Gold precip fineness

[Anonymous]

I have never dropped gold this is my first time. Is the precip so fine that it will not or takes a very long time to settle. My feed stock is very rich and a very dark emerald green ( I did not add water at any time)when I added the smb a super fine black powder formed, I am concerned though because it has not settled yet.
I thaught about diluting the feed stock but was trying to avoid that because I want to recover the copper and keep my solution volume low, if I need to dilute inorder for it to settle out please let me know.

 

[lazersteve]

James,

Are we talking about an AR solution or another (AP or HCl-Cl)? From the sound of it you are talking about AP (based upon color), if so the amount of gold is minimal and may take a long time to settle due to the size of the gold particles in the solution. The bulk of your gold should be in foils from AP reactions.

If you are talking about an AR solution, it should settle readily, but the color should be more orange than green if you properly removed all your base metals first.

How much material did you process and by which method?

Stev

 

[Anonymous]

Steve, I used HCL no dilution, with Dry sodium hypoclorite also know as super tropical bleach to to dissolve of 5 lbs of gold plated material I did not or tried not to dissolve the base metals. I place the pieces in and as soon as there was no gold coloring left on them I removed them. I have kept them all incase I did not get the gold. I kept the solution clorinated by adding small amounts of the hypo and it seemed to dissovle the gold plating off quite reasonably. I processec each piece one at a time and stirred the solution while it was processing.

I only have about a 1 1/2 cup of solute.

I know I devated from your standard but I only have small space to process and was trying to keep everything minimal.

 

[lazersteve]

James,

The green color is a good indication that you have dissolved copper. Any excess chlorine in the solution will keep the gold from precipitating. If you have a lot of copper in the solution the gold may have already been pushed out by the dissolved copper.

Did you test with stannous before you added SMB?

Steve

 

[Anonymous]

Steve, I haven't made any stannus yet. I thaught I was doing pretty good at pulling the pieces out when the gold was dissolved, suffice it to say I baby sat this very closely. I did not see any precip until I added the smb. I am glad I kept all of the items but most of them are now have a silvery color which I assumed to be the nickel undercoat as soon as I saw that I pulled the item out.

I will make some stannus tomorrow and check the solution although I do not expect anything to be there unless I did not add enough SMB. The black stuff looks like your video its just so fine it has been almost a day and it has not settled. I may try to filter it and see if I can catch enough for a melt, I do not thing coffee filters will work but I have acess to some really good filters at work.

Maybe I should add that when I added the smb after a little while sorry didn't time it or anything the solution contained so much of the super fine black powder that it is almost black.

 

[Platdigger]

I had some settle and continue to settle for a very long time......like weeks and weeks.....
Randy

 

[eagle2]

James, I would add that next time heating your solution will make a big difference in the particle size and allow a much quicker settling time.
Heating will drive off the free Chlorine. Also If you didn`t use up most of the HCl with with additions of your scrap, the solution will be too acid and you will get a fine incomplete precip. SMB likes a PH of about 1-3. Heat to 60 -90 C. for at least 30 minutes, then add the SMB.

Be very careful, leaning over a container with acid and adding bleach, and baby sitting scrap means you are breathing TOO MUCH Chlorine. You just can`t run a process that way.

Al

 

[Platdigger]

Al, just thought I would tell you that, I am saving that last post of yours to a folder.......Thanks!
Randy

 

[eagle2]

You`re welcome! I sure appreciate your thanks.

That huge discussion in the copper recovery thread was very interesting.

I`m glad we`re all one big happy family. LOL

Al