Dissolving gold

[Yggdrasil]

This is good to know, but also worrying as I currently have e-waste soaking in Vinegar & Peroxide. I decided on this route as I am not able to source Nitric (HNO3) at the moment. Could I use Sulfuric Acid (H2SO4) to precipitate out the lead (Pb) or use tin (sn) to cement it out or is there another way to clean it up?
Also what would be a better way to put the base metals and silver (Ag) into solution?

Do not edit your post without indicating that it has been edited.
It makes the replies seem out of order.

You should have access to HCl which is the part that Vinegar substitutes.
Vinegar will in the end cost more and create more waste so why are firmly against its use.

Nitric is not needed for small scale refining of e-waste, HCl/Bleach or HCl/Peroxide will dissolve Gold foils.
But HCl is necessary and luckily easy to get.

 

[Ultrax]

I don't want to purify lead, I just want to get the lead acetate out of my solution.

Could I use Sulfuric Acid (H2SO4) to precipitate out the lead (Pb) or use tin (sn) to cement it out or is there another way to clean it up?

There are two contradictory theses in your sentences.

If you try to dissolve anything in peracetic acid, you can receive in a solution (a) iron, (b) nickel, (c) copper, (d) zinc, (e) lead, and (f) tin only (with different speeds). So, generally, such a solution does not contain any valuable metals in most cases.
Why do you need to remove lead acetate from the peracetic acid solution?

 

[Golden DALB]

Lead acetate is no more toxic than any other lead salt. It is only more dangerous because it tastes sweet, therefore people will tend to eat it without suspecting anything is wrong, as opposed to a bitter-tasting toxic salt. Long ago, it was even used as a sweetening adulterant in cheap sweets, and as a sweetener and preservative in wine. This, naturally, resulted in lead poisoning cases!

Okay, good to know, Marcel just put the fear in me for a minute. I'll just try not to eat it then

Do not edit your post without indicating that it has been edited.
It makes the replies seem out of order.

You should have access to HCl which is the part that Vinegar substitutes.
Vinegar will in the end cost more and create more waste so why are firmly against its use.

Nitric is not needed for small scale refining of e-waste, HCl/Bleach or HCl/Peroxide will dissolve Gold foils.
But HCl is necessary and luckily easy to get.

Sorry, I've added a correction.
HCl isn't as easy to get here as other places it seems, but I'm working on it.
Why does Acetic Acid create more waste?

There are two contradictory theses in your sentences.

If you try to dissolve anything in peracetic acid, you can receive in a solution (a) iron, (b) nickel, (c) copper, (d) zinc, (e) lead, and (f) tin only (with different speeds). So, generally, such a solution does not contain any valuable metals in most cases.
Why do you need to remove lead acetate from the peracetic acid solution?

Okay, that is good to know.
Marcel's post just put the fear in me for a minute, I don't need to remove the lead until clean up.

 

[Yggdrasil]

Okay, good to know, Marcel just put the fear in me for a minute. I'll just try not to eat it then

Sorry, I've added a correction.
HCl isn't as easy to get here as other places it seems, but I'm working on it.
Why does Acetic Acid create more waste?

Okay, that is good to know.
Marcel's post just put the fear in me for a minute, I don't need to remove the lead until clean up.

Because it is a much weaker acid than HCl.
And thus needs a much larger volume of acid to do the same job.
HCl is often used as brick cleaning and such.

 

[andu]

Because it is a much weaker acid than HCl.
And thus needs a much larger volume of acid to do the same job.
HCl is often used as brick cleaning and such.

Can't volume be avoided by evaporation?

 

[Yggdrasil]

Can't volume be avoided by evaporation?

Of course, but that takes time.

Most of the misconceptions goes that,
since vinegar is an organic and thus "safe" chemical the reaction and its products are safe, which is not correct.

Additionally all reactions are much slower because the "HCl" that the Vinegar and Salt creates is much weaker then proper HCl.
Even worse with pure Vinegar.
Vinegar and Salt can not be used to make AR or as HCl/bleach or HCl/Peroxide as far as I understand.

So it is basically a waste of time and energy, both for the user and specially for the forum where we have to time after time write up these explanations.

Ooh how I wish people could do some proper research themselves.

 

[galenrog]

Ooh how I wish people could do some proper research themselves.

Asking quite a lot, aren’t we?

Time for more coffee.

 

[Yggdrasil]

Asking quite a lot, aren’t we?

Time for more coffee.

Yeah I know.
I'm a picky old geezer aren't I

Edit for spelling

 

[Golden DALB]

To be fair, I wanted to ask that as the Acetic acid I'm using is 40% so requires less than the shop bought stuff, but I didn't want to flood you with simple questions.

 

[Yggdrasil]

To be fair, I wanted to ask that as the Acetic acid I'm using is 40% so requires less than the shop bought stuff, but I didn't want to flood you with simple questions.

If you can get 40% Acetic acid you can get HCl, period.
40% Acetic acid is harder to get hold of then HCl any place I know of anyway.
Look for Brick cleaners or Muriatic acid in hardware shops.

 

[GoIdman]

HCl isn't as easy to get here as other places it seems, but I'm working on it.
Why does Acetic Acid create more waste?

If you are based in the UK then Tesco has some limescale remover products which contain HCl acid.

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/258203797
Limescale remover products are usually 15-20% HCl therefore are good to be used in AP processes with 3% H2O2(which you can buy from pharmacy). It is slower but a fishtank bubbler will help you on the way.

Pete.

 

[andu]

If you can get 40% Acetic acid you can get HCl, period.
40% Acetic acid is harder to get hold of then HCl any place I know of anyway.
Look for Brick cleaners or Muriatic acid in hardware shops.

On a side note, as example, here, I could get glacial acetic acid where i get HCL but HCL is limited to 24%.

 

[Dreamer]

You really don't want to use acetic acid if you can possibly avoid it. Please read up on it's explosive potential when using it with other acids we commonly use in refining. Most of the experienced refiners don't even like having it around thier shops.