# Gold Flake Vials



## toadiesop

I bought some of these on ebay at a great deal last fall. It was someones personal collection and I got over 100 vials for $70.

50 of the vials were the standard 2" ones that you see on ebay for roughly $1 each.

The rest were 4" and a few were around 9" long with the thickness of a broom handle!! So I know I got a deal @ $70. I really didn't know what I was doing at the time, but I just took all the flakes and flashed them with a torch to make smaller nuggets. I still have all of it and it will be processed but I'll never know the exact yield since it was all random vials bought as a lot.

So what do you guys think about these? Do you think it's worth it? Do you think there's over $1 worth of gold in some of those vials?

I may buy another 50 and do a controlled test.


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## Noxx

I never bought gold vials but I suppose the isn't much gold in them...


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## ME CO

Hard to tell without a pic but sounds like gold leaf to me- if so not much weight. Mark


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## catfish

If you look at your vials real close, you will see that they are flakes. They also are submerged in a liquid. When you take them out and dry them for melting, there is very little actual gold. Gold flakes dont melt very good. and also once dried, there is little gold there.

I hope you lots of luck on your endever. My son already went through this ordeal and came up with practicality nothing.

Catfish


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## goldsilverpro

Those cheap gold vials are gold leaf, probably 23 karat. Same stuff is in Goldwasser booze. Also, it is used as decoration on Indian (Asian) food - you can eat it. It originally comes in sheets 3 3/8" square and there's about 8 or 9 grams in 1000 sheets. I may be wrong about this. It may be 500 sheets but, I seem to remember 1000. They probably cut it up to make up the vials. A tiny bit looks like a lot. The vials are a sucker deal. Gold leaf is about 3.5 millionths of an inch thick. It takes almost 300,000 sheets, stacked up, to make an inch. If you put a sheet of it against a window glass, you can see light through it. If you roll a sheet of it around in your fingers, you'll end up with a speck about 1/10 as big as a pinhead, or less.


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## Noxx

Lol ! I was pretty sure there wasn't much gold in them.


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## AuMINIMayhem

I just recently came across a box of 100 of the same same ($50), with the exception that there was zero fluid in them. I cracked open all the vials placed their contents in a container and weighed it to a shocking 8.8 grams.. now I'm wondering if it's actually 23k gold or not.. according to this site http://www.jackhunt.com/gold-calc.html I made roughly $120 in profit.. gotta be something wrong with that though, I'm not THAT much of a sucker. I'm going to fire it in the kiln and see if I can smelt it down and get a button of any appreciable value to it (possibly this w/e). We'll see what happens.. worst case, it was funny money that got blown no harm, no foul.. 8)


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## goldsilverpro

Let's see. Did you just buy this recently? If so, either someone made a big mistake or something is rotten in Denmark. They make 16KT yellow but, it's very pale looking plus, you would still be making a profit. The first thing I would do is to put a small piece of it in nitric. If you don't have nitric, try HCl, HCl + Hydrogen Peroxide, or HCl + Bleach. They make some fairly realistic looking artificial gold leaf out of copper alloys. If copper, it will dissolve in nitric, etc. If copper, it makes sense to leave the water out. They may be worried about corrosion.


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## AgAuPtRh

A friend of mine got totally schnookered on ebay with that stuff. 

But then again we all get a good spanking every now and then. I bought some old boards on Ebay -- advertised as "Military Scrap" -- 85 percent of it was brass/copper plating. 

On many occasions I've written to a seller to confirm that they have tested the item they are selling. No test -- No bid -- No Matter What.


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## Harold_V

AuMINIMayhem said:


> I just recently came across a box of 100 of the same same ($50), with the exception that there was zero fluid in them. I cracked open all the vials placed their contents in a container and weighed it to a shocking 8.8 grams.. now I'm wondering if it's actually 23k gold or not.. according to this site http://www.jackhunt.com/gold-calc.html I made roughly $120 in profit.. gotta be something wrong with that though, I'm not THAT much of a sucker. I'm going to fire it in the kiln and see if I can smelt it down and get a button of any appreciable value to it (possibly this w/e). We'll see what happens.. worst case, it was funny money that got blown no harm, no foul.. 8)



You are aware that there is a faux gold leaf on the market, made of a copper alloy? Comes in large sheets and is easily broken up to flakes. 

