help needed, wheres my gold gone

[johnynell]

Hi

I am new to the forum, I have just attempted to refine gold ( I have done quite a bit of silver before I plucked up the courage to attempt gold).
I have left overnight in the AR, filtered, added Urea, all seemed fine however until I added the SMB, after the reaction I am left with a clear greeny colour liquid, have I added to much, if so how do I retrieve the gold..

many thanks in advance

John

 

[Topher_osAUrus]

May i ask why you opted for urea?
Also, did you stannous test?
Did you dilute the AR before adding smb?
-you say cloudy. that, to me, sounds like either a. AgCl or b. The little bit of gold you had in solution is now precipitating.

But, you neglected to mention what your feedstock is/was. Which can be a big deal. Since you left it overnight (heat or no?), if it was something that had base metals in it. The gold could have (probably did) cement back out on the base metals, leaving you a barren solution, so no amount of smb would get it out of solution if it has already reduced itself.

Anyways.. Pics?
More info?

 

[nickvc]

As Topher has said we need a lot more information to be able to help.
Feedstock and amount.
The process you followed, and the amount of acids used.
What do you have in your filter paper, pictures would help here.
We are fairly certain we can help but we need good and full information to avoid further problems.

 

[johnynell]

hi

Thanks for the reply's, it has been left overnight in AR 1-4 ratio on a bed of sand on a low heat,
it has settled down now but there is no substance at all, the liquid is clear, there was a definite reaction when I put the SMB in ( I diluted first with distilled water)....the stock was 9ct jewellery(£200 worth ) that I had melted to shot, apologies if I am not making myself clear, I'm new to this very exciting new hobby.
Should I have used something other than urea to neutralize the nitric acid??, checked on forums and youtube and urea seemed to be the chemical to use....please ask more questions, I am eager to learn..( and I want to retrieve my gold :wink: )

thankyou

 

[FrugalRefiner]

Don't worry. Your gold is still there and you won't lose it unless you throw something away.

It is better to eliminate as much base metal as possible before dissolving your gold. We would accomplish that by inquarting the jewelry by adding some silver or copper when we melt it to granulate/cornflake it. We then dissolve away the base metals with nitric acid, which leaves nearly pure gold, then dissolve the gold and precipitate.

It is better to use all the hydrochloric acid we expect to need, then add the nitric in increments until everything is dissolved. It avoids using too much nitric, which then has to be eliminated before precipitating. Most members now use sulfamic acid to eliminate excess nitric.

It's always a good idea to put your beaker in a second vessel that will catch the liquid if the beaker breaks. Most people use a pyroceram / Corning ware dish.

Those are just bullet points, but should give you enough terms to start searching the forum for the details.

When all else fails and you have a mess on your hands, you can add a chunk of copper to your liquid. This will cause any precious metals to cement out of solution. Then, when you know a bit more, you can dissolve it again to refine it.

Best of luck on your journey,
Dave

 

[Lino1406]

According to the photo, more SMB is needed, For if not to get gold, at least see a copper salt precipitation

 

[g_axelsson]

Hi and welcome to the forum.

Be careful of what you watch and believe on youtube. There are the bad, the ugly and the good videos there and it can be hard to know which is what.
I have a short list of some good ones at http://goldrefiningwiki.com/mediawiki/index.php/YouTube

I think that Lino is in part correct, but if there is a lot of nitric acid still left then just dumping in more SMB is a sure way to make a mess. To get rid of nitric acid already in your solution there are a couple of alternative ways, commonly called denoxing. Look that up before doing anything else. It is mentioned in the library, Hokes book (look at Dave's signature above, you should read it) and on http://goldrefiningwiki.com/mediawiki/index.php/Denoxing

Before doing anything else, make or get yourself some stannous chloride and learn how to test and detect gold in solution. It's the eyes of the refiner and will tell you where your gold is and if you still have some in solution. As before, check the library. The wiki is incomplete on that topic but there are two videos at the bottom of http://goldrefiningwiki.com/mediawiki/index.php/Stannous_chloride

Dave, it looks like the sand bath is in a pyroceram dish already.

Best advice I can give you is to put a couple of layers of saran wrap on that beaker and read. The gold isn't going anywhere. Some of it might be in your filter and solid waste, so you should save those too for later processing.

Good luck Johny, you are almost at the finishing line. When you have your gold back as a shiny button you will be hooked.

Göran