gold melting

[ldmnrnld]

I am fiarly new to this but need to know what I did wrong had 16 g of foils that I tried to smelt but came up with nothing but glass. true , I used a premixed flux from my kiln manufacture Instruction say 1tsp per crusible I tryied to send Image but could not figer out how

 

[FrugalRefiner]

Welcome to the forum.

I can't answer your question without asking some of my own.

First, I'm guessing you tried to melt your foils, not smelt them. See A Glossary of Common Terms.

What were the foils from? How did you process them before you tried to melt them? How did you try to melt them? Melting dish? Your fuel/torch choices? Did you use a flux? What kind? How much? Can you post a picture of your setup and the used melting dish? See Attaching Images or Files, Working with Attachments.

I don't mean to be rude, but without any details, your question is like asking how much a rock weighs, or how much a car costs. Give us lots of details and some pictures and we'll try to help.

Dave

 

[Bentfunky]

I am fiarly new to this but need to know what I did wrong had 16 g of foils that I tried to smelt but came up with nothing but glass. true , I used a premixed flux from my kiln manufacture Instruction say 1tsp per crusible I tryied to send Image but could not figer out how

Impossible to say without lots more detail, but here are some thoughts. Read at your own risk.

"1tsp per crusible" is an odd instruction. There's no standard sized crucible. They come in all sizes. Typically, amount of flux is determined by amount of input material and it's composition.

If one had 16g of gold foils that were pure gold or similar, one might just use borax as flux. In this scenario, one would just be melting the gold, more or less. The less pure the gold, the more thought one must put into the refining process. In this scenario, one would need to consider what might be alloyed with the gold.

Here are some possibilities for an answer to you question. These are the ones that come to mind and I'm sure that there are others.

-- Your foils were not gold or only had a tiny amount of gold

-- Your gold is mixed in the glass slag as fine particles. To check, crush glass to fine powder and pan material.

-- You vaporized your gold by accident. It happens.

-- Some combination of all of the above

 

[Roscho]

You vaporized your gold by accident. It happen
Thing is one thing I am very interested in I would not
Like this to happen to me when I get to that point.
How can this be Avoided? I have not processed any gold yet but Have heard of this happening and I would like to avoid it?

 

[Martijn]

You dont need any flux to melt gold or silver. A glazed crucilbe and a torch will do fine. Foils may fly away though. I would refine them first anyway. Foils dissolve a lot better than a button.
Flux is used to reduce or oxidize metals and salts in tailings, ores and sulfides with smelting. It's chemistry at high temperatures.
Melting is just that. Melting metal into a button. You could sprinkle a bit of borax over to hold the powder together.
Watch sreetips YouTube video's to see how he does it.

Martijn.