# Making your own Cathodes and Anodes



## Oneal58 (Nov 14, 2011)

Hi everyone,
I would appreciate anyone giving me some advice on the questions below. Thanks, Oneal58 
1-LEAD CATHODES--Can I make my own lead cathodes out of the lead of an old battery or old tire balancing weights. Is the lead in car batteries and or tire weights pure lead or mixed with other metal impurities. If battery lead is pure, will the sulfuric that the lead has been soaking in for years interfere with melting process. Such as fumes, poisonous gases Etc;. Are the lead weights to balance tires on automobiles, is this lead pure enough lead if you take the metal clips that attach weights to the tire rims off? How pure is this lead and has anyone done this before? If so, what is the prep to the lead, if any?

2- STAINLESS STEEL CATHODES--If a stainless steel large utensil, such as a thick 12" serving spoon or similar item if marked 100% Stainless Steel, can this item be forged into a Cathode. If marked 100% Stainless is it just what it says it is?

3- COPPER CATHODES/ANODES-- Can common copper tubing such as sold at Lowe's or HD pure enough to be forged and used as Cathodes or Anodes. 

4-STERLING .925-- Is .925 Sterling Silver pure enough to be used as a Anode or will I need to recover the pure silver out of the .925 Sterling to use to make the anodes? 
Thanks, Oneal


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## Geo (Nov 15, 2011)

i used wheel weights for the cathode in my stripping cell. stainless steel can be an alloy with alot of different compositions,low grade stainless is still 100% stainless steel.i wouldnt use stainless steel as a cathode in a sulfuric stripping cell because as the acid heats up it will attack the stainless and put nickle into you electrolyte and too much nickle will cause the cell to stop working properly.i have the components to make one but havent put it together yet but copper is used for the cathode in a silver stripping cell using sulfuric as the electrolyte.


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## element47 (Nov 15, 2011)

Without making a comment as to the wisdom of using copper for something or not, the single great thing about common copper (pipe, pipe fittings, stripped wire, is that for an ordinary industrial metal widely available it is remarkably pure, probably .98 pure. 

I am not so sure about wheel weights. Nobody (who makes them) really cares if those are pure or not, and I believe I have read that lots of lead "things" have a low single digit percentage of antimony in them, perhaps as an agent that lowers the viscosity of the molten lead, eg; it "liquifies" the lead, it allows the lead to take up the shape of a mold better. I have no idea of whether the antimony (Sb) interferes with any electrolytic reaction.

And I will echo what Geo said about stainless. I have never seen something stamped "100% stainless steel"...nor do I think it actually makes sense. There are hundreds and hundreds of different types of stainless steel, and as I suggested in a prior post, there are lower grades that might be quite susceptible to attack by nitric acid. And yes, that would put nickel in solution and that is generally considered troublesome.


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## philddreamer (Nov 15, 2011)

"4-STERLING .925-- Is .925 Sterling Silver pure enough to be used as a Anode or will I need to recover the pure silver out of the .925 Sterling to use to make the anodes? 
Thanks, Oneal"

Not really. 
You can use .925, but the electrolyte will be overloaded with copper & what ever other base metals that might be present in the sterling.
It is best to run the .925 items thru 50/50 nitric, cement with clean copper.
This should bring your silver to around .99%. Then make your anodes for the cell, & your crystals will be purer & the electrolyte will last longer. 
I did a test with sterling for anodes to see if I could save on nitric, but the electrolyte did not last but few hours. I had to rinse & re-melt into anodes & run thru cell again. Be aware, you should make your electrolyte with .999 crystals.

By the way, what type of cell are you making, or, what are you intending to run thru your cell?

If its for refining silver, a hard graphite for a cathode & your .99 anodes will do.

Phil


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## Oneal58 (Nov 15, 2011)

