Hi Guys, I’ve been reading over the forum the last few days, what an awesome community and wealth of information. I’m hoping for some advice, and have some general knowledge of the process basics but no first hand experience. We have some sentimental family gold items that we would love to refine down to give to our jeweller to be re-annoyed and made into our wedding bands. Some are stamped and we think we are dealing with between 9k and 18k with all pieces being yellow gold. Given the sentiment we don’t want to go through a refiner and no doubt the volume is too small anyway. I have a science degree (albeit many years ago) so can muddle my way through some chemistry but would really value thoughts on a best approach. Have also been considering a test run on some scrap jewellery given we don’t want to not be able to recover the gold in solution from the wedding ring of a great-great-great grandfather!! Based in Australia and only have about 2 weeks to pull this off so perhaps DIY kits from the US are not an option. Thanks in advance, and yep I know it’s a little crazy but ain’t life - it’s worth a crack.
Help! Getting married and trying to refine sentimental family jewellery into weddings bands
- Thread starter GLOCK
- Start date
Help Support Gold Refining Forum:
What Alloy are you looking for 12K, 14K?
Depending on what you have, you may not have to do anything but melt together. What's the Karat/weight of each piece...remove any stones before weighing.
The jeweler can add small gold or silver shot to get you the alloy you want, if needed.
Just getting the chemicals and equipment will eat up most of that 2 weeks, not to mention getting the process right....just my opinion.
Depending on what you have, you may not have to do anything but melt together. What's the Karat/weight of each piece...remove any stones before weighing.
The jeweler can add small gold or silver shot to get you the alloy you want, if needed.
Just getting the chemicals and equipment will eat up most of that 2 weeks, not to mention getting the process right....just my opinion.
Welcome, and there are no such thing as a DIY kit for this.
And you have taken on task that may be over your or anyone's head for that matter, when time is a factor.
First you need to get confirmation on the actual karat of the stuff you have, then as Eaglekeeper says you may be lucky and not need alloying at all.
That might be a long shot with respect to work ability on the alloy.
Try to calculate what you will end up with as the karat of the whole batch and if it is within your specifications,
melt it together and try to hammer it a bit, if it is formable without cracking you can move on and ask your jeweler if they can do it.
If it is brittle I'm afraid you are out of luck and need to quarter it so it is around 6 karat and make shots of it.
Then you use Nitric acid and part it, so only the Gold is left. Clean the Gold and the Jeweler can make an alloy for you.
Ideally you might pull the jeweler into the loop early so you are in the same field on this.
If you have to go the chemical route I recommend you read at least the safety section and dealing with waste in the links below:
We ask our new members to do 3 things.
1. Read C.M. Hokes book on refining jewelers scrap, it gives an easy introduction to the most important chemistry regarding refining.
It is free here on the forum: Screen Readable Copy of Hoke's Book
2. Then read the safety section of the forum: Safety
3. And then read about "Dealing with waste" in the forum: Dealing with Waste
Suggested reading: The Library
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2021
- Messages
- 1,355
I concur with you , Dr. Yggdrasil.
Gwar
Well-known member
At this point, you better be shopping for rings this week, it is a process that takes time..
Trying to make great rings, eh?
Well, I just happen to know a guy! He goes by Steve Auron, and he makes rings so amazing you just HAVE to put them on! I mean, you even here whispers in your mind when you take them off... it makes you worried... worried about losing the prrrrrreciousssssss ring!
Well, I just happen to know a guy! He goes by Steve Auron, and he makes rings so amazing you just HAVE to put them on! I mean, you even here whispers in your mind when you take them off... it makes you worried... worried about losing the prrrrrreciousssssss ring!
If the use of the gold is purely for sentimental reasons then melt it all together and make the rings from the resultant bar, they really do not need to be 14k or 18k as it really doesnt matter and with the time you have and the costs involved you could do this much easier this way.
Martijn
Well-known member
Last year, I went to the jeweller to ask if he could alloy and make me some nice rings, it would have been twice as expensive as buying new rings of the same weight. That's with my gold and silver to alloy!! And he would have to keep the filings and clippings separate, which was a big problem impossible to solve...
