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antinnel

Member
Joined
Mar 16, 2014
Messages
9
Hi there,im Michel from Spain and im a really noob in this field.For the first time i tried to refine.I will explain entire process and if somebody can can tell me where i fail i will be very grarefull.Ok i have a computer shop and i collected all the components which i considered have gold in it then i bought 1L of nitric acid 40ºBe and 1L of hydrochloric acid 21ºBe.I mix 3 parts of HA with 1 part of NA and poured in the plastic recipient filled with the computer components.after a while the solution has turn green.Filter the solution and i start to ad alimentar sodium metabisulfite...while stirring the solution turn dark brown i wait 2 days to precipitate and nothing happends.Please help and tell me where i was wrong.Thank you in advance


Sorry i putted the message in the wrong section :oops:
 
Michel,

Welcome to the forum. I can see several mistakes in your process. You mention that you collected all the components you thought had gold. I don't see any mention of sorting them into different types. Different types of material are best handled with different processes, but it sounds like you put them all together into your plastic container. Then you put aqua regia on them. This is a big mistake. Your goal should be to eliminate the base metals before you dissolve the gold in AR. Instead of using a 3 to 1 ratio of acids, it is best to calculate the amount of HCl you'll need, then add nitric acid in increments until the material is dissolved. You didn't mention how much acid you used, but most beginners use too much. When you added your sodium metabisulfite, you say you saw a color change, but then nothing happened. Either your gold redissolved because you still had nitric acid in your solution, or there was so little gold there's not enough to see. Throughout the process, I don't see any mention of testing with stannous chloride, so you really have no idea if you ever had gold in your solution.

Fortunately, you'll find answers to all your questions here on the forum, but you have a lot of reading ahead of you. Here are my standard recommendations for new members.

The first rule is to be safe in everything you do. Before you jump into any of the processes you see discussed here, be sure you understand the potential hazards and do everything you can to minimize the risks. Read EVERYTHING in the Safety section of the forum, especially the Dealing with Waste topic. No amount of precious metal is worth jeopardizing your health or the health of those around you.

I strongly encourage all new members to follow the Guided Tour created by LazerSteve. It will provide an introduction to the forum and numerous valuable links including the General Reactions List. Be sure to follow the link to his web site as he has many outstanding videos, a collection of great reference documents, and he sells a lot of the supplies needed to get started including detailed instructional DVDs. Samuel-a also has a lot of videos, guides and tutorials at his web site Gold-N-Scrap.

Download C. M. Hoke's book. You'll find links to both screen readable and printer friendly versions in my signature line below. You'll see her book mentioned repeatedly here on the forum for good reason. It is probably the best book ever written for the beginner who wants to learn refining. It is written in layman's terms and will provide a solid foundation that will help you understand everything you read here on the forum. You'll also find a tremendous amount of information in the two Forum Handbooks compiled by aflacglobal, Forum Handbook Vol 1 and Forum Handbook Vol 2.

Good luck on your journey,
Dave
 
FrugalRefiner said:
Michel,

Welcome to the forum. I can see several mistakes in your process. You mention that you collected all the components you thought had gold. I don't see any mention of sorting them into different types. Different types of material are best handled with different processes, but it sounds like you put them all together into your plastic container. Then you put aqua regia on them. This is a big mistake. Your goal should be to eliminate the base metals before you dissolve the gold in AR. Instead of using a 3 to 1 ratio of acids, it is best to calculate the amount of HCl you'll need, then add nitric acid in increments until the material is dissolved. You didn't mention how much acid you used, but most beginners use too much. When you added your sodium metabisulfite, you say you saw a color change, but then nothing happened. Either your gold redissolved because you still had nitric acid in your solution, or there was so little gold there's not enough to see. Throughout the process, I don't see any mention of testing with stannous chloride, so you really have no idea if you ever had gold in your solution.