Let me suggest that you simply place one of the tiny flakes in nitric. If it fizzes and goes away, you've been had. If it remains bright yellow and does nothing, you did good! If it reacts slightly, but remains intact, you may, indeed, have purchased placer gold-----but I have very serious doubts. 

I'm of the opinion you got screwed! Let us know. The nitric test takes no time and provides instant results, and it's one of the things you should know if you're going to mess with gold. 

Harold


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## toadiesop

Let me just restate what I said before....

I bought A LOT of vials for $70. It was from a "collector" I just torched it and I still have all the "remains" 

LIke I said, I bought a collection. Be wary of anything else. But I obviously feel that these flakes can be worth it, if you know what you're looking at and you can trust the people you're buying from.


edit****

I've had (and still have) some of those faux copper gold flakes. If I can find them tomorrow, I'll post some pics side by side with real gold foil.

I remember they smelled like "plastic paint" when I tried to melt them.. :lol:


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## darkelf2x1

right now im eyeing a possible gold mine but im waiting for the tests with apx 6 ounces to be had plus this source might be a renewable one


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## AuMINIMayhem

yeah, I'm pretty much a skeptic myself about the whole thing.. I'd love to do the nitric thing IF I could find nitric around town, having a helluva time finding it.. (there's a whole thread somewhere on here about it.. anyone who wants to post an answer an find the thread I'm talking about WINS!!!.. [a gold star :lol: ])

No biggie though.. I knew I was going to come across scams and whatnot as I get into this, but hey, I figure it this way, I don't spend any money that I can't afford losing..  

now if I can just find that damn nitric somewhere local .. :twisted:


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## lazersteve

Mayhem, 

You really crack me up!!

Here's the nitirc recipie you're wanting:

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=315

I posted to it a few days back. Be sure to read the whole thread there's a lot of good info in it. Catfish tested my theory and he says it's good stuff!

Enjoy,

Steve

P.S.: You do know that the topics that you haven't read show up as an orange piece of paper on the left right? If you see a lot of orange topics you got lots of reading to do. The orange icon goes white when you've read everything. I read all of them (no orange on my page)!

Steve


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## catfish

Auminimayhem:

You can buy a test kit from Ebay that has all four karrat gold test acids and one for silver for about 25 bucks.

Or you can make your own concentrated nitric acid that works fairly well. It will be about 50% concentrate. If you are interested, then go to Help Needed section and review the topic "Concentrated Nitric acid.

I have made Nitric acid a couple of times using this method and it works great and you will be supprised at the results.

All you need is some Sodium Nitrate or Nitrate soda "synonymous" (which you can purchase from just about any garden or feed store. 4 Lbs for $6.00.) and some hydrochloric acid.

You may want to check this link out.

You can also purchase Concentrated Nitric acid (reagent grade) from A & B Prospecting Supplies for $29.95 per gallon, but there is a $30.00 Haz Met handling fee. That makes it about $60.00 a gal plus shipping. The last I got was about $75.00 per gallon. I find that to be too expensive. so now after Steve and Cris has developed this formula, I wiil make my own. I find that this Nitric acid will do every thing I want to to.

I also have all the commerical test acids too.

Catfish


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## AuMINIMayhem

Steve... *laughing*.. ummmm, yeahhhhh, I kinda hit the "mark all topics read" button thinking it would mark the ones I have read, not mark them as having been read..  Anyways, I had read that recipe (yesterday, I think) and it seemed a bit more complex than I was willing to try, but heck I think I'll give it a shot in a week or so..

Okay, back to the "gold flakes"..

I did the HCL+H2O2 rinse tonight and had two very interesting things happen.
1) a pretty quick, but mild exothermic reaction (no detectable gases, however.. at least not any I could smell..)
2) 85-90% turned black, the rest dropped out as a solid, somewhat gold in color. I ran it through eight coffee filters as you would with the cell precips. (at this point very much diluted with water). I wound up with a very VERY pretty blue color, almost identical to *this color*. I'm assuming this shows a high copper content. However there was quite a bit of "black stuff" left over in the coffee filters. Now I know aluminum also burns off into a blackish goo in the presence of HCL, so I'm not exactly sure what I have here. I plan on doing some melts this w/e with my new kiln, so we'll see what kind of result I get with that (it'll probably be about the size of a BB, by my estimations.)

