How to make my own refining system

[qfinej]

Hi Everyone,

I've just joined this forum and I'm wondering is it possible to build my own refining system? I have a small jewellery store and we make all our own jewellery on the premises, I would like to be able to refine all our scrap, sweeps and polishing to save on costs, I'm not looking to buy gold and make money I more looking to save our scrap by reusing. Is it possible to build my own (I have no knowledge on chemistry..... I know this is a stretch) I've looked at amritgroups refining machine which looks fantastic and safe to use inside my workshop, the only thing is the cost is far to much is there a cheaper way... far cheaper. I usually refine every few years so that kind of expense on a machine is far to much. I currently have 300gms of filings, a garbage bag of polishing and sweeps, 330gms of 9ct scrap, 280gms of 18ct scrap and about 400gm of mixed tinyn pieces of scrap, I would say this has taken me about 3 to 4 years to build up and now I have to send it to be refined which costs about $600-800 roughly which isn't much but then I have to pay tax when I see it to them which is crazy.

I would appreciate any help anyone can give even if its saying I'm crazy and its not possible.

Regards,
Aaron

 

[patnor1011]

Aaron,
generally said the only refining system which works is your brain and your hands. There is no machine which do-it-all. I have no doubt that after some studying and experimenting you will be able to process your waste yourself.

 

[martyn111]

Welcome to the forum.
What you are asking is more than possible, but, you must be prepared to do your homework as this is really a self help forum. Everything you will need to know is contained within the writings of the forum, which will be easier to understand once you have learnt the language of the forum by reading Hoke's book, available as a free download from many members signature lines or from the book section.
Once you have read and understood Hoke's book, done the getting aquainted experiments and read the forum, if there is any particular process you are having problems performing or understanding then we are here to help, the clearer the question (shows you have done your homework) the better the answer you will receive.

 

[nickvc]

As Martyn said very well yes you can do this and the cost of your refining will cover some of the set up costs plus you will recover all the values in your scrap and sweeps!
Read Hoke it's the basis of what you need to know it's very easily read even for the non chemist and gives very good testing procedures so you know what you have and where. Make sure to read the safety section here on the forum and spend some time researching the materials you have here on the forum, search function top right of your screen, and then decide if refining is for you.
You might decide it's too dangerous or not worth the effort and should you come to that conclusion maybe ask for a member to toll refine for you, they refine your material and keep a percentage of the values the rest comes back to you as gold and silver and any PGMs if worth recovering.
The beauty of this is you have metals which you can re alloy or simply save and no tax to pay until you sell your material either as product or as bullion, many bullion houses run metal accounts which is exactly what it sounds like, you deposit gold or silver and draw down product, the advantage is the costs for material can be much less than buying, might be worth a look.

 

[NobleMetalWorks]

There are three types of refining systems.

Professional industrial systems which are very very expensive

eBay systems, which are all suspect and might not work at all or worse could be very dangerous

Hobbyist systems put together by people who are knowledgeable and have the experience to back it

Most of us though have a process that we follow. If you want to do this the most cost effective way possible, learn and become comfortable with a process, not a system. Once you have a good process, it only gets better from that point on, so long as you don't suffer from brain damage. If you purchase a system, not only would it not perfectly fit your needs, but it may not be comfortable for you to use and you are stuck with it. It's far easier to change your process to fit your needs than to try to adapt some system for your requirements.

If I were you I would learn a process, not spend my time trying to find a recovery and refining system that just magically does everything for me. You do have other options. You can see if someone here wants to purchase your material, you could sell your material on eBay, you could look for a better refiner and even ask members here who might be a better refiner to do business with. Someone might even be interested in trading precious metals with you, for your scrap, you just have to ask. And you might even find someone you can purchase your raw material from.

If you are only producing small quantities each month, you don't need to spend all the money on a system, because your process is more than sufficient, and remember you didn't spend a lot of money on the equipment. That $800.00 that you would have spent to have the material processed will probably purchase everything you need for small quantities.

This is what I would do if I were in your place

1. Read Hoke, again if need be to understand the process. She speaks about Jewelry waste specifically.

2. Decide if I can be safe enough, since I am dealing with NOx and other gases, to process your scrap/sweeps

3. Purchase only the items you need to process a small amount. Small beakers, small stir rods, no need to go big, I am also assuming that you have a way to melt PM since it sounds like you are casting your own custom jewelry, or is that not the case?

4. Test small quantities of your most easily processed scrap, become comfortable with your process

5. Since you have saved up three years worth of material, you can become very good at recovering and refining your sweeps and scraps.

6. Since