Thank you very much for your recomendations im realy pleasant...Sorry i didnt mention that in first post,i tested with stannous chloride and the test was positiv(the paper turn imediately black)The materials that i used was:contacts cutted down from memory sticks,pins from motherboards,a few ceramic processors broken in parts,pins from processors.All the component weight was 1,8-2 Kg.The quantity of acids used is about 1000ml Hcl 21ºBè 33-34% and 350ml Nitric 40ºBè.Another detail...After separate the debris and filter the solution when i added SMB apears at the bottom of a white precipitate The big problem now is if this solution is still viable to recover the gold in it or is only a chemical waste ready to be disposed properly and in safe conditions.And what is the process now to precipitate the gold because until now i added 1 kg of SBM and nothing happend.


Best regards
 
As I mentioned, different parts are best handled with different processes. Mixing them all together just complicates things. It's hard to estimate how much acid would be required since it was such a mix of materials, including weights of ceramic processors, etc.

The general rule of thumb for adding SMB is to add a bit more in weight than the amount of gold you expect to recover. Clearly, you couldn't expect 1 kg of gold, so adding 1 kg of SMB was WAY too much.

All is not lost. If you haven't thrown anything away, your gold is still there, somewhere. The best way to recover from a mixed solution like this is to add a large copper bar to the solution, and stir it from time to time. Eventually, some of the copper will dissolve into solution and the gold will be cemented out by it.

While that's happening, you'll have time to study the links I provided and learn what happened and why, and how to process your scrap correctly in the future. You'll also learn how to proceed with the cemented material from your current batch.

Set the chemicals aside for now and read, read, read. Everything you need to learn is here on the forum, but it's up to you to read it. Trying to answer one question at a time, or point you to a single thread with the answers to your questions, will just lead to more questions. The more you study, the more this will all make sense, and eventually you will know exactly what to do to recover your gold.

Dave
 
FrugalRefiner said:
As I mentioned, different parts are best handled with different processes. Mixing them all together just complicates things. It's hard to estimate how much acid would be required since it was such a mix of materials, including weights of ceramic processors, etc.

The general rule of thumb for adding SMB is to add a bit more in weight than the amount of gold you expect to recover. Clearly, you couldn't expect 1 kg of gold, so adding 1 kg of SMB was WAY too much.

All is not lost. If you haven't thrown anything away, your gold is still there, somewhere. The best way to recover from a mixed solution like this is to add a large copper bar to the solution, and stir it from time to time. Eventually, some of the copper will dissolve into solution and the gold will be cemented out by it.

While that's happening, you'll have time to study the links I provided and learn what happened and why, and how to process your scrap correctly in the future. You'll also learn how to proceed with the cemented material from your current batch.

Set the chemicals aside for now and read, read, read. Everything you need to learn is here on the forum, but it's up to you to read it. Trying to answer one question at a time, or point you to a single thread with the answers to your questions, will just lead to more questions. The more you study, the more this will all make sense, and eventually you will know exactly what to do to recover your gold.

Dave



You are right i know is a rule in all what we doing we need to have the necesary preparations and also experience-Right now i started to learn and of course i will do what you recommend me.Thanks a lot again and i hope to recover the batch what i wasted innecesary

have a good day
 
antinnel,

Welcome to the forum.
It is not a good idea to get into an airplane and try to fly it before you learn how.
It takes some time to learn, and it is much safer for you and those around you if you spend the time needed to learn to fly before you try it, recovery and refining is similar to this, spending the time to study can mean the difference in a successful flight or a crash.

There is a lot of science to the art of recovery and refining of precious metals, you do not have to be a scientist but you will need to study and work like one, and learn it well before mixing chemicals and metals.

You can get the values back you have in this mess, use your study to find out how, and learn how to recover and refine your precious metals, and to do it safely, you have tons of study to do, this is not as easy as it appears, but with dedication, and work studying, and enjoying that work, you will do just fine, and be flying that jet through the clouds.
 
butcher said:
antinnel,

Welcome to the forum.
It is not a good idea to get into an airplane and try to fly it before you learn how.
It takes some time to learn, and it is much safer for you and those around you if you spend the time needed to learn to fly before you try it, recovery and refining is similar to this, spending the time to study can mean the difference in a successful flight or a crash.