I'll keep you all updated.. :idea: would anyone on here be interested in assaying just for the hell of debunking the "gold flake" phenomenon on Ebay? I'll send it (or a sample of it to you) through the post if you're game. PM me if interested.


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## lazersteve

Mayhem,

This method is a notoriously slow reaction. From your description it doesn't 'sound' like you waited very long. The 'gold flakes' may take a few days to be completely stripped of copper. The black is a sign of copper (copper oxides). You'll know it's done when the gold foil floats freely in the bottom of the solution.


Steve


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## AuMINIMayhem

ahhh.. dang it.. it dissolved almost instantly in the solution leaving some "balck oxides" and blue water.. I figured it being so fine (flakes, not even grains) that the reaction was done.. well, I'll see what I got, but it's not sounding all that promising (I'd be happ if there was ANY gold, to tell the truth)


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## goldsilverpro

Mayhem,

I totally agree with Steve's analysis of the situation. You didn't complete the dissolving and the black is most likely copper. 

Aluminum chloride is either white or a clear colloidal gel like material. When you dissolve commercial aluminum alloys in HCl, the remaining residue, which comes from the metals added to harden the aluminum, will often be black. However, when you made your first post on this thread, one of the things I thought of was aluminum bronze, a gold-look-a-like yellow alloy that has strange dissolving properties.

I wish you had photos of the gold flakes before you started trying to dissolve them. Did they look like small flat dull mining nuggets or like the bright gold plating that flakes off when you dissolve the metal underneath it? This whole thing is very curious.

It seems that your work is a good start in debunking the sale of phony gold. If I had a fire assay setup, I would surely be interested in running a sample of this material. But, alas.

Keep us posted


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## goldsilverpro

It sure gets confusing when these posts get mixed up.

Sounds like the original idea of it being faux gold leaf was probably right.

Those crooks on eBay are going to ruin it for the honest dealer and they should be caught and banned. I don't know how one would go about this. Some benevolent person should probably buy a sample of everything, test it, and raise hell about the crooks. Sort of an eBay watchdog. Maybe, eBay would pay for this service (dream along). I don't think they want crooks on there any more than we do.

My supplementary money making hobby, for 40 years, has been hand carving mahogany, gold leafed, high end signs. It's a passion. They are the "Cape Cod" type sign that you see all over New England. When I first started, I used fake gold leaf. It is quite a bit thicker than the real gold leaf. In appearance, it will fool the novice. It can't be used outside because it turns green. Twenty years ago, I made my brother a outdoor house sign. I looked at it the other day. All of the clear coat is long gone, but the real gold on the letters looked brand new.


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## toadiesop

Okay guys, I found some of my old vials and scraped a bunch of remaining flakes out of them. I dissolved them in 22K gold testing solution (nitric) in the bottom of a test tube which was actually one of the 6" vials I got that still had a lot of flake stuck to the sides.

Heres what I got. Very yellow.












What do you think?

Should I keep going and try to process? Not that I'm comsidering even getting anything of value but can I use the AR formula and just drop some urea and meta, in VERY small amounts, to see if ANY gold precipitates?


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## toadiesop

So I'm guessing from goldsilverpro's answer in the AR thread in the chemicals section, this can't be pure gold. There were a few flakes that I tried on a dish that DID NOT react at all. Those I got out of a bag.

The stuff I put in the solution came out of vials. 

So apparently, some dissolve and some don't, and I'm sure everyones milage will vary. :wink: 

Now back to the vials and my yellow nitric... wouldn't copper turn the soultion green-blue, as was said earlier??


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## toadiesop

Here's a picture of the gold NOT dissolving on the plate. All these flakes have a drop of 22K solution on them. like I said these flakes came out of a bag I had while everything I put in the solution came from vials.







It looks like it'll be hit or miss for us until we know who on Ebay is selling the 24K or the impostor flakes. 


This mission sounds right up my alley!! 8)


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## goldsilverpro

It sure looks like pure gold chloride with no copper in it. When treating it I agree that VERY SMALL AMOUNTS is the keyword. You may dissolve some meta in water and add it with an eyedropper. If you add too much urea, you will end up with a white precipitate. I would try to pour the liquid off this before adding the meta. When all the gold has dropped, the yellow color should be gone. If gold doesn't drop, iron also gives a yellow color.


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## toadiesop

Cool I'll try it out and let you guys know later tonight. Thanks again.

Also, what is the 22K test solution REALLY. The bottle says "Contains Nitric Acid" but gives no percentages.