hanks Phil and Geo, 
I have a lot of the old silverplated copper, Sheffield plated items. I accumulated this from my second job, years of Auctioneering. I would have a cheap lot come across the auction block that nobody wanted. I would buy the lots which contained bowls, plates, Etc;, for pennies a piece. I also have a lot of the old quadruple plated stuff. I feel there is enough silver on some of these pieces to give reverse plating a try. This is the same way I got ahold of most of my gold plated items and gold filled items, across the auction block. 
I have found an old battery box but it isn't large enough. I have a heavy thick polyurethane barrel I am thinking about sawing the bottom off of to use that for the large platters. But I am thinking I need more of a rectangle shaped container? Silver plate is selling for little at auctions these days if it's not in excellent condition. I have everthing to put a system together but the acids of which I have not found a supplier yet. To put enough acid in that barrel to cover some of these pieces a few times would cost me dearly. Some of this quadruple plated stuff that I know very little about may ruin my electrolyte and that would get expensive. But it's something I am studying up on. I also have a couple of sets of gold plated flatware made by a high quality company. I don't know what the thickness of the gold on the flatware is but I don't even want to think about scraping it off as I have read that some have tried. I want to use the sulphuric cell on this stuff, maybe a half dozen pieces at a time. Isn't that a lead cathode and copper screen wire anode Lazersteve is using on that cell, that's what it looks like to me. I have sulphuric acid in a powder form out in a box I have had for years. Does this stuff deteriorate over time. I bought a plating outfit out of a magazine many years ago but never got around to doing anything with it. I was going to replate the silver palted items even back then untill I found out how plentiful the pieces really were. A lot of that stuff was made back then. This was years before the internet so I am concerned about the strength of the sulphuric now. 
I have been looking at the price of Nitric and different chemicals and even the industrial grade stuff is high. I am getting into this to try and make a profit and not spend all of my returns in acid cost. You got so many people after the gold these days I thought I would maybe focus on something that's plentiful in my area and I know where to find it. Reverse Electroylisis seems to be the easy way to get the silver off. And then I would still have the copper on the sheffield plate to sell as scrap. I haven't checked the price on copper in a while but the last time I did it was at $2.85 a pound about 1 year ago. Clean #1 copper was higher than that. 
I am waiting to hear back from kadriver that you told me about here in S.C. to see if he can hook me up with a good supplier of some acids to start up with. I will have to keep looking until I find a good supplier. As I said before, I have been talked out of making my own Nitric out of Ammonia Nitrate that I have a free supply of by you fellows here on the forum. You wouldn't know how to take the ammonia out of ammonia nitrate, leaving only the nitrates would you? Is Nitrate still dangerous without the ammonia in it? Ha! old habbits die hard don't they! I just wish I knew more, it isn't because I haven't been reading everything I come across and buging all you fellows also. 
Thanks for all your help. Oneal


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## Oneal58 (Nov 15, 2011)

Thanks Phil and Geo, 
Phil can't I use motor brushes out of large industrial size motors for my graphite cathodes? I have changed out what seems like thousands in my lifetime. I think I still have connections to get hold of a lot of these large brushes, they are just thrown away at the plant I worked at. I have also read I can make molds out of these brushes if they are prepared properly. I have a router with the bits to do just that. But have you heard this? I am probably rambling but that's what my mind does in information overload.
I have a lot of the old silverplated copper, Sheffield plated items. I accumulated this from my second job, years of Auctioneering. I would have a cheap lot come across the auction block that nobody wanted. I would buy the lots which contained bowls, plates, Etc;, for pennies a piece. I also have a lot of the old quadruple plated stuff. I feel there is enough silver on some of these pieces to give reverse plating a try. This is the same way I got ahold of most of my gold plated items and gold filled items, across the auction block. 
I have found an old battery box but it isn't large enough. I have a heavy thick polyurethane barrel I am thinking about sawing the bottom off of to use that for the large platters. But I am thinking I need more of a rectangle shaped container? Silver plate is selling for little at auctions these days if it's not in excellent condition. I have everthing to put a system together but the acids of which I have not found a supplier yet. To put enough acid in that barrel to cover some of these pieces a few times would cost me dearly. Some of this quadruple plated stuff that I know very little about may ruin my electrolyte and that would get expensive. But it's something I am studying up on. I also have a couple of sets of gold plated flatware made by a high quality company. I don't know what the thickness of the gold on the flatware is but I don't even want to think about scraping it off as I have read that some have tried. I want to use the sulphuric cell on this stuff, maybe a half dozen pieces at a time. Isn't that a lead cathode and copper screen wire anode Lazersteve is using on that cell, that's what it looks like to me. I have sulphuric acid in a powder form out in a box I have had for years. Does this stuff deteriorate over time. I bought a plating outfit out of a magazine many years ago but never got around to doing anything with it. I was going to replate the silver palted items even back then untill I found out how plentiful the pieces really were. A lot of that stuff was made back then. This was years before the internet so I am concerned about the strength of the sulphuric now. 
I have been looking at the price of Nitric and different chemicals and even the industrial grade stuff is high. I am getting into this to try and make a profit and not spend all of my returns in acid cost. You got so many people after the gold these days I thought I would maybe focus on something that's plentiful in my area and I know where to find it. Reverse Electroylisis seems to be the easy way to get the silver off. And then I would still have the copper on the sheffield plate to sell as scrap. I haven't checked the price on copper in a while but the last time I did it was at $2.85 a pound about 1 year ago. Clean #1 copper was higher than that. 
I am waiting to hear back from kadriver that you told me about here in S.C. to see if he can hook me up with a good supplier of some acids to start up with. I will have to keep looking until I find a good supplier. As I said before, I have been talked out of making my own Nitric out of Ammonia Nitrate that I have a free supply of by you fellows here on the forum. You wouldn't know how to take the ammonia out of ammonia nitrate, leaving only the nitrates would you? Is Nitrate still dangerous without the ammonia in it? Ha! old habbits die hard don't they! I just wish I knew more, it isn't because I haven't been reading everything I come across and buging all you fellows also. 
Thanks for all your help. Oneal


