Electrolysis bath recover gold - Help-

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panoslok

Member
Joined
Jan 9, 2014
Messages
5
Hello,

i am from greece and i have an electrolysis bath which is full of gold but i can't retrieve it. its about 5 gallons solution and according to my dad it should have about 30grams or 1oz of gold disolve in it..

i haven't got lots of knowledge in the matter. i can do electrolysis. can i collect in a plate the gold in the negative plate?and then melt it to get the gold?

or can i add something to the solution tha will gather the gold in the bottom and then drain it and melt it with borax?

Please help me my friends
Thank you very much in advance
 
Slow down. Relax. Quit posting 4 topics at the same time.

You can use zinc. You can plate it out onto steel and scrape the gold off.

What type of solution is it?
 
i don't quite know what type it is.. it has no acids inside i am not sure about cynodie..it was used to electroplate copper plates..

what voltage should i use and for how long time should i keep it running?

thank you
sorry for the multiple posts, i am new at this forum.
 
It's probably either gold sulfite or gold cyanide. Again, slow down. If your dad knows how much gold is in it, he probably knows what type of plating bath it is.

If you are unsure, err on the side of caution and presume it is cyanide unless you can check the pH--if it is 10 or higher, chances are that it is CN-based.

Really, if you have to ask on this, you should not do it. I suggest you find a jeweler in the area that you can talk to who is knowledgeable about such processes before you hurt yourself or others.
 
Thabk you for your answer my friend,

My dad has past away some years ago..i have some knowledge..the solution contain cyanide as i remember now.. Can i add zinc oxide powder in the solution and then drain with caution the solution the bottom powder and then melt it in a jewerly friend my dad have to seperate gold from zinc? Or to just use sulfuric acid with caution to seperate?

Or melt them both and seperate by difference in temperature?is it possible?

Thank you
 
Be aware cyanide takes no prisoners, you mess up and you will die!

If your not fully equipped to deal with this material leave well alone, a fume hood is a must and the knowledge to dispose safely of the solution once the values have been removed.
No gold is worth yours or your neighbours lives this is highly toxic and poisonous material, if your not 100% sure you know what your about to do leave it alone or find a professional to do this for you.
 
I am living out of the city and i have a lot of garden..also i use mask and i am doing everything in the out space with safety equipment..

So i will divide it in smaller amounts and i will put zinc oxide powder in..i will mix it good and i will drain the liquid..i will keep the ore of the bottom and i will apply heat to sent the moisture away..

Then i will try nitric acid to disolve zinc and turn it into salt
Like staff to be ready to disolve in water and keep the gold.

And i will try to apply heat to melt the metals and seperate them due to different melting points.

Your opion will be valuable if my ways are any good or if i am missing anything..

Thank you very much
 
Before doing anything, it would be nice to know the pH or, at least whether it's alkaline or acidic. There are 3 basic types of gold plating solutions and they can be generally distinguished by their pH. Acid cyanide golds are about 4 to 6 pH. Alkaline cyanide baths run about 11 or higher. Sulfite golds usually about 8-10. By the strength you gave, 0.2 oz per gallon, it sounds like it could be an acid gold strike bath.

Most of the gold in all 3 types can be plated out. I would use non-magnetic stainless steel sheet for the cathode (-), preferably a clean piece that's been lying around for awhile and has a good oxide layer built up on its surface. Don't scrub off this layer if you clean it. The oxide layer is what prevents the gold from sticking too tightly to the stainless. You can use the same stainless for the anode (+) but it may degrade a bit and produce a little sludge. Graphite anodes would probably work OK. The gold will either loosely adhere to the cathode or will form a powder and fall off. I would only use about 3 amps per square foot of cathode surface area. A 5 gallon plastic bucket would work. Make sure you collect all the sludge, that's where some of the gold lives. You probably won't be able to plate out 100% but you can get close

Zinc (325 mesh zinc dust) will work well directly with alkaline cyanide solutions, with acid cyanide solutions after the pH has been raised to 11 -12 with sodium hydroxide, but will not work well with sulfite gold. With sulfite gold, you can simply make it acidic with 10% sulfuric acid and the gold will fall out as a brown powder. However, to do this you must be absolutely positive it is a sulfite solution. If you add sulfuric to an alkaline cyanide solution, it will release the very toxic hydrogen cyanide gas.

Unless you know exactly what you're dealing with, I would probably plate the gold out. Keep the current low and run it for a long time.
 
Thank you all for your help..for how long have the zinc powder have to stay in the solution? hours? days?

thank you very much in advance
 
I don't know if he's alive, but he hasn't visited the forum since Jan 20, 2014. If you move your cursor over a member's name or avatar to the left of their post, you'll see when they were here last.

Dave
 
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