Is it just AR? (nitric and HCL)


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## goldsilverpro

I'm sure that the 22KT testing solution is some mixture of aqua regia - HCl plus nitric acid. The only other thing in it might be a little distilled water.

Sorry I haven't commented more on this thread. To be honest, I've been a little confused as to what was what and didn't really know how to comment.


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## Harold_V

toadiesop said:


> Here's a picture of the gold NOT dissolving on the plate.



It has already been mentioned by GSP that iron will yield a gold colored solution in AR. 

The un-dissolved bits may be nothing more than black sand. Did you witness the presence of any when you started?

That the solution is amber is a good sign of gold, but it's not conclusive. Have you tested the solution with stannous chloride to determine if it's gold? If the material included copper, you should have achieved a green colored solution. Considering it is lacking, and I don't see signs of any flocculence (no silver chloride), I can't help but wonder if what you dissolved isn't just a man made product. While 999 gold has been found in nature, it's much more common to be alloyed with silver. I see no signs of that, although if the bits on the plate have a coating that leans gray/green in color, that's a good sign the material is a gold/silver alloy, and dissolution has stopped due to the formation of a hard silver chloride crust. In that case it won't be white, and there wouldn't be little to no flocculence in the solution. Those bits, in that case, may very well be placer gold. 

I've processed a reasonable amount of placer gold in my years. One observation I made early on is that black sand that doesn't dissolve in the process tends to make a change in color, shifting to a salmon color of sorts. If you find those tiny spots are leaning in that direction, that may be an indicator of what they are. 

Do keep in mind, everything I did was done with heat added, so a cold dissolution may not affect black sand the same way. I simply don't know!

Harold


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## toadiesop

Thanks for the info Harold.

So about my test....

I added about 4-5 pellets of urea and it stopped fizzing. I repoured to remove the tiny bit of urea that was left. I started adding meta and it reacted quickly and violently. When it subsided I added more until the solution was clear. It took about 1 1/2 teaspoons.

When the solution was clear I lifted and low and behold, brown sediment. Of course it wasn't a lot (maybe .1 grams) but it was proof of concept.

I don't have stannous to test with but the test tube I used that still had all the flakes stuck to the side says "Pure Gold"

I know there's some rip-off on ebay, and I don't have a full vial yet to see the exact yield, but I have a few different samples on the way that I plan on processing and figuring out yield per vial.


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## champ110

a per vial yield would be a great thing to know


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## AuMINIMayhem

hey guys... just so you know had to take half a xannie bar today so my post and spelling may be a bit off.. helluva day to say the least ..

withouth further ado, the info someone requested earlier :

here's the ebay seller I bought mine from if anyone was interested (i destroyed all I had, unfortunately.. however the picture I'm going to post looks exactly as what I receieved...

The listing number is: 330095587119

and here's the pic they posted.. but I noticed the seller has nothing listed at this time.. :roll: 








woooooo... ok, nighty-night time.. so very tired.. :? ... catch up with you guys later..

Derek


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## toadiesop

okay, I got 2 different sources. The first is a bag of flake... never said 24K or even real gold... I bought it for a few dollars.. I'm going to melt that tonight, but I did put a drop of that 22k solution I have on a few flakes and it looks kind of green.

The other auction I won was 10 vials of LABELED 24K in solution.. the soultion is just rubbing alcohol (as my nose told me). I took 5 of the vails, emptied them in a coffee filter, borax, blah, you know the rest. 

I'll post a picture of the nugget in about an hour or so. I'm going to do the first bag of material now.. My guess (and I lost my scale so I can't tell, but you guys will be able to by size I think)

I still think it may be worth it. I'll be back around 10 EST with some pictures.


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## AuMINIMayhem

sweet.. I'm curious what you came up with. you gonna post in this thread or in the gallery section?..


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## toadiesop

Sorry guys, I'm in the middle of a move and all the USB cables are packed for the camera. :? 

I have to go pick up the keys for our new apartment about an hour awau tpday so I'll post the pictures when I get home later today.

Like I said, the nugget I got from 5 vials is tiny, but I know it doesn't take much gold to have 5 dollars worth and I know I didn't get all of it. There's still some in slag that I didn't have time to remelt.

As for the bag of "flake" it's what I expected...... copper.

I'll be back later.

edit*******

nevermind, I found a USB cable.

