24 lbs ram yield?

[JBo]

Hi everyone,

I'm trying my first batch of ram soon (never done gold recovery before). I have 24 lbs or ram. How much gold will that most likely yeild? Any tips and tricks you guys have to help decrease gold loss? I will be using the HCl/bleach method to make poor mans AR.

 

[anachronism]

One little point- HCl/bleach isn't poor man's AR.

That's HCl and a Nitrate.

 

[Shark]

One little point- HCl/bleach isn't poor man's AR.

That's HCl and a Nitrate.

That is a point that kind of burns me as well. If I didn't understand the difference I would hold off on running that much ram.

Better yet how about listing the steps you plan to use in detail so we can better understand your thought process and be prepared to point out any mistakes before they may occur.

 

[kernels]

Top tip is to start small, will mean you make smaller mistakes. Be constantly aware of how much waste acid you are creating, I cringe now at the gallons of waste I was creating for a few grams of Gold early on.

Take safety seriously. Get yourself some cheap lab glass, kitchen pyrex is not the same thing.

There are about a million more little tips, but I think those are the key ones.

Once you have the ram split into fingers and chips we will be able to guide you better as to the yield you can expect.

 

[JBo]

One little point- HCl/bleach isn't poor man's AR.

That's HCl and a Nitrate.

That is a point that kind of burns me as well. If I didn't understand the difference I would hold off on running that much ram.

Better yet how about listing the steps you plan to use in detail so we can better understand your thought process and be prepared to point out any mistakes before they may occur.

My steps:

1. Trim gold fingers off of ram boards making sure the gold fingers are clean of any steel and other small IC chips.

2. Put ram fingers in a bucket with a bumbling aquarium pump and aquarium heater set to 85 degrees Fahrenheit. Pour 31.45% HCl until it covers the fingers, keeping track of how much HCl I poured in. Then pour 1/3 of the volume of HCl I used of 3% hydrogenperoxide.

3. When all the foils have detatched, (I expect 48-36 hours) poor acid foil mixture though coffee filter to filter foils out of the mixture. Then take each individual ram finger and spray with distilled water to get residual foils stuck to the ram fingers off.

4. Rise the foils and residual circuit board junk caught in the filter with 31.45% HCl to dissolve any remaining Cu and other base metals.

5. Take coffee filter with foils and residual circuit board material and rinse the foils into a 250mL beaker with distilled water. Wait for the mixture to settle and decant distilled water into waste bucket.

6. Take the 250mL beaker with foils and residual circuit board material and pour 31.45% HCl into the beaker until it covers the foils. Then slowly add Clorox bleach to the mixture (about 10mL at a time with a dropper) and mix, repeating this process however many times nessessary, until all the foils are dissolved.

7. Take the gold solution and poor through a coffee filter to filter out residual circuit board material.

8. Take the filtered gold solution and add the same mass of SMB as I expect to get gold yield slowly after dissolving the SMB in enough distilled water to dissolve the SMB. (I have 24 lbs of ram, so I'm not sure how much gold to expect). Mix until the solution turns mud brown. Let the mixture settle for 24 hours.

9. Pour the gold powder mixture through a coffee filter.


Any big mistakes? How much gold should I yield from 24 lbs or ram if I follow these steps exactly?

 

[denim]

Don't forget about the chips. They have a good amount of gold inside of them as well. Plenty of information about processing chips here in the forum. Your ram fingers should yield about 2-2.25 grams of gold per pound of fingers.
You have a lot of work, and perhaps studying, ahead of you so take your time and be safe.
Don't forget to let your filtered solution stand over night so the chlorine can gas-off before you add the smb. Otherwise the gold may not drop the way you want it to.

Dennis

 

[anachronism]

Thanks for the info.

Don't use as much H2O2 as that- it requires much less than that to start the reaction. The reaction will self sustain once it begins especially with the air bubbler.

 

[JBo]

Thanks for the info.

Don't use as much H2O2 as that- it requires much less than that to start the reaction. The reaction will self sustain once it begins especially with the air bubbler.

Ok. How much H2O2 should I use? Also, how much SMB should I use when precipitating the gold? I know you're supposed to use about as much as you expect your gold yield to be, but I don't know how much gold I will get with around 900g (1.99 lbs) of gold fingers.

 

[miroman]

If you trim the fingers as near as possible, you should receive ~ 70-75 gram of each kilo RAM. You have 22 lbs (10 kg), so the result should be 700-750 g. fingers.
The yield should be 4.5-5.5 g. 24k. gold per kilo, so at the end you should have 3-4 g. gold.

Don't forget to add urea BEFORE SMB, as if you have a nitric in the solution, part of your gold will dissolve again immediately after precipitation.

Regards, Miro.

 

[rucito]

Hello,
from 31 pieces RAM weighing 595 grams I received this:
Fingers -36.4 g gold 0.16 g
chips -196 g gold 0,26 g
I can not say whether this is good or not, but that's my result.
Even if it's not very accurate, you'll have some idea what to expect.

 

[anachronism]

If you trim the fingers as near as possible, you should receive ~ 70-75 gram of each kilo RAM. You have 22 lbs (10 kg), so the result should be 700-750 g. fingers.
The yield should be 4.5-5.5 g. 24k. gold per kilo, so at the end you should have 3-4 g. gold.

