# Interesting crystals



## mjgraham (Oct 30, 2013)

First off want to thank everyone on here, I would have had no idea how to do any of this other wise. First off as most of us I wanted to make a cell that was easier for me to use I have had a few annoying setups mostly due to rushing then I came up with what I thought was going to be a good filter basket arrangement. I found a tupper ware container that fit in a 1L beaker and cut the bottom out, I then decided to just cut a hole in the bottom and just cover the hole and make an internal snap ring out of 314 SS to hold it in place, I thought that was going to be the good idea. Well I filled the cell and turned it on and left for a bit, 30 min. later the electrolyte was dark and there were needle like crystals growing from the snap ring to the outside of the basket, not it is not electrically connected to anything however it was growing silver on the inside of the basket and the two slots I cut to hold it was growing the dark crystals on the outside plus it was bubbling on the inside. I then tore it down and filtered the electrolyte and it had a dark suspended material that filtered out pretty well. While I know to remove that part now just wondering if anyone had seen something like this. The feed stock was sterling that had been cemented with copper and melted into a slab. The electrolyte has 100g of silver crystals and has had about 150g ran through it.
The cathode is a piece of 316 tig welded to a 316 rod, the rod has heat shrink on it up to above the liquid level. In the overall I moved the cathode closer to increase the amperage, which was 3.3v @ 1.2 A



Filter basket



Basket after removed



Needle crystals



Filters



Cathode



Overall


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## butcher (Oct 30, 2013)

2AgNO3 + Fe --> Fe(NO3)2 + 2 Ag
Iron can displace silver from solution.


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