Here's the bag of flake...






Here's what I got. :x 







I don't have pictures of the vials, but they're standard vials that we've all seen. About a 1/4 inch wide and an inch tall. So this is what I got with just 5 of those vials. The best part is that it was soooo easy. Since the flake was already in alcohol it was just pouring it into the filter, a little borax, torch, done.

Like I said, there's still some in the slag that I have to remelt when I have time.






My scale is missing so I can't weigh, but if it's even 1/4 gram that's more than I paid for it. 8)


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## AuMINIMayhem

nicely done!.. I'll expect your full investigative report by the end of the day, lieutenant. 8) For real, though.. major kudos!


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## toadiesop

So do you guys think that little nugget next to that dime is more than $5 worth of gold?


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## goldsilverpro

If it's 1/10" thick and solid and 24KT and I measured it right, it's about .5 grams. It's about .117" X .146"


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## toadiesop

Thanks goldsilverpro. Looks like I'll be buying more.... 8)


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## goldsilverpro

Don't buy it based on my funky measurements. It probably isn't pure. If you don't have a scale, ask a pawn shop guy to weigh it.


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## toadiesop

It says 24k flake so i would imagine the nugget is real close...but you know how that goes. And I do have a scale, it's just lost in move (moving on Sat). I guess I could take it into the pawn shop if I make it down that way today.

It's hard to "guesstimate" doing only 5 vials though. I'm going email the guy I got if from and see if he'll combine shipping on 50 vials. That should make a nugget that's a lot more "telling"

We'll see. If I don't make a decent profit at least I'll have a nice conversation piece :lol: 

After I melt a few hundred vials I'll send it to one of you pros on here (I'm still in the learning process with AR so I know I won't get .999)

If one of you wants to purify it after I have a nice sized nugget we'll know for sure if it's worth it.

I'm very optimistic about it though.


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## AuMINIMayhem

:idea: You know what I think?.. I think you should let someone else in on your source, someone you could trust, that way you'd have two different people .. maybe even three.. always better to have a few different people analyzing a source.. 

alright.. I'll accept your offer! :lol: :lol: 

just kidding  , but perhaps Steve or Goldsilver or Harold might want to take a look and make sure you're not getting "hosed".. I merely suggest them because they seem like they have the most experience and have been the most upfront and willing to share that experience (no offense to anyone whom I haven't seen post yet.. I'm still new, so don't get all tweaked..  )


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## toadiesop

Hehehe!!

I'm not afraid to share my source with the regulars here, I just don't want to post it publicly. You know what I mean? Then it will be like the pins which were $30/# a few months ago and now they're $60/#.

Plus, most of the information here has already found it onto fleabay in PDF format. I'll PM you with the link to the vials I got in a little while Mayhem.
And the people you named were the exact same 3 people I would trust sending it to. :lol:


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## AuMINIMayhem

LOL!.. wow, I'm in the "inner cirle"??? :shock:  I've never been in the inner circle on anything! (insert sappy music here) you're the best!..  don't worry, mums the word on my end, it's wikked hard to catch a break, so I'm certainly not one to abuse it when they come my way..

Thanks again!
Derek


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## jewelerdave

The Gold leaf vials are easy to make, When I was 16 and working at a Scout camp we made them and gave them away to kids who panned for gold,
All it was was baby oil and a couple sheets of leaf, it was given a few shakes to break up then squirted into the little bottles.
I calculated out The cost at the time. the vials cost us about $25 cents. and the baby oil and leaf combined cost another 12 cents.
THIS WAS PAYING RETAIL FOR THE GOLD AND BABY OIL!!!
They cost us 37 cents each to make. this was in the early 90s
We charged $1 for gold panning and they got to keep the vial at the end of the panning lesson with the gold leaf. We just didn't have it in the budget to let them keep the placer gold. But we made enough that the kids who didnt have a dollar we could quietly give a few away.

When I was younger we made them and sold them to tourist traps for a dollar each to sell to tourists for $2 to $3, some stores sold them for as much as $5
Much the same as a soda. 12 cents in syrup and some water gets sold for $2.50 any more.