This because he would have to alloy the pure gold and silver I have, lost wax cast or hammer it out, and it would create so much more work than he usually would do (order it online from a cheap labor country and just sell that to me)
Anything not in the catalogue was not possible all they do is set new diamonds and stones that fell out of their high quality stuff.
It was a huge disappointment so I bought my wife a nice ring from the other jeweller they dissuaded because that's cheap online ordered trash compared to theirs(?!?!)"high quality", and made her a rolling ring for christmas some years ago and made myself one simple fat 10 gram 18K ring.
Most jewellers want to make a profit fast and easy, not be creative and help people out with their own gold. It does not match their profit plan.
I'm afraid that for a wedding two weeks away, you're too late. unless your jeweller can remelt as suggested by Yggdrasil and it's not too brittle by ding so.
This because he would have to alloy the pure gold and silver I have, lost wax cast or hammer it out, and it would create so much more work than he usually would do (order it online from a cheap labor country and just sell that to me)
Anything not in the catalogue was not possible all they do is set new diamonds and stones that fell out of their high quality stuff.
It was a huge disappointment so I bought my wife a nice ring from the other jeweller they dissuaded because that's cheap online ordered trash compared to theirs(?!?!)"high quality", and made her a rolling ring for christmas some years ago and made myself one simple fat 10 gram 18K ring.
Most jewellers want to make a profit fast and easy, not be creative and help people out with their own gold. It does not match their profit plan.
I'm afraid that for a wedding two weeks away, you're too late. unless your jeweller can remelt as suggested by Yggdrasil and it's not too brittle by ding so.
I had a similar experience.
I wanted to have a ring designed so I could have it cast.
They just looked at me as if I fell from the sky and I talked some space language.
Today I'm not sure there are proper Gold/Silver smiths left, in my country at least.
They are just retailers pushing goods over the counter.
While some jewellers may be out for a fast profit remember if they have to pay rent, insurance etc their time is money , I had a friend who wanted a platinum engagement ring hand made and also his and hers wedding rings also handmade in platinum and it was if I remember correctly over twice the price of off the shelf ready made rings of very good quality, when you go down the handmade route time becomes the main cost excepting expensive stones not the materials.
I'm sure there are proper Gold/Silver smiths here in Norway too, but they are hard to find.
Most jewelers are these chains selling factory made stuff.
Same thing with chemists/pharmacies or hardware shops, just standard stuff.
Good luck finding a non standard bit or drill bit.
It all comes back to economy.
Which more or less forces us onto the mail order circus.
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2021
- Messages
- 1,355
There are still some people out there doing custom pieces. I think a lot of them prefer to be classed as "artists", and not so much as Jewelers any more. I know quite a few of these, who create pieces at home. They far out number the retail stores, by many times. If you need it in a hurry, I would search for one of these type of cottage industry type artists. The in store jewelry, is kind of going the way of the rotary dial phone.
Thanks for the advice so far! We have a great local jeweller, very experienced, knowledgeable and up for the challenge. The thinking behind refining it back is that I’m more inclined to wear white gold and my soon to be wife wears gold. Trying to re-alloy unknown base metals into a white gold ring purely by remelting would seem problematic due to brittleness. I’m curious about the “too late to do anything now” commentary. If I can source the correct chemicals locally and have access to lab facilities at the local university why would a 2 week timeframe (to just refine the gold, not to make the rings) be considered too late?
Because of the lack of time to recover and refine your metal scrap, you could buy silver and gold rounds .999 fine use them, and sell your scrap to help cover cost.
If time is not of concern, you can study and learn to recover and then refine your metals and cast them, and make your own ring for your wife as an anniversary present.
If time is not of concern, you can study and learn to recover and then refine your metals and cast them, and make your own ring for your wife as an anniversary present.
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2021
- Messages
- 1,355
Why not buy some time to do it right. Get a set of facsimiles just for the occasion, while the real ones are getting done in the manner you would like. The only 2 who will know are you 2. I don't mean to imply it is not important, it just seems like it is a bit of a big last minute push. Emergencies = a lot of money being thrown out for the inconvenience of a fast job. Don't know if there is someone in the hood who can do this locally. Not a huge deal once set up. I could easily do it in a day. Hopefully you will find someone in time. I would not let it sour the wedding, if it doesn't happen though.