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## publius (Nov 15, 2011)

element47 said:


> Without making a comment as to the wisdom of using copper for something or not, the single great thing about common copper (pipe, pipe fittings, stripped wire, is that for an ordinary industrial metal widely available it is remarkably pure, probably .98 pure.



Copper pipe and copper pipe fittings (not referring to brass or bronze fittings) are not pure Cu. There are other metals added to allow them to be formed easily and uniformly. Copper wire, used to conduct electricity is, on the other hand, 5 nines fine, (99.999%) as the electrical resistance jumps if the wire is not "pure."

I am *not* picking on element47. I am just trying to contribute to the forum and he sparked something in the dusty reaches in my brain.

Robert


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## Geo (Nov 15, 2011)

the silver stripping cell set up is on the forum.the size of the cell needs to be proportionate to the size of the piece your dealing with.unless your wanting to keep the piece intact i suggest cutting them into smaller pieces.sulfuric acid is unforgiving to work with so always use safety precautions.you can buy automotive battery acid and condense by evaporating to 1/3 volume or you can purchase drain opener that contains concentrated sulfuric acid.like i said before.the cathode for a silver stripping cell should be copper as copper resist attack from concentrated sulfuric acid.try to find a piece of copper plate that has a larger surface area facing your piece than the piece your working with,if you dont your resistance will be so high it will cause the electrolyte to heat up faster. by the way, you may consider that silver is attacked by HOT sulfuric acid.WARNING! hot sulfuric acid will cause acid burns on contact down to the bone.some people use a crock pot and and just dip the piece in hot sulfuric acid to strip the silver.length of time in the solution depends on heat and thickness of the plating.


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## Oneal58 (Nov 15, 2011)

Thanks everyone, I am learning so much on this site that I keep a headache. But each and every bit of information I get puts me one step closer to my dream. I want to be ready before starting up and you fellows are surely helping me get there. I have did the sulphuric cell search in different forms in the search box but I cannot find the information about Cathode size verses material surface area. I must not be doing something right in the search window to find the information I need about the Sulphuric Cell. I thought I had read every post about the cell but evidently I am wrong about this and have missed a lot. I am just learning how to search the site so I guess patience is the key here. How critical is surface area of the copper cathode compared to the surface area of the plated jewelry? Do I need to go strictly by surface area to find out what size copper cathode to use in the sulphuric cell. I want to use at first a similar setup as Lazersteve's. I see he has laid his plated items on what looks to be a copper screen to me? Am I right about this? Then puts the positive leads on the copper screen (Anode). He keeps his negative lead on his cathode that I thought was lead/stainless? Am I right or wrong about the Cathode? Also, I feel I am missing something here. I just don't know how to go about measuring all those necklaces, bracelets, rings, etc;. I could lay my copper cathode on a table and just keep filling in the space untill I have the sheet of copper (cathode) covered good by the plated jewelry. Would this be close enough or will the circumference factor come into play and if I have necklaces that are round, do I double the room for them. The necklaces and pieces that are flat though it would seem that this would work for them. Do I take into consideration the size of the anode that is submerged into the bath also? Or just the surface area of the plated jewelry that I am stripping? I have a rheostat that I will be putting in the circuit to control my voltage off of my small battery charger instead of using light bulbs as some have recommended. I have settings of 6 volts DC and 12 volts DC. Do I keep increasing the voltage untill I get the reaction on the anode? 
Is there a formula that I can use to figure out how many amps should be used, like surface area of palted items verses amperage? If I could find these answers on the site I would much rather not bother anyone, But I can't seem to find them. Could I read the resistance in the anode with the jewelry in place on the anode verses the resistance of the cathode. Then take into consideration the surface area involved as best as I can? Is any of this making any sense to anyone or am I off track here. 
Thanks, Oneal58


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## Geo (Nov 15, 2011)

the next question i should ask is, are you stripping gold plate or silver plate? the video on lazersteves website is a gold stripping cell. in this cell the negative goes to the cathode which is lead and the positive goes on the anode which is the wire mesh basket.in a silver stripping cell the negative goes to the cathode that would be a copper sheet or plate and the positive goes on the anode which will either be the piece you are working with or a wire mesh basket. the electrolyte is the same,concentrated sulfuric acid.the voltage is the same,12V DC.if you are working with jewelry theres no need to worry about the size of the cathode as long as its bigger than the jewelry.if you are doing candlesticks and platters,spoons and forks then the cathode needs to have as many square inches facing the piece as there are square inches in the piece total. i hope you can understand this,maybe someone else can explain it better than me.