So bottom line, are they kinda cool, yeah. cheesy, defiantly. Worth buying to refine, Defiantly not unless they are free, the vials are worth more than the gold.

david


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## goldsilverpro

Dave, at less than 12 cents for 2 sheets, you must have been using faux gold leaf. It couldn't have been real gold. My hobby for 40 years has been hand carved, mahogany, 23K gold-leafed signs. In the early '90's, I bought the leaf in bulk, 500 sheets at a time, for about 70 cents per sheet (3-3/8" X 3-3/8"). And that was the cheapest price available.


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## jewelerdave

yeah that sounds right 12 cents worth of bottle filler not per sheet, Same thing you probably use, we got them for about 90 cents a sheet, a sheet would make about 8 to 10 vials full of oil and foil, it was marked and sold to us in little packets of about 3x3 sheets and called deep 23k XXX someting, its been a while, they didnt need much more than a square inch to 3/4 a square inch in each to look good.
So yeah the scouts were paying about 20 cents a sheet more than you were but it was only purchased one booklet at a time. I think 28 to 30 sheets are in a book if I am not mistaken? I dont remember, but it was about 12 cents per vial to make. NOT 12 cents per sheet. And at 25 cents a vile plus the 12 makes for 37 cents each, we did the cost after we finished with a case of 144 vials, oil, and leaf and thats the average figure we came up with.
I cant find a problem in the math or the product at that rate. The viles were only the size of someones finger.


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## heritagegroup

Hello all. I am new and have spent the last two days reading and learning. I have 120 grams of supposedly gold flake. I am going to cook it down using hcl-cl method and see how much gold is really in there. We melted some and it does have a good amount that you can see but it is alot copper also. I will post pictures soon.


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## heritagegroup

Ok here are the pictures. What a surprise. Any Comments?


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## heritagegroup

smelting with glass


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## heritagegroup

broken glass


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## heritagegroup

more


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## heritagegroup

ditto


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## heritagegroup

and...


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## aflacglobal

Dam good camera.


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## heritagegroup

in water


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## heritagegroup

more than expected


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## heritagegroup

let me know, admin...

Here is where I found this idea. I just wanted to take this "gold flake" and see how much gold was really in it. I ran out of propane but this came out of about 165 grams of flake.

http://www.prospectorsparadise.com/html/smelting.html


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## aflacglobal

I would say that if it is copper, which from the green flames looks so.
That it would make up the majority of the material.
Try removing the base metals before you go directly to the hcl-cl.

Why the glass ?


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## heritagegroup

Ok, check out the link on the last post. This guy says that the glass smelts with the copper and when it bonds with the copper it makes copper nitrate. When it cools the copper just crumbles off with the glass and the gold remains. Kinda messy to clean up though. Anyone know if HCL will desolve glass?


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## heritagegroup

since I was using this crappy oxy propane torch I probably made he batches too big since I needed to get the entire chunk molten. Small chunks are definately easier. I used a cast iron hot plate .It looks like about 25 grams or so of gold out of 165 grams of flake once I get it all cleaned up.


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## aflacglobal

heritagegroup said:


> let me know, admin...
> 
> Here is where I found this idea. I just wanted to take this "gold flake" and see how much gold was really in it. I ran out of propane but this came out of about 165 grams of flake.
> 
> http://www.prospectorsparadise.com/html/smelting.html




Bullshit. :shock: ( not you heritage ) :wink: 

I'm no expert but that's B.S. you cant remove that much metal efficently with this method.

Dissolve the foils in AP to remove the base metals and continue on with the hcl-cl method. The remaining foils after AP should be almost pure anyway so when you go to hcl-cl you should get a pretty clean drop with smb
It should not take that much acid to do it . Plus it's a lot cleaner and easier than that crazy process.


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## heritagegroup

I know what you are saying. This flake was sold as gold but we all know it will have copper in it. I just wanted to see how much gold was really in it in a fast way.It definately has alot of gold in it. I don't want to say how much I paid for it cause it was alot and I will look stupid here but so far there is alot of gold in it.
Sorry if this over the top as a newbie. I just wanted to show you guys. It is going to be a trick to clean this though. But the point is that some of this gold flake is kinda for real. It would have been easier in hcl-cl.


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## aflacglobal

Hey, don't feel alone. I'm the same way. lol

The main trick for gold refining is to remove as much as the base metals as possible before the final processing. The less trash you have going in the less you have coming out. Just think Base metals. It's all about selective removal of unwanted metals from the mix. Very seldom is this a one step process. It requires several processes.