There is a lot of science to the art of recovery and refining of precious metals, you do not have to be a scientist but you will need to study and work like one, and learn it well before mixing chemicals and metals.

You can get the values back you have in this mess, use your study to find out how, and learn how to recover and refine your precious metals, and to do it safely, you have tons of study to do, this is not as easy as it appears, but with dedication, and work studying, and enjoying that work, you will do just fine, and be flying that jet through the clouds.



Thank you Butcher you have reason.
 
Just a suggestion for studying. I started by reading everything, then broke what I learned down into individual steps. Then studied each step alone, by its self. Understanding the individual steps and how and what they do really helped me understand it better. There is a lot to the whole process from recovery through refining, but it isn't that bad. You just have to want to know it.

Good Luck.
 
sharkhook said:
Just a suggestion for studying. I started by reading everything, then broke what I learned down into individual steps. Then studied each step alone, by its self. Understanding the individual steps and how and what they do really helped me understand it better. There is a lot to the whole process from recovery through refining, but it isn't that bad. You just have to want to know it.

Good Luck.

Hi,i understood but only i want to know if there is any method to recover the wong batch.I read the the handbook and i dont find any reference for this situation.
 
FrugalRefiner gave some good advice,

All is not lost. If you haven't thrown anything away, your gold is still there, somewhere. The best way to recover from a mixed solution like this is to add a large copper bar to the solution, and stir it from time to time. Eventually, some of the copper will dissolve into solution and the gold will be cemented out by it.

While that's happening, you'll have time to study the links I provided and learn what happened and why, and how to process your scrap correctly in the future. You'll also learn how to proceed with the cemented material from your current batch.

I am new at this myself, and this is the only way I have tried, only on very small amounts for testing the various methods. The little I have done for actual recovery and refining has had no major problems, other than the small tests I made up as experiments. From reading Hoke's book, you learn refining and recovery of the metals from jewelry and the like, but for the recovery of eScrap, electronic parts, the forum is where the majority of the information is found. Try the copper bar, and let it take it's time, and study the forum, much of the forum information is newer than Hoke's book, and pertains more to electronic components. As for the refining aspect, Hoke's book is the most understandable literature I have ever seen. And I have looked at a lot of literature for recovery and refining of computer parts over the years. I have about the same mixture you are working with now, maybe less than you have, and the copper bar is how I am working towards recovering it. The main difference in mine and yours is I made mine on purpose. It is an experiment to see just how much I have learned. I know there should be .5 gram in my mix, and I am trying to see how well I can recover it. I wish I could help you more, but that is the best I can offer at this point in my adventure.

Good Luck with your adventure.
 
The amount of acid you used would dissolve about 0.32kg of base metal.

Did you use heat? It didn't sound like it.

How many hours were the parts in the aqua regia?
 
sharkhook said:
FrugalRefiner gave some good advice,

All is not lost. If you haven't thrown anything away, your gold is still there, somewhere. The best way to recover from a mixed solution like this is to add a large copper bar to the solution, and stir it from time to time. Eventually, some of the copper will dissolve into solution and the gold will be cemented out by it.

While that's happening, you'll have time to study the links I provided and learn what happened and why, and how to process your scrap correctly in the future. You'll also learn how to proceed with the cemented material from your current batch.

