# Gold remains after SMB drop.



## gs2420 (Mar 30, 2014)

I just officially joined. Thank to all of you for having me.

My question is this. I just dropped some gold out of solution using SMB after using AR on ceramic chips. I did not get much to settle as i had hope. But, there is clearly fine gold foating on the top. Are there any suggestions on how the recover this?

Again thank you.


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## necromancer (Mar 30, 2014)

hi, all the information you need is here on the forum.

sounds like you have free nitric, Hoke covers this in her book also on this forum for 100% free


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## FrugalRefiner (Mar 30, 2014)

gs2420 said:


> My question is this. I just dropped some gold out of solution using SMB after using AR on ceramic chips. I did not get much to settle as i had hope. But, there is clearly fine gold foating on the top. Are there any suggestions on how the recover this?


If you have gold floating on top, you can knock it down with a spray bottle. Keeping your glassware scrupulously clean will help to minimize this problem.

Dave


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## Pantherlikher (Mar 30, 2014)

Hello and welcome...

You just joinning and are actively doing something is a problem for us here.

Where did you learn what you are doing?
Hopefully not Youtubewillhurtyou videos...

Do you have a plan on disposing of the solution when you are done with it?
How did you Denox the solution before dropping gold? 
Alittle more knowledge goes a very long way and we on this forum can help but only if you do your homework.

Let us know

B.S.


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## gs2420 (Mar 31, 2014)

I would be less than honest if I said I had never watched a U-tube video gold refining early on. This is something that has always interested me.
I want to do it correctly, safely and by the book. So I have made arrangements for my waste. 

I used Urea to put down the Nitric Acid. I added it after pour in off the liquid from the AR reaction. I have had trouble determaining what is enough to do the trick. While it does not react any more it does disolve. When I added the SMB I got a drop smaller than I expected and saw gold film on the top. 

On a second small rum I got not drop at all. I am assuming that the gold is still in there but do not know what steps to take to retrive it.

Thank you for you time. If you have any other suggestions I would welcome them.


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## necromancer (Mar 31, 2014)

help us help you.

what type of ceramics did you process & how did you process them.
what was the was the total weight of your ceramics that you are recovering the gold from.

tell us how you started this whole process all the way to your SMB drop.

did you remove base metals ? did you have any silver to remove ? did anything explode during your recovery process ???

now we don't have to guess what you did. youtube is famous for 1/2 how to videos.


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## joubjonn (Mar 31, 2014)

1. Urea is a bad choice, search the forum on that. Solid gold to remove nitric is a very good and easy way to fix extra nitric or just don't use too much in the first place which is difficult with cpu's. However this trick only works to a point. If you added 100ml too much nitric you have more work to do. I add like 1-2ml at a time with a small plastic syringe. 

2. Search how to test for gold in solution, should always test. You can buy what I'm talking about for $5 on eBay. Search it first.


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## Pantherlikher (Mar 31, 2014)

Welcome to the forum.
Put your Urea to it's destined use...fertilizing the plants.

Yes, to some extent it gets dir of Nitric acid as it fumes the nitric.
NO, it does Not do enough to be of use. You're gold, if any(Test), is still in the solution waiting for you to learn how to properly extract it.

The good posters are trying to help you out of where you are. 
You do however need to learn all of it in order to not need to ask the next batch of questions that will arise from this or any other process.

My suggestion, you may not like at first; is to put all the solutions into lightly covered containers, store any solids you have. And begin by reading the welcome section here in the forum.

Yeh right!...is the normal responce but this will get you your answers and lead you onto the path of learning how it's all done. From start to finish, including safety and safely disposing of waste as well as proper washing and melting your gold and other PMs so you will get the MAXIMUM amount possible from material in question.

Good luck learning patience and learning the right way.

B.S.
Hope we see a nice shinny button soon


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## FrugalRefiner (Mar 31, 2014)

gs2420 said:


> I used Urea to put down the Nitric Acid. I added it after pour in off the liquid from the AR reaction. I have had trouble determaining what is enough to do the trick. While it does not react any more it does disolve. When I added the SMB I got a drop smaller than I expected and saw gold film on the top.
> 
> On a second small rum I got not drop at all. I am assuming that the gold is still in there but do not know what steps to take to retrive it.
> 
> Thank you for you time. If you have any other suggestions I would welcome them.