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## Harold_V

I've never heard a more idiotic idea in my entire life. Melting (NOT smelting) with glass serves no purpose aside from complicating future operations. You missed a golden opportunity to clean up that material while it was in a finely divided state. It should have NOT been melted. 

I'm not directing my comments (idiotic idea) at you, heritagegroup, but the person that told you about the process-----which makes no sense. 

Readers should be careful about the information they accept as good, or functional. All too many of these people don't have a clue. 

Harold


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## heritagegroup

I just wanted to see and to show that there is gold is some gold flake. It was really quite interesting. The gold formed nuggets anywhere from 1/4 to well over a gram. Big chunks of gold stuck in the copper/glass whatever it is and it just crumbles off the gold like sand and leaves the nuggets behind. The problem is cleaning it up but it was very easy to do. Boric, crushed glass(silicate) and a propane torch. I was not attempting to get 24k pure , just wanted to see if the flake I bought was a rip off . It was obviously not.
At say 20 a gram....I am definitely ahead...


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## Never_Evil

Lets say gold is selling for $800 per troy ounce. ( that is the average right now +/- $10)

One troy ounce is about 31.1 grams.

$800/31.1 grams is $25.72 per gram

If you have 20 sheets per gram, then that equals $1.28 per sheet. That is assuming 100% return upon selling the gold. 

If you use www.midwestrefineries.com they pay 94% on pure gold so you will only get $1.20 back per sheet if its at near purity. Of course, time, acids, and other materials are not factored in, but it gives you a good base price of what you want to buy at.

Sorry for making this a word problem, but too many people are eager to have gold, they dont want to do their due diligence of running the numbers. 

I will admit to buying one of those tiny tiny vials of gold flake. I was fortunate enough to buy it for 1 penny and paying under $4 for shipping. To me, I bought it for the "awesome to have" factor, not the money factor. 

Just look before you leap on what you buy that is "gold" and buy it right. I hope this gives you and others a good insite.

Dennis


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## macfixer01

Just as a reality check of how little gold there is in gold leaf, look at this auction. It appears to be legitimate gold leaf for craft purposes. They sell one hundred 1.5 inch square sheets of 24K gold leaf (0.2 to 0.4 microns thick) for the equivalent of $13.78 USD. Plus some slightly inflated shipping from Thailand.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=310003818932

macfixer01


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## Harold_V

heritagegroup said:


> I just wanted to see and to show that there is gold is some gold flake. It was really quite interesting. The gold formed nuggets anywhere from 1/4 to well over a gram. Big chunks of gold stuck in the copper/glass whatever it is and it just crumbles off the gold like sand and leaves the nuggets behind. The problem is cleaning it up but it was very easy to do. Boric, crushed glass(silicate) and a propane torch. I was not attempting to get 24k pure , just wanted to see if the flake I bought was a rip off . It was obviously not.
> At say 20 a gram....I am definitely ahead...



*You're not paying attention.*

That you melted the material proved nothing except that it could be melted. It is likely mostly copper, and if not, a copper alloy. Look at it like this. Copper is about 2/3 the weight of lead, and gold is not quite double the weight of lead. The melted material, assuming it was predominantly gold, would be very heavy as compared to anything you may have picked up with a similar volume. I venture a guess that it is not. I also venture a guess that the color is not anywhere near that of pure gold. Is the end product yellow, or is it rosy red? Is it covered in red oxides? If, when red hot, and you drop it in water, does it shed the oxide coating that's sure to be there, and leave a dull copper color? Pure gold looks like the picture I've posted, below. 

As I said, you should have tested with nitric acid-----not melted. Nitric would have immediately dissolved any of the copper alloys, leaving behind only the gold, or other values. That would have been a true measure, although not to be construed as an assay. 

Now that you have it melted, one thing you can do is apply a drop of nitric to the material to see what kind of reaction you get. If it stays shiny, does not change color, and gives up no brown fumes, you have gold. If it gives up fumes, the solution changes anywhere from blue to green, and the surface of the material in question changes color, what you have is a copper alloy. It may or may not contain gold----and that, too, can be determined, but right now that's not the issue. 

I recommend you do nothing more with this material until you understand good and proper testing and refining. Thus far, the only thing you've managed to prove is that you can melt it----nothing more. Do NOT jump to the conclusion that you have gold. You may not have. 

For your own good, learn to walk before you start running. If you'd like advice on what to do, and how to do it, ask. 

Harold


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