Any backyard smelters in NJ or Eastern PA? Looking to test black sands.

[Alondro]

I've been panning out glacial moraines in Bordentown which were deposited from the last Ice Age and dragged material all the way from Canada, and I'm finding gold flecks and a few flakes. But I'm also getting a fair amount of heavy black sands. I can see tiny specks of gold in them, too tiny to separate from the black sands. I'm also certain there's galena and a super-dense silvery material consisting of dust-sized grains which could be gold-rich sulfides.

I'd like to smelt a sample with lead as a collector, then cupell and see if these black sands are worth saving for processing.

 

[goldshark]

We have 100's of tons of like material. I sieved to 80 mesh, sent it to assay. The minus 80 was twice as rich as the plus 80. I didn't do a minus 150 mesh test, but may in the future. The black sands assayed at 4grams per metric ton. There was visible Gold , and pyrites under a 15 power loupe. I was surprised at 4 gr. per tonne , despite the visible Gold. My recommendation is to get a legitimate assay done, to determine if it is worth messing with. Tiny visible Au takes a LOT to make an ounce, despite being visible, and plentiful, under a loupe.

 

[Alondro]

We have 100's of tons of like material. I sieved to 80 mesh, sent it to assay. The minus 80 was twice as rich as the plus 80. I didn't do a minus 150 mesh test, but may in the future. The black sands assayed at 4grams per metric ton. There was visible Gold , and pyrites under a 15 power loupe. I was surprised at 4 gr. per tonne , despite the visible Gold. My recommendation is to get a legitimate assay done, to determine if it is worth messing with. Tiny visible Au takes a LOT to make an ounce, despite being visible, and plentiful, under a loupe.

That's why I want a simple assay. If I can't even get a decent little bead out of the few pounds I have with inexpensive methods, then it's not worth saving them.

What makes these interesting is that they're ancient and heavily weathered. Most of the pyrites should be gone, meaning any remaining sulfides must either be lead-based or high PM to resist 10,000 years of direct weathering.

I've found some of the source quartz, which has many small sharp-edged and sculpted cavities where the sulfides used to be.

So I'm hoping these black sands are a little richer than usual.

 

[goldshark]

Interesting enough, the pyrite piece I sent a picture of in the thread " Metal detector screaming at pyrite", under the metal detectors section, has been sitting in a glacial moraine since the last ice age also. The exterior pyrite is weathered very little. It was buried about 20 feet deep, but still in the presence of Oxygen rich descending waters. I have many specimens that have oxidized pyrite cavities right next to a pyrite crystal that looks as fresh as if it came from deep under ground. Lead will oxidize to a mineral called Cerrusite. It has a white luster to it, so it could be considered a silver luster, under the various lighting conditions.
As to your post about a back yard smelter, a smelter is considered smelting for large lots of ore. You may want to post it as " Back yard assayers in NJ area". Probably more people could help you, since not many people could set up a smelter in their back yard. An assayer would be a little easier to do. A couple pounds would still be a large assay. Usually a sample of 1 assay ton is used. This is because of the high cost of materials, fluxes, necessary very accurate scale, and labor.
Anybody with the knowledge and equipment to do this couple of pounds you have, would probably charge a couple of hundred dollars. others wanting to do it just for fun, will most likely mess some aspect of it up, leaving you with no real answer. My advise is to send it to a legitimate assay house. $50 is about the cost for Au/Ag, plus a grinding to 150 mesh fee of $20 = $70 + freight, if you can't drop it off in person.

 

[goldshark]

Assuming you have 5 lbs. of 10 oz. per ton sands. The math is 5/2000 = 1/400 th of a ton. 1/400 th of 10 ozs. would equal 1/40 th of an ounce, or just under a gram. assuming you had these quantities, now you can see how much you will have to get to say gross $500, $1,000, $2,000 per day, or whatever your goal may be. Get a legitimate assay to determine your values, then do the math to realistically see what it will take to do what you want to do.

 

[Alondro]

Assuming you have 5 lbs. of 10 oz. per ton sands. The math is 5/2000 = 1/400 th of a ton. 1/400 th of 10 ozs. would equal 1/40 th of an ounce, or just under a gram. assuming you had these quantities, now you can see how much you will have to get to say gross $500, $1,000, $2,000 per day, or whatever your goal may be. Get a legitimate assay to determine your values, then do the math to realistically see what it will take to do what you want to do.

That's why I just want to have a simple smelt and cupel done. If there's not enough PMs for simple, inexpensive methods I can undertake when I have my own kiln constructed to recover efficiently, then there's no point in saving the black sands.

Basically, if a decent little bead of PMs can be produced from the few pounds of sands I currently have, then it's likely worth saving more. If it's just a tiny speck, it's not.

If there is a good bead, then THAT needs to be properly assayed to determine its composition.

 

[Wolfpacker1]

We have 100's of tons of like material. I sieved to 80 mesh, sent it to assay. The minus 80 was twice as rich as the plus 80. I didn't do a minus 150 mesh test, but may in the future. The black sands assayed at 4grams per metric ton. There was visible Gold , and pyrites under a 15 power loupe. I was surprised at 4 gr. per tonne , despite the visible Gold. My recommendation is to get a legitimate assay done, to determine if it is worth messing with. Tiny visible Au takes a LOT to make an ounce, despite being visible, and plentiful, under a loupe.

Have you ever considered making a concentrate from the 100’s of tons you have available? Test your percentage of mags to see if it is worth removing them before concentrating . All you need is a 30 grams in a ton to make money . That is less than a 10 to one con. Even less if you have a high percentage of mags. Use a jig to make a con or whatever you are comfortable with. There are buyers for this type of material

 

[goldshark]

That is exactly the process that I will try next. The + 80 mesh ran 2 grams per metric tonne, the - 80 ran 4 grams per tonne. Going to screen to - 80 mesh, remove the magnetics, then see what it assays. If results are better, then try maybe a -150 mesh cut.

 

[Tjcary]

I have a small smelter set up in central NJ somerset area if you want me to melt some of your media. I also have all the chemicals needed to try a hydrometallurgical approach as well.

 

[goldshark]

Thank you for your offer. At this point in time, I am just helping some friends in their endeavor to extract the very last, out of their black sands. They have many hundreds of tons of black sands. They run it over a jig, classify, then send over a good table. From what I have seen, they are getting a very good recovery. I do my own assaying, predominately on my own silicious ores. I have not done a black sands melt yet, but through this forum, I have found some info for a very good flux, which I am about to try.

 

[Tjcary]

Yeah flux is the hardest part usually careful with smelting one drop of water o moisture into molten metal blows up with 2.5x the power of tnt. Had a mini blow when i first started and its no joke

 

[Alondro]

More material from a second, very steep ravine in the moraine, about 1/2 a mile from the first spot. Many large boulders in that area, exceedingly iron-rich substrate which forms countless concretions in the soil. This seems to be a hill made entirely of weathered ores of various types dropped by the glacier. I even found native copper crystals this time in addition to the gold flecks.

 

[Alondro]

Notes on the pictures:

First one: 3 small 'fly poops' with a copper crystal above and to the right.

Second one: another 'poop' and a copper crystal 'flower'. It looks very intricate with a magnifying glass, and has sharp edges, so it must have weathered out very recently.

Third one: The biggest flake from my first sample of 2 half-buckets.

 

[Tjcary]

Native copper crystals are really gorgeous I have a large one i picked up from a mineral show and its one of my favorite pieces, definitely not as cool as finding your own. Nice find and good luck!