Download the book in my signature line. You can choose the screen readable version or the printer friendly one if you'd prefer a printed copy. You will find the answers to your questions there.

It will teach you how to eliminate excess nitric acid without using urea, as well as how to test for the presence of gold in your solution.

Dave


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## Anonymous (Mar 31, 2014)

I'm a little confused about the answers on this thread.

If gold has dropped and there is gold powder floating on the top I'm struggling to see how there is excess Nitric in the solution?

Have I missed something fundamental here because In the AR I've used the gold either drops or redissolves. Period.


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## bmgold2 (Mar 31, 2014)

spaceships said:


> I'm a little confused about the answers on this thread.
> 
> If gold has dropped and there is gold powder floating on the top I'm struggling to see how there is excess Nitric in the solution?
> 
> Have I missed something fundamental here because In the AR I've used the gold either drops or redissolves. Period.



I'm just guessing here but, if there is gold powder (gold colored) maybe it never got dissolved in the first place. I have seen gold wires from I.C. chips NOT get dissolved if there was any oil on them. I had to incinerate the material before the acid could get to them.

Just a thought but, from what little bit I know, the precipitated gold doesn't look like gold anymore until it is melted.


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## FrugalRefiner (Mar 31, 2014)

He did two different batches.

In the first, his gold reduced, including some that was floating. That was in his first post, and I agree, he didn't have any nitric left in that batch (he got lucky).

In his second, he didn't get a drop, so he probably still has excess nitric.

Dave


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## Anonymous (Mar 31, 2014)

No worries Dave, I was referring to the posts referring to his first though. That's where I can't see a Nitric issue as you've agreed.


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## Pantherlikher (Mar 31, 2014)

Yes, Spaceships, I agree there was no nitric in the first batch...

This is not the disscussion on this group of posts.

The new person here asking our help today failed to follow through the correct process to achieve the full potential of results.

What you all seem to be missing alot...is the fact that alot more study is needed to get better answers and results.

Get out of the mess, save everything and point to where he can learn the correct proceedures.

Why is this so difficult? 

B.S.


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## Anonymous (Mar 31, 2014)

Hey I agree partly. 

However I also think that for a guy to successfully process a batch of fingers, refine in AR, and get powder demonstrates a level of knowledge that surpasses the average newbie. What do you think?


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## Pantherlikher (Mar 31, 2014)

O, I agree whole heartidly.
If it's described well enough we understand all of what's been done.

This perticular "Gold remains after SMB drop" however shows alot of novice mistakes that need to be addressed before being able to accurately give help. 

I've seen this dissagreement more then once with newbie questions.

I feel most parties giving answers only help alittle and up front but never completely.

2 goals need to be addressed when facing a question. About anything really.

Find a safe solution and give what advice we can so no more questions arise.

Help with the question while addressing the need to completely understand the process.

I only do AP and HCL+bleach because I do not fully know the procedures. More study is needed before I'll even attempt anything else.

B.S.


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## necromancer (Apr 2, 2014)

gs2420 said:


> My question is this. I just dropped some gold out of solution using SMB after using AR on ceramic chips. I did not get much to settle as i had hope. But, there is clearly fine gold foating on the top. Are there any suggestions on how the recover this.



if the comments in this thread are because of "my answer" its an answer for the way i read and interpreted what i read.

i have had floating flakes in my AR after using smb to drop gold with a small bit of free nitric.
the flakes would stay on top, gold would drop and then 90% would redissolve in seconds, leaving a very small amount of "dust"
if i was not watching closely i would have missed the initial drop before it went back into solution.

please "everyone" feel free to openly post if i make any mistakes, i will not be insulted at all !!

this forum and its members are & have been fantastic !! i am here to learn & to help where i can.


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## necromancer (Apr 2, 2014)

Pantherlikher said:


> I only do AP and HCL+bleach because I do not fully know the procedures. More study is needed before I'll even attempt anything else.
> 
> B.S.



i have switched to acid peroxide // muriatic+bleach for many reasons

1 fumes are less toxic & easier to scrub. scarry "run away" reactions don't happen like with nitric

2 nitric is sometimes tough to get your hands on unless its a large amount.

3 chlorides are easier to get rid of then nitrates.

4 i can get everything i need within walking distance from my home or my shop.