Martijn
Well-known member
I said that.
Thinking minimalistic:
You could do this outside, staying upwind and holding your breath every now and then, away from humans and animals, inquart the gold to 25% or 6K gold, the jeweler can do this for you, dissolve in nitric acid to get all silver out, dissolve the gold in AR, the right way by dissolving small amounts of nitric and watching the reaction die out or consume the last gold, and not by premixing it at a 3:1 ratio, precipitate the gold with SMB, filter and wash with boiling HCl and boiling water a couple times according harold's or others procedure, completely dry it and give it a hot nitric wash and melt into a pure button of gold.
You'll need the safety gear like gloves, goggles, a catch basin, acids, beakers, hotplate, filters, funnels, SMB to precipitate the gold out and the jeweller can alloy the clean powder or button to get the right ratio for the gold type you want.
For white gold you need Pd or Pt i think. Not sure. If that is in your source material, be exrtemely carefull, even more than with the 'normal' toxic chemical salts you create.
And thats a very short simplified way of saying it. Actually i consider this a dangerous advice to a novice. There are points where you can get into problems or need some experience to get it right.
It took me 4 years before I had the confidence to give it a go.
This craft is not easy or to think lightly about.
Do we have experienced members living near you to help you out? Fast! Would be awesome.
It can be refined in days, with the right knowledge and equipment.
Congratulations with your engagement and i hope you succeed in this wonderfull idea.
Martijn.
Edited for spelling and to add the precipitation step.
I'm not a jeweler so my knowledge is limited on forming PM's..... but I would think if it was already formed into jewelry then cracking shouldn't be an issue...?
Martijn
Well-known member
The more you remelt an alloy if gold and copper the more brittle it becomes. You need to refine at some point.
Melting different rings together increases the chance one of them is a remelt and 'pollutes' the rest.
rhwhite67
Well-known member
Gentlemen why make this difficult. As a former jeweler who regularly refined scrap for customers reslloyed and made misc. Take and weigh your scrap add 4-5 times the weight in pure silver and melt it together stirring thoroughly and while nice and liquid carefully pour it into a metal gallon coffee can full of water causing it to cornflake/ shot. Take the sh0t. Place it in a 12 cu glass coffee pot with 2-3 cups of water and 1/2 cup of hydrogen peroxide. Then add nitric acid very slowly about 2 tablespoons to start with place on low just warming heat and let it slowly react overnight outside away from anything you don't want to rust or if as you mentioned you have access do it in a fume hood. Cover the coffee pot top with cling wrap or press and seal to keep the fumes in. The peroxide will help to keep the fumes down also. Add additional nitric acid as needed in small additions on heat until all of the silver is dissolves/parted. This will leave behind all of your gold in a fine powder at about 98% purity and all of the base metals and silver should be in solution. Carefully pour off as much solution as possible and then filter the gold out through a coffee filter. Dry it and take it to your jeweler to alloy appropriately for the grade if metal you want in your rings.
On the solution. Add salt and you should get a lovely cottage cheese looking precipt known as silver chloride. Store this in an air tight container under a layer of water and if you wish to you can find the appropriate way to convert this back to silver metal elsewhere on the forum. Your jeweler could also do all if this for you in his playing fumehood if he wished to do so simply give him the info. He will also be able to roll the metaled button out flat and thin and cut it into pieces that would dissolve much faster than shot. Good luck to you on this. Sincerely
Ron White
On the solution. Add salt and you should get a lovely cottage cheese looking precipt known as silver chloride. Store this in an air tight container under a layer of water and if you wish to you can find the appropriate way to convert this back to silver metal elsewhere on the forum. Your jeweler could also do all if this for you in his playing fumehood if he wished to do so simply give him the info. He will also be able to roll the metaled button out flat and thin and cut it into pieces that would dissolve much faster than shot. Good luck to you on this. Sincerely
Ron White
Last edited by a moderator:
Thank you Ron, that is very much the approach I was after, cheers!
