Hey all,
Like you guys, I'm just making an observation. I know Jay and have known him off other forums since before the GRF. He's a good guy and yes, he's absolutely making money. Good for him. If it doesn't work for some people, go get the better deal...but as a mod, I can't have an opinion on it if he's delivering product and people are happy.
FYI Kurt, I work at a refinery (we now have four locations after an acquisition) and work with other refiners predominantly, people you would know, as THEIR service provider (that is the refiner's refiner). So there is always assay exchange, there is always surveillance, there's always the cost known to the penny before it's even done. We do some outside work from customers to be sure, but it's not a melt and assay shop by any stretch, it's toll conversion.
I was just highlighting how important it is that you consider the fact Jay is being straight on his deal. That to me is worth something. Heck, I think a 10% premium on silver coins that aren't maple leafs/silver eagles ABSOLUTELY INSANE (can get those cheaper!) but I'd gladly pay it to Jim who owns GSM because he's a straight up gent.
And Gsracer, I'm on the forum to educate people first and foremost. I love separation science. It's my day job and it was once a hobby.
Ok, that clarified, moving on to the real topic, casting silver bars and having them look nice.
I posted that picture of the bars because they show the spectrum of what hand cast silver bars can look like, mostly because my buyer just remelts them and makes coins they sell to the Mint. I also wanted to show you the crystal planes are more defined/equiaxed where as yours directionally point inward. A tell tale sign of pure silver is that polycrystalline look, which I call tiger striping. All the Engelhard/JM bars, they have that right out of their cast iron molds and then they get the scotch bright pad to the matte finish. Same thing with Silvertowne.
The first bar I make has the cooling swirls because the mold I use starts off cold. The second bar is flatter surfaced. If I'm busy and I let the induction furnace run overlong, it picks up oxygen, as you can see in a few of the bars, the case example seen in the upper left. On the bottom bar, you can also see some of the glaze with some carbon soot (I throw a bit of beeswax in the melt) from the new SiC crucible I used (bottom bar).
None of this really matters (on mine, as they're not meant to be pretty) as this was part of a small couple thousand ounce lot of silver that's going to go into a big directional casting furnace and all that crap floats up and stays up on top of 20K other ounces as that furnace basically does not ever shut down, and they deoxidize the silver anyways (the furnace runs in reducing flame).
The keys to nice pretty bars of silver (or gold for that matter), in no particular order:
1. Pour as big a bar as you can.
2. Use a hot mold if you don't want a pipe/contraction sink hole. I don't use a cherry red mold, but it's dull red after the first few bars.
3. Use a steady hand in pouring (this is where a hot mold). Not too fast, not too slow. Don't want to splash it and you don't want to pour in the same place. I start at one end and move to the other when I really want a bottom that doesn't have the "pour spot" mark.
4. Pour the metal at as close to the freezing point of the melt as possible for bigger bars.
5. Keep the metal molten for as short as possible to minimize impurity uptake/oxidation.
6. Use inert atmosphere or add a deoxidant (charcoal or wax for silver)
7. Gentle bushy flame for the bars if you want the surface flame polished flat and shiny.
8. Do not use flux unless you need it, and if you do, remove it with a quartz rod (forms borosilicate and sticks to the quartz and can be drug off the metal surface).
