Buying jewelry off ebay?

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Define cheap.

Cheap by retail standards perhaps but calculate the scrap value before you bid. The majority of auctions meet or exceed scrap value. You can get a good buy once and a while, but they are not easy to find.
 
The so-called gold leaf contains no gold, 99% of the time. You should have read the many posts on the subject before you leaped.

Cheap is a clue that it's worthless. Most everything goes for top dollar. The buyers are pretty wise, although many overbid.
 
I wish you had searched the forum on those fake gold vials. Several members have failed to find any gold in them.

This page covers the basic markings.

http://www.utilisegold.com/jewellery_technology/caratage/

You still need to beware of fraudulent marks.
 
Lol they were only a few quid guys, i wont lose any sleep :)

Since you're all chatting on here, does anyone wanna post me a link where i can actually buy Nitric acid?...... I'm still failing to find it, i've found some sites but they wont sell to private individuals.
 
Other than the tips I and others have given you in another thread I have no clue. There is a someone on here in GB that gets nitric and has helped others there get it but I do not remember his screen name.
 
try http://www.hswalsh.com £12.36 for 1.42 s.g dont buy the 1 ltr as you will pay a furtune for the postage you will need id and you will have to pick up as they won't post to you.. good luck on ebay as you will be up against the best of the gamblers im one of them some you win :lol: some you lose :cry:
 
I dont think that one can buy gold with good price on ebay anymore... especially not after this economic meltdown thing start. however I remember that I bought few antique gold working wrist watch and about 30+ gold rings for less than gold value in them. that happened 4 years ago in heights of economic boom and all my good priced gold purchases happened when I bid for lots or bulk auctions like 5 watches or 10 rings and such... when all hell broke loose with goldman sachs and ING I noticed that gold mostly disappeared from ebay and if not it was priced well over spot price... It is slowly begin to normalize but I doubt that we can buy gold below spot there in this times...
 
buying PM is probably useless, it might be a scam unless it costs over 200$, but still...you wanna be sure that you know what you're buying...go for tungsten carbide or titanium rings
 
i bought some of the gold flake on ebay and the vials to put it in. it is good for a conversation piece and something unusual to to give to friends. or maybe sell at fleamarket. huelo
 
Ebay when starting this hobbie can cost more than you will make from it, try and find almost free sources of electronic scrap till you really get a handle on processes and buying to the recovery costs and your up to speed in this field, get the practice first with junk then start thinking karate gold, the electronics are some of the trashy stuff but give you a good feel for how to deal with these metals and problems you may encounter, with the good stuff.
learning to buy is harder for me than learning to refine, but either one can cost more than you can make. and when you start out you can spend alot for materials, learn the work arounds (like making nitric or ferrous sulfate), use second hand stores and grocery/hardware stores for chemistry supply (like for coffee pots hot plates jars and chemicals).
dont be tempted by ebay
 
The best way i have found to buy Gold off ebay is to do a search for "Scrap Gold" in the search box and lot's of things will come up in the search. Try not to go for anything that has brooches, pendants and stones in them and if your only just starting out then i would suggest to just go for the Necklace and Bracelet items, try and just stick with the 9k chains as they are faster to refine without having to inquart with silver etc... I just break the chain links up into small 1mm pieces and attack with Nitric Acid...

Try and avoid buying brand new gold chains off ebay as you will pay a premium for them and theres a likely chance that they could also be counterfeit. Always ask for the weight of the item, most will give the weight details when dealing in scrap items anyhow.

Once the weight and Karat are identified then do a quick calculation over here: http://www.dendritics.com/scales/metal-calc.asp for the total value that item of jewelery is worth in Gold. Bid on lots of items and don't be tempted to go over the spot price of Gold just because you have to have that ITEM... Just wait another day and something similar will pop up again. I try and buy for 80-90% of spot price and sometimes you will get it cheaper.

Ive bid on approx 20 items the past few days and have only won 1 of those items, however i have made money on that item and if your willing to spend the big bucks you chances are better on winning an item and coming out ahead when buying the scrap gold.

I might even create a thread on some of the items ive purchased and a tutorial on how I process them if anyones interested.
Don't expect an Alchemist type tutorial as i'm still learning how to do all this refining :)

Good Luck and happy Bidding.
 
Great, i'll see what i can put together. I don't process much so it might be a while before i can get it all together...

Stay tuned :)
 
LaurenceOs said:
Is it a waste of time or what?

There's always loads and loads of it on there and its always supprisingly cheap.
Click to expand...

I would not say so... a few times I was able to pay 50-60% melt on ebay... not to common though. 90%+ of auctions will be more 75% melt and to many even above melt for damaged solid gold jewelry... crazy. Either way IMHO, ebay is worth a look, it feels good to win an auction and pay 1/2 melt.
 

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