Don't forget to add urea BEFORE SMB, as if you have a nitric in the solution, part of your gold will dissolve again immediately after precipitation.

Regards, Miro.

Hi Miro

I think 4 - 4.5g is more realistic on the fingers and I'd be using Sulphamic acid rather than urea to knock out the Nitric.

 

[Shark]

Less peroxide and the use sulfamic are the two main points I see as well.

The peroxide should only need an ounce or so. Just add a very small amount until you just start to notice a green tint start to appear. From there your air bubbling in should do the work. If you use to much Peroxide you may put some gold into solution but that is not a big deal. It will cement back out as the process moves along. It will come out as a fine, (usually) brown powder. The less peroxide you use reduces this and makes for a lot of pretty gold foils.

I have never used urea (based on the information found around the forum here). I have used sulfamic ever since I started out. It is actually easier to get locally for me than urea as well. One of the main reasons is that it will help to reduce any lead out of your gold while neutralizing the excess nitric. There is lots of info on the forum concerning that and is fairly easy to find.

For the chips, check out Patnors post. Lots of good ideas there and it covers about everything that you would need to do the job.

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=11827

Edit:
Just to add another point. When you filter your gold solution a coffee filter may not get all the waste the first time through. Run it through your filter until it is perfectly clear. The saying is "filter it until you can read a newspaper through it". When it is that clear, you have some very clean gold.

 

[JBo]

Less peroxide and the use sulfamic are the two main points I see as well.

The peroxide should only need an ounce or so. Just add a very small amount until you just start to notice a green tint start to appear. From there your air bubbling in should do the work. If you use to much Peroxide you may put some gold into solution but that is not a big deal. It will cement back out as the process moves along. It will come out as a fine, (usually) brown powder. The less peroxide you use reduces this and makes for a lot of pretty gold foils.

I have never used urea (based on the information found around the forum here). I have used sulfamic ever since I started out. It is actually easier to get locally for me than urea as well. One of the main reasons is that it will help to reduce any lead out of your gold while neutralizing the excess nitric. There is lots of info on the forum concerning that and is fairly easy to find.

For the chips, check out Patnors post. Lots of good ideas there and it covers about everything that you would need to do the job.

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=11827

Edit:
Just to add another point. When you filter your gold solution a coffee filter may not get all the waste the first time through. Run it through your filter until it is perfectly clear. The saying is "filter it until you can read a newspaper through it". When it is that clear, you have some very clean gold.

Thanks so much! Where can I get sulphuric acid? Does this work?

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Custom-Building-Products-Aqua-Mix-1-lb-Sulfamic-Acid-Crystals-050231/300176044

 

[anachronism]

sulFAMIC not sulfuric mate 8)

 

[jimdoc]

JBo.

The more you study this forum for what you plan to do, the less risk of screwing up your investment in that 24 lbs of ram. Your gold can wait until it is guaranteed to be recovered correctly and safely.

Here is a tip: Don't do it all at once, since you are just starting out.

 

[Shark]

I get mine from Home Depot. The way I understand it is when you add the sulfamic acid to gold chloride it neutralizes the nitric acid. While neutralizing the nitric acid the Sulfamic acid is converted to sulfuric acid. The sulfuric acid then drops the lead out as a lead sulfate. I am not good on chemistry so if this is wrong maybe someone else can explain it a bit better.


And Jimdoc is right, read the forum as it has such a huge amount of information, and much of it is geared towards the beginner. I have been around the forum for around 5 years and look up new things almost daily on the forum.

 

[FrugalRefiner]

miroman, anachronism, and Shark, there is no need to use sulfamic or urea. He's using HCl and bleach to dissolve his foils, so there are no nitrates.

JBo, after you dissolve the foils, allow the solution to sit for 24 hours or heat it for a while to drive off any excess chlorine before precipitating the gold with SMB.

Dave

 

[Shark]

miroman, anachronism, and Shark, there is no need to use sulfamic or urea. He's using HCl and bleach to dissolve his foils, so there are no nitrates.

JBo, after you dissolve the foils, allow the solution to sit for 24 hours or heat it for a while to drive off any excess chlorine before precipitating the gold with SMB.

Dave

While I do agree that sulfamic is not a requirement on this process I still use it. I seldom use hcl/bleach anymore. I find that I tend to not forget when I use the same process (at least in my mind) that I use for most other materials. I also seldom run just one type of fingers as well, and feel that it saves me headaches in the long run. I tend to use a combination of heat and sulfamic, mainly for my peace of mind.

 

[anachronism]

miroman, anachronism, and Shark, there is no need to use sulfamic or urea. He's using HCl and bleach to dissolve his foils, so there are no nitrates.

JBo, after you dissolve the foils, allow the solution to sit for 24 hours or heat it for a while to drive off any excess chlorine before precipitating the gold with SMB.

Dave

The one point I missed is the one point Dave will be on like a hawk. 8) He's right though jbo - no need if you're not using poor man's AR. Though if you do, you'll need it.

 

[JBo]

Thanks to everyone for all the advice. You guys are so kind and helpful!