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## resabed01 (Nov 15, 2011)

Just want to add my $0.02 worth of wisdom about the lead cathodes for the gold stripping cell. The lead doesn't need to be pure. For a source of lead I would forget about hacking open a car battery. You'll just be opening up a big caustic can of worms and the lead inside won't be very clean to start with. The plates are designed to have maximum surface area to create maximum cold cranking amps. All that surface area will be suphated to some degree creating impurities when you melt to cast your cathode. Lead wheel weights have been discussed, steel clip removed of course. A word of caution... I went to a tire shop asking about old lead weights and the guy told me nowadays lead isn't used anymore, zinc is now cast into tire weights.
I don't know if it's true or not but I decided to pass on that for a source in case I got a pail of mixed weights and then I'd have to figure out which metal is which.
The source of lead I used to make my cathode was from the car battery cable clamps. Three or four chunky ones should do it. If there's a worry about contamination then clean them up with a wire brush before you melt. A propane torch will easily melt lead. Do it outside of course and do not breath the fumes from the molten lead. I used a steel channel taken from a old Compaq computer case, the same Lasersteve used. It's the right size for making a cathode. Cut up your lead into chunks and lay them out in the channel. With heat they will melt and flow together into one piece. I used something like a screwdriver to move the slag and push it all to one end of the channel. Once cooled the cathode easily drops out of the steel channel then the end with the slag is cut off and discarded.


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## philddreamer (Nov 15, 2011)

At times, in the second hand stores, you can find diving lead weights.
I found 45# a few months ago & I think a paid $15.00 for them.

Just a thought.

Phil


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## Geo (Nov 16, 2011)

philddreamer said:


> At times, in the second hand stores, you can find diving lead weights.
> I found 45# a few months ago & I think a paid $15.00 for them.
> 
> Just a thought.
> ...



not to get side tracked but ive done some diving in the lakes here for mussels when they were $7.00 a pound.i could make upwards of $500.00 a day.i still have the 5# and 10# dive weight molds.


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## butcher (Nov 16, 2011)

Oneal58, 
I have heard silver can be stripped from silver plate in a concentrated sulfuric cell (hot probably for speed), I have never tried it, and I do not know any one else who has, GSP has made several good posts on this subject, from what I have read the men who plated silver, would use this method to strip the silver (when re-plating an article) there is no mention of recovering the silver sulfate, (and from my memory GSP thinks that it is in the recovery of the silver there would be a problem, or difficult).

Caution diluting concentrated sulfuric acid would be very dangerous if done wrong.

Never add water to the acid, always add acid to the water.

Some people remember this in a rhyme do like you otter......

I just remember the concentrated sulfuric acid was poured into toilet water not the toilet water into the acid.

Then also there is the problem of diluting your acid it would need re-concentrating if you wanted to reuse it.

And then getting the silver sulfates melted, Iron added to flux may help in a furnace melt? Or maybe by using some other silver conversion methods?

I am not trying to discourage you. But I think you need to look into this Idea more.

Remember the copper volume to silver volume in most of the plated items; you mostly have copper (or other base metals) and very little silver.

Will you be wasting your time? Who knows I do not, but always had it on my to list of thing to try.

I have experimented removing the silver using several other types of cell just to learn, the dilute nitric cell, and then the dilute sulfuric cell, of the two I liked the dilute sulfuric better, here my goal was to try and plate most of copper and get things like zinc into solution, it would somewhat work (but the cell will not plate the copper very well at all, most would fluff off and fall into silver powders, so at best I was just using the cell to save me on acids, basically breaking the anode spoon down to silver and copper powders, these powders I ran through the acid peroxide process, to dissolve copper powders from the silver, leaving me a silver chloride (also this was not the normal way most here on the forum use HCl acid/ peroxide, and it would be hard to explain), after about a year of playing around with this experiment (and dealing with lots of waste) I can tell you the little bit of silver I got from it would cost you a fortune to buy it from me, I have a lot of money and time invested in it (it was not worth it financially, a man could go broke quick that way) but was worth it to me for the education I got.

Laser Steve's web site has a better search button for the forum (than the one we have here on the forum), try using it.

Search silver Plate under GSP's posts.


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## Geo (Nov 16, 2011)

i remember from chem class "first the water then the acid otherwise it wont be placid".


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