickness and quality of plating that a modern instrument-controlled plating shop specializing in jewelry delivers.

This is the best explanation I've found. We are going to have a placard made to include this info and have the customer read it before working on their white gold piece.

Any experience or other input with regard to this plan would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
kadriver


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## anachronism (Nov 24, 2016)

FrugalRefiner said:


> anachronism said:
> 
> 
> > Sure. A Google search of the term "white gold composition" will yield a whole host of sites that will answer this. I can happily link a few if you have problems with that.
> ...



Dave I actually just meant it as it was written. I provided the relevant search term and offered to help if that wasn't enough. If you read it differently then that's your issue.


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## goldsilverpro (Nov 24, 2016)

To me, bright, gaudy, rhodium plating is butt-ugly. It looks like a chrome plated bumper. I like that soft, barely yellow, effect you get with white karat gold, especially when Pd is used instead of nickel. However, for those people with nickel sensitivity, nickel white golds almost have to be Rh plated.


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## kadriver (Nov 24, 2016)

I agree, a chrome bumper look is a good analogy. It makes the piece look fake - to me.


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## nickvc (Nov 24, 2016)

The English 9k white gold recipe is basically sterling silver mixed with fine gold and inherently will always look a little like a very pale butter colour and be fairly soft, decent 18k white gold can be anything from 10-15% palladium which hardens and whitens the alloy, most repairers will use a rhodium plate to refinish the sizing or repair to an item and most customers prefer that look.


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## upcyclist (Nov 25, 2016)

I like that approach, kadriver. I generally warn people that the whiteness in "white gold" varies, because gold is inherently yellow. That, combined with telling them about rhodium plating should be enough of a mini-education. The sales staff probably needs to make sure customers understand that every time someone drops off a white gold piece for repair.


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## kadriver (Nov 26, 2016)

nickvc said:


> The English 9k white gold recipe is basically sterling silver mixed with fine gold and inherently will always look a little like a very pale butter colour and be fairly soft, decent 18k white gold can be anything from 10-15% palladium which hardens and whitens the alloy, most repairers will use a rhodium plate to refinish the sizing or repair to an item and most customers prefer that look.



Thanks for all the input. The jeweler has concluded that in order to stay current that he will set up a rhodium plating station. He wants me to help set it up. I have absolutely zero experience with plating.

He has done it in the past, but it was decades ago. Stuller has all the stuff we need, but I'm thinking the kit that they sell probably has chemicals that we can get much cheaper if I just knew what they were.

If anyone has any experience that they can share it would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
kadriver


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## nickvc (Nov 26, 2016)

Lou is probably the man to help your friend as he has the experience with PGMs and the products associated with them.
Most plating set ups have a cleaning and a plating side and is generally heated with a power supply to electro clean and plate the items, when I had my shop I charged $10 for a polish and plate so the cost can be recovered fairly quickly and customers love that as new look.


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## kadriver (Nov 26, 2016)

Thanks nick, I've contact Lou.


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## goldsilverpro (Nov 26, 2016)

kadriver said:


> nickvc said:
> 
> 
> > The English 9k white gold recipe is basically sterling silver mixed with fine gold and inherently will always look a little like a very pale butter colour and be fairly soft, decent 18k white gold can be anything from 10-15% palladium which hardens and whitens the alloy, most repairers will use a rhodium plate to refinish the sizing or repair to an item and most customers prefer that look.
> ...


Those jeweler's plating solutions are very simple. Just follow the instruction's to a tee and keep everything very clean. Don't contaminate the solutions with anything - other metals, organic materials, etc. Before the plating itself, cleaning and activation steps are required. Don't contaminate the Rh solution by dragging in these prep cleaners and acids. Proper rinsing between steps is vital. When not in use, cover the solutions or pour them back into their bottles, after cooling. The plating solution vendor should be able to help in setting up proper cycles. Different base metals might require slightly different prep cycles. Many plating problems occur due to a faulty, inadequate, or contaminated prep cycle. The rhodium solution is heated and will evaporate - maintain the solution level with pure water.

In general, as a group, jewelers are the most ignorant of all the types of people that use plating solutions. This is not a criticism. It is because all they need to use are these easy to learn, hopefully never fail solutions that plate super-thin deposits and they rarely need to get into the intricacies required of the much, much more advanced plating systems, such as found in the electronics industry.

I would not shop for price and I would never make the beginners mistake of trying to formulate my own solution. I would select a large supplier that has a lab and has tech service people that are quite knowledgeable about their plating products. A good vendor will help you out with technical problems. I assume they still do this, and solution analysis, maybe, as a free service. I spent several years as the head of tech service/lab guy for 2 of the largest plating solution suppliers in the world and I owned a couple of plating shops. I've been on both sides of the counter. That was a long time ago, but Rh baths are still exactly the same.

Most Rhodium plating solutions are nothing but 2g/l rhodium, as the sulfate, sulfuric acid, and pure water. There are also rhodium phosphate/phosphoric acid and rhodium phosphate/sulfuric acid baths. The maximum thickness of Rh plating is very limited. Typical Rh plating on jewelry is from 2 to 5 microinches thick. Plating time is about 20-60 seconds at 6 volts. Every vendor's instructions are a little different. I would not buy from a vendor that didn't provide good instructions. Rh plating is very stressed and, if you try to plate too thick, the deposit can crack and peel. Here again, follow the instructions. Platinized titanium or tantalum anodes are required - buy them new - they are sold by the square inch. Get a good variable power supply of proper size - no Mickey Mouse battery chargers. If this is just for a ring or two, every so often, a beaker kit would work fine. For greater volume, I would look into a more professional vendor such as Technic. 

For this simple plating system, I may be overstating everything. These are the things I would do. Most jewelers don't do them all. If you have questions, please ask them.


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## 4metals (Nov 26, 2016)

http://www.cohler.com/ 

This company makes a cold rhodium solution that is easy to use. Lots of jeweler suppliers re-sell their line. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## kadriver (Nov 27, 2016)

thanks for taking the time to write that detailed information Chris. I'll have the jewelry read it and look for a place that provides tech assist as you pointed out.

Looking into cohler.com also. These should be some good places to start, thanks to you all.

kadriver


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## Topher_osAUrus (Nov 27, 2016)

The book that gsp mentioned is excellent.
Gold - by Wise.
He worked at a watch company, worked at international nickel co, and holds several patents, one of which is a white gold alloy composition. In the book Mr Wise goes over the binary and ternary alloys of gold, as well as many many many other great things.

I bought my copy from a member, but, when i looked on amazon, i believe it was around 50 bucks or so. Definitely worth the money!.


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