I am new at this myself, and this is the only way I have tried, only on very small amounts for testing the various methods. The little I have done for actual recovery and refining has had no major problems, other than the small tests I made up as experiments. From reading Hoke's book, you learn refining and recovery of the metals from jewelry and the like, but for the recovery of eScrap, electronic parts, the forum is where the majority of the information is found. Try the copper bar, and let it take it's time, and study the forum, much of the forum information is newer than Hoke's book, and pertains more to electronic components. As for the refining aspect, Hoke's book is the most understandable literature I have ever seen. And I have looked at a lot of literature for recovery and refining of computer parts over the years. I have about the same mixture you are working with now, maybe less than you have, and the copper bar is how I am working towards recovering it. The main difference in mine and yours is I made mine on purpose. It is an experiment to see just how much I have learned. I know there should be .5 gram in my mix, and I am trying to see how well I can recover it. I wish I could help you more, but that is the best I can offer at this point in my adventure.

Good Luck with your adventure.


Thank you very much!
 
goldsilverpro said:
The amount of acid you used would dissolve about 0.32kg of base metal.

Did you use heat? It didn't sound like it.

How many hours were the parts in the aqua regia?


Hi and thanks fo you help!I didn`t use heat and i let the parts in solution about half hour until i noticed the parts enough corroded(bad decision i think...) here is a photo:
 

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From what I can tell of the picture, the scrap is similar to gold plated fingers, in this case I would not have used aqua regia.

If solder or tin is involved in these scrap parts the tin will create problems.

Some circuit boards also have copper traces in inner layers of the fiberglass on circuit boards, (I do not know if the ones you have do or not), also copper traces under the solder mask on circuit boards, or pieces of circuit boards can be hard for acids to reach, bubbles of the acids attacking the the metals under these layers can block fresh acid solution form getting under these layers, metals like copper left in between the fiberglass layer or under solder mask can cement values to them.

From what I can tell from the picture, the parts do not have traces between layers of the circuit boards, and I cannot tell but it does not look like you have solder.

It looks basically like you are working with gold plated fingers, if this is the case you would have been better off using another recovery process to dissolve the copper and recover the gold as foils, leaving you with a more clean gold metal to refine.

It looks like you have metals left on the pieces of circuit boards, copper and gold, the copper left would cement gold back to the copper.

Now to the problem as I understand it, you have gold in a solution of aqua regia, it also sounds like you may have used way too much acids, especially nitric acid, from what I can tell some of your gold is in solution (with copper, and possibly some tin), and there is still copper and gold left on the remaining pieces of circuit boards.

I do not see where you have removed excess nitric acid before trying to precipitate the gold from solution, if you have free nitric acid in solution you cannot reduce the gold with a chemical reagent like SMB, the free nitric acid would just redissolve the gold as it tried to precipitate.

As I see it you have a couple of choices here, to recover from this batch, you can add back the pieces of fingers (with the gold and copper foils add heat and let these react with free acids),dissolving more copper and gold into solution, until all of the acid is consumed or no metals remain undissolved, after this you can remove the fiberglass pieces, filter and heat the solution to vapor off remaining nitric in an evaporation process, (adding a little H2SO4 to help precipitate lead later) and aid in the evaporation process, and or, use sulfamic acid to remove free nitric acid, and then try again to precipitate the gold, before the precipitation process diluting the solution, and letting it sit overnight for insolubles to settle out, decanting and filtering the solution before adding your reagent to precipitate the gold, (using your stannous chloride as a guide), if this fails use copper to cement values out of solution.

Then treat the solutions for waste, save the recovered materials, and put up the acids in a safe place,, shut down the lab for a bit, and study, to get a better understanding of how to proceed to recover and refine your gold.
 
butcher said:
From what I can tell of the picture, the scrap is similar to gold plated fingers, in this case I would not have used aqua regia.

If solder or tin is involved in these scrap parts the tin will create problems.

Some circuit boards also have copper traces in inner layers of the fiberglass on circuit boards, (I do not know if the ones you have do or not), also copper traces under the solder mask on circuit boards, or pieces of circuit boards can be hard for acids to reach, bubbles of the acids attacking the the metals under these layers can block fresh acid solution form getting under these layers, metals like copper left in between the fiberglass layer or under solder mask can cement values to them.

From what I can tell from the picture, the parts do not have traces between layers of the circuit boards, and I cannot tell but it does not look like you have solder.

It looks basically like you are working with gold plated fingers, if this is the case you would have been better off using another recovery process to dissolve the copper and recover the gold as foils, leaving you with a more clean gold metal to refine.

It looks like you have metals left on the pieces of circuit boards, copper and gold, the copper left would cement gold back to the copper.

Now to the problem as I understand it, you have gold in a solution of aqua regia, it also sounds like you may have used way too much acids, especially nitric acid, from what I can tell some of your gold is in solution (with copper, and possibly some tin), and there is still copper and gold left on the remaining pieces of circuit boards.

I do not see where you have removed excess nitric acid before trying to precipitate the gold from solution, if you have free nitric acid in solution you cannot reduce the gold with a chemical reagent like SMB, the free nitric acid would just redissolve the gold as it tried to precipitate.

As I see it you have a couple of choices here, to recover from this batch, you can add back the pieces of fingers (with the gold and copper foils add heat and let these react with free acids),dissolving more copper and gold into solution, until all of the acid is consumed or no metals remain undissolved, after this you can remove the fiberglass pieces, filter and heat the solution to vapor off remaining nitric in an evaporation process, (adding a little H2SO4 to help precipitate lead later) and aid in the evaporation process, and or, use sulfamic acid to remove free nitric acid, and then try again to precipitate the gold, before the precipitation process diluting the solution, and letting it sit overnight for insolubles to settle out, decanting and filtering the solution before adding your reagent to precipitate the gold, (using your stannous chloride as a guide), if this fails use copper to cement values out of solution.

Then treat the solutions for waste, save the recovered materials, and put up the acids in a safe place,, shut down the lab for a bit, and study, to get a better understanding of how to proceed to recover and refine your gold.

Thanks i will try the pocess what you indicate me and if nothing happends y will try with copper bar.I want to ask if i reduce the liquid with heat until the solids left and repeat the process?
 
You do not want to overheat the solution or boil it, or cook it to salts.

You just want to give it enough heat to make the acids attack the metal better and react with the metals, (acids if weak in solution will work more on the metal when heated), this will help to use up free acids. (I would add just a tiny bit of H2SO4 sulfuric acid towards the end of this step), to reactivate some of the acid and assist in latter steps.

At this point you should be left with most of the acids with metals in solution.

Then after this process, removing the circuit board materials (which hopefully are free of all metals), you can let the solution cool and settle out insoluble materials overnight, separate the clean liquid from the insoluble material sitting on the bottom (save these powders for now), decant and filter the liquid, and return it to the heat source, being sure to use a heat source and vessel that can do the job and will not break in the process, slowly evaporate the solution, do not evaporate to a salt, you are trying to concentrate the metals salts in solution to a syrup, and drive off free nitric acid (as NOx fumes) in the process, leaving the gold chloride salts in this thicker solution, normally this first evaporation will take a while to perform to get the solutions volume concentrated, and even then you may have some remaining nitric or nitrate salts in solution, here you can add just a little HCl to this solution, this can reactivate the nitrate salts, you do not need to increase the volume of the solution much with this added HCl, you may notice a red cloud of NO2 gas as you add that HCl, continue to heat again driving off more NOx, and re concentrate the solution, (this will go faster as the volume of the solution is already pretty much concentrate except for the HCl acid you added and its water content), again add the HCl and concentrate, after this third evaporation process you will normally have driven off most all of the free nitric acid, at this point you can dilute the solution with water, and let it sit again over night for insolubles, settle out again before decanting and filtering the solution and precipitating the gold.

If you use the sulfamic acid, (which can be found as a tile grout cleaner in the flooring section of major store's like Home Depot in the US), you can use the sulfamic acid to help eliminate the free HNO3, I normally use just a little of the sulfamic acid in combination with the evaporation process, just to be sure I have removed the nitric, you can use it to do the job instead of a complete evaporation process, or just use a little of it to insure the evaporation process is complete.
or do the evaporation process with out the use of sulfamic acid...
 

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