Do you understand the principle of values cementing on base metals?
One of the biggest mistakes newbies make is to process everything in one lot. When you do so, you can expect a few things. One of them is, assuming you achieve your goal, the gold will not be very clean. That's not a big problem because it can be refined a second time to improve quality.
The biggest problem is the cementing I mentioned. I'm going to assume that you know what you're talking about, and that you did, indeed, dissolve some, if not all of the gold. The problem comes when you allow the gold solution to remain in contact with the remaining base metals. The gold you dissolved is cemented down, and the base metals, regardless of what they may be, go into solution. That will happen until one of two things happen. One of them is that you exhaust all of the values, which are then converted to a powder, and will be found mixed with the solids that remain. The other is that the cementing process will continue until all of the base metals have been consumed, at which time there may or may not be some of the values left in solution. It can go either way.
I saw no mention of you testing your solution with stannous chloride. Did you? If not, why not? Would you drive a car without vision? This appears to escape many that attempt to refine, and it's the biggest mistake you can make. You have no clue if a solution is worth keeping for further processing, or if your gold is still in solution. Color alone isn't always a reliable indicator, which you will come to understand after you've discarded some values, thinking they were no longer in solution.
From your description, I think you're wrong. I don't think you have gold in solution, and if you do, the majority of it is not. Test your solution for a purple to black reaction. If there is no reaction, eliminate the existing solution and go after the values once again. This time, insure that you dissolve all metallic substances before you stop the process. Otherwise, you'll experience the same thing, although it may be a slightly different reaction, depending on how much gold and base metals are present.
The very best policy when you attempt refining is to eliminate base metals as much as is possible------before you attempt to dissolve gold. Otherwise, you can expect the problems outlined, above, routinely.
Read Hoke.
Harold
Edit: Upon re-reading your post, if, by chance, you have dissolved all of the base metals (no metallic substances remaining), your gold may well be in solution. That might account for the green color you mention (a combination of iron, copper, or what ever is present, along with gold). Again, without testing, you can't know that. Testing with stannous chloride is key to your next move.