5 AP forces me to go slower, and i like that.

6 i don't mind getting bleach on my hands


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## gs2420 (Apr 3, 2014)

FIrst of I want to thank you all for throwing a line to yet another new guy. I imagine it takes uncommon patience to watch us come and go. I have be at this a while with mixed success with different processes. I did not want subject this group to someoen that wanted all the answers without first taking his own lump. I have gotten a ton of good information so thanks you. I will take better notes, do more research to add to my limited knowledge. I will kick Urea to the curb. If I have more questions I will see if the answer exists here first before I scream for help.

Again thank you,

Greg


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## necromancer (Apr 3, 2014)

thank you, that will be $29.95 LOL (just joking)


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## Anonymous (Apr 3, 2014)

necromancer said:


> thank you, that will be $29.95 LOL (just joking)




Haha you beat me to it mate 8)


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## necromancer (Apr 3, 2014)

its spring, early bird gets the worm 8) 

to bad i cant "type" in a australian accent lol


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## freechemist (Apr 4, 2014)

That's spring too: Early worm is eaten.


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## sir_mix_a_lot (Feb 10, 2016)

Hi, i'm very new to hobby refining and this is my first batch of AuCl. I have a similar problem. I think i may have messed up my AR solution with too much HNO3. I'm not sure. I stripped off the gold plating of many computer ram fingers using 1:1 H2O2 + HLC and had 17 grams of platings and some copper with gold melted in them my buddy gave me. So I put 200ml of HCL and added about 100ml of nitric acid, thinking it was of a much lower concentration than 68%. It turns out it was closer to, if not higher than the azeotropic stuff than expected. After I "neutralized" the HNO3 (not sure it did the job) with pure commercial grade Urea and diluted with water, and then vac filtered, the solution, it was bright green from copper contamination i believe. Anyways, I decided to add commercial grade Sodium metabisulfite mixed with water and then i poured it in...it almost immediately turned brown then black. not much stuff settled to the bottom and the solution was then filtered out to leave a light black particulate of less than half a gram. I believe the solution might still have gold because its as dark brown post filtering as it was before i extracted the fine black particulate. It's almost a root beer color. I tried adding more SMB, way more than should be required and still no go. Still brown/orange as can be and now fuming SO2...nasty stuff. Is there anything i'm doing right? lol Why am i not getting gold to drop out of solution? If there is free HNO3 what can i do to recover the gold, cause Urea just doesn't seem to work. Any input would be helpful.


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## butcher (Feb 10, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot,
Basically your trying to do things you do not understand yet, you may have read some about this skill from the intranet, some of which may have given you only partial or wrong information.

Starting out learning that way is very dangerous, if you begin working with the chemistry with virtually no understanding of what you are actually doing.

As with other professional skills, recovery and refining, and its chemistry is just not as simple as it sounds when you read a few articles or watch some video, it can take years to lean it and gain the skills needed.

It is wise to put away the chemicals until you understand the dangers and reactions and how to deal with them, and learn how to deal with the toxic wastes safely, and you also understand how dangerous the chemicals are that your working with, where some not only create deadly gases or dangerous solutions, salts or even possibly explosive reactions, and the many other dangers related to this profession.

My suggestion is if you are serious about learning this profession is to put away the chemical.
Get out Hoke's book, study it, and the forum, gain the understanding first before harming yourself or others.

Urea will not destroy nitric acid. it can be used to remove NO2 gas in concentrated nitric acid, but will not destroy, or decompose the nitric acid. 

From reading your post, it appears you made many mistakes, you do not understand much about what your trying to do, this makes me believe your putting yourself and others in danger, and if you had more understanding you could of done things differently with much less difficulty and have been melting pure gold by now.

If you keep going the way you are now you, I fear you will just make one mistake after another until you give up or get hurt,or hurt someone else. If you spend time learning and understanding, you have a good chance at becoming successful and skilled in this professional trade.


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## rickbb (Feb 10, 2016)

"What am I not doing right?"

Almost everything. (Trust me, not long ago I was in the same boat as you, until I found this site.)

1. You've mixed up 2 different processes. AR and Cu2Cl.

2. You started to refine a microscopically small amount of gold. 17 grams of fingers is way to small a batch to bother with. It is plated gold so I doubt you could even see the gold after it dropped.

3. You used way too much peroxide, you only add a cap full or 2 to get the process started and keep it going with a simple aquarium air bubbler after that. A 1-1 ratio is enough to dissolved the gold and the copper.

4. You used a VERY large amount of nitric in your AR. You used a 2 to 1 ratio, no one uses that much. Most people would only use a 1 to 4 ratio and only then IF they had a large amount of gold to refine. There is a specific amount of nitric to use based on how much gold you have to dissolve. (Search the forum, it's here.)

5. Never use urea, it's not best for gold or you're safety. Use sulfamic acid instead, and only as much as needed, you won't need much or any if you use the correct amount of nitric for the amount of gold you expect to have.

6. That small amount of black stuff in the bottom, IS your gold. (Along with other stuff due to using way too much nitric.)

As Butcher said, set this stuff aside and study this forum and the books you can download from here.


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## patnor1011 (Feb 10, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot said:


> Hi, i'm very new to hobby refining and this is my first batch of AuCl. I have a similar problem. I think i may have messed up my AR solution with too much HNO3. I'm not sure. I stripped off the gold plating of many computer ram fingers using 1:1 H2O2 + HLC and had 17 grams of platings and some copper with gold melted in them my buddy gave me. So I put 200ml of HCL and added about 100ml of nitric acid, thinking it was of a much lower concentration than 68%. It turns out it was closer to, if not higher than the azeotropic stuff than expected. After I "neutralized" the HNO3 (not sure it did the job) with pure commercial grade Urea and diluted with water, and then vac filtered, the solution, it was bright green from copper contamination i believe. Anyways, I decided to add commercial grade Sodium metabisulfite mixed with water and then i poured it in...it almost immediately turned brown then black. not much stuff settled to the bottom and the solution was then filtered out to leave a light black particulate of less than half a gram. I believe the solution might still have gold because its as dark brown post filtering as it was before i extracted the fine black particulate. It's almost a root beer color. I tried adding more SMB, way more than should be required and still no go. Still brown/orange as can be and now fuming SO2...nasty stuff. Is there anything i'm doing right? lol Why am i not getting gold to drop out of solution? If there is free HNO3 what can i do to recover the gold, cause Urea just doesn't seem to work. Any input would be helpful.


 
So you think you still do have gold dissolved in AR. Simple solution to this dilemma. Test it with stannous.


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## upcyclist (Feb 10, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot, I know it's off-putting, but they're exactly right. If you put your solution away while you learn, it'll be fine. The gold won't go anywhere.

As rickbb pointed out, it's a small amount anyway. You can continue e-scrapping and accumulating enough material to work with while you learn. People on this board process fingers in pound and kilogram amounts. It takes correspondingly more acid*, but the time investment is actually about the same when done correctly. And time IS money, my friend. Even if you're just doing it to learn or as a hobby, that's time you could be spending with your friends & loved ones, or catching up on The Walking Dead 

*side note on acid use: always add acid in smaller amounts as needed, exhausting each batch while you get a feel for the correct amounts, don't just dump in a load and let it work. You'll use far less acid, which both saves you money (duh) and time--because then you won't have as much to process in your waste stream! Also, adding only the minimum required amount of nitric to your AR saves you from having to denoxx as much.


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## FrugalRefiner (Feb 10, 2016)

Guys, I believe he had 17 grams of foils, not 17 grams of fingers.


sir_mix_a_lot said:


> I stripped off the gold plating of many computer ram fingers using 1:1 H2O2 + HLC and had 17 grams of platings and some copper with gold melted in them my buddy gave me.


Having said that, I do agree with most of the advice that's been given.

Dave


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## sir_mix_a_lot (Feb 10, 2016)

Thanks, for the links and suggestions folks i'll read up on this subject a bit more, downloaded a copy of Hoke. And yes the gold platings were just that..from about 2lbs+ of ram fingers and the rest from communications boards with no peripheral electronics, plus some copper and gold my buddy melted when he was messing around with his new torch(a 14K ring and two pennies)to be specific. My separation process of plated printed boards works well, no problems there. The gold did dissolve into solution rather quickly in the HCL+ HNO3 bath. I know i used too much HNO3 and Na2S2O5+H2O. One of my sisters friend who is into organic chem, said i could try boiling the HNO3 out, dilute with HCL and try again using more smb..or stick a chunk of gold 24K in it to use up the HNO3 and try again. I don't have the enough 24K to do any good so i'm not doing that method...not saying boiling will work as it's all hearsay to me, but is the right track even?


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## Barren Realms 007 (Feb 11, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot said:


> Thanks, for the links and suggestions folks i'll read up on this subject a bit more, downloaded a copy of Hoke. And yes the gold platings were just that..from about 2lbs+ of ram fingers and the rest from communications boards with no peripheral electronics, plus some copper and gold my buddy melted when he was messing around with his new torch(a 14K ring and two pennies)to be specific. My separation process of plated printed boards works well, no problems there. The gold did dissolve into solution rather quickly. I know i used too much HNO3 and Na2S2O5+H2O. One of my sisters friend who is into organic chem, said i could try boiling the HNO3 out, dilute with HCL and try again using more smb..or stick a chunk of gold 24K in it to use up the HNO3 and try again. I don't have the enough 24K to do any good so i'm not doing that method...not saying boiling will work as it's all hearsay to me, but is the right track even?



With the amount of nitric you used to HCl you will probably be better off just cementing out the gold from the solution with come copper bus bar. But you are way over on the amount of nitric you used so if you try to keep using the solution you will need to add some HCL at some point because it will get used up before the nitric gets used up. But you could also look at using sulfamic acid to remove the nitric but that will mess up some other parts of the chemical equasion that will need to be addressed.


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## kurtak (Feb 11, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot

With your current case/solution your best bet is to follow Barren Realms advice & use some copper to do what we call cementing your gold out of solution --- you have already added so many other chemicals to your AR that I most certainly would not add anymore chemicals (like sulfamic) to get rid of the free nitric 



> One of my sisters friend who is into organic chem, said i could try boiling the HNO3 out, dilute with HCL and try again using more smb



Note that I underlined "try boiling" --- we NEVER boil solutions that have values in them to evaporate them - we heat them enough so they evaporate but "never" boil them --- when they (solutions) boil - the bubbles "burst" at the surface & they spatter up & out of the vessel you are boiling it in which means values are being lost (spattered) out --- also - because of all the chems you have already added (SMB, Urea etc.) the evaporation method of riding the free nitric is going to cause chemical salts to crystalize when the solution cools

When you use copper to cement your gold out of the solution you need to use "heavy" pieces of copper like bus bars or some flattened out copper pipe - do not use light copper like copper wire --- cementing with copper will "recover" your gold - but it wont be pure gold - you will have to refine it again

The best advice I can give you is to cement your gold out of this solution - let it settle - siphon/decant the solution off - rinse/wash most the chem out (let the gold settle before decanting each rinse/wash) - transfer the "recovered" gold powder into a smaller jar with a non corrosive (non metal) lid & set it aside - then ----------

down load Hokes book - read it & read it till you understand what it is saying --- & spend LOTs of time doing some research on this forum --- then when you have your head better wrapped around how this is actually done you can proceed with refining your gold &/or start asking any questions that you may be confused about from what you learn in research - we will be more then glad to help you - but first you need to get a better understanding of it all - the info is all here

Welcome to the best source of information about refining that you will ever find - anywhere

Kurt


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## jason_recliner (Feb 11, 2016)

The evaporation method you have described _will work_ for excess nitric. Though you will likely have to evaporate, add HCl, evaporate, add HCl, several times before you are completely free of nitric and are ready for SMB. It's a little hard to know when it's finished.

The cementing on copper method, as advised, is probably better in your case. It's certainly faster, and is easier to get it right.


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## rickbb (Feb 11, 2016)

The evaporation method is described well in Hoke's book. Perhaps your sisters friend could use a copy.


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## upcyclist (Feb 11, 2016)

sir_mix_a_lot said:


> not saying boiling will work as it's all hearsay to me, but is the right track even?


Honestly, if you seek out the answer yourself here on the boards, you'll learn a heck of a lot more (and I mean practical, relevant information) than if one of us were to just tell you. While you're looking, you'll also learn about safety, why it works and not just _if _it works, and why there's a huge difference between _boil _and _evaporate _

Edit to add: "here on the boards". Avoid the youtubes until you know enough to discern good teachers from alchemists, hedgewizards, and snake oil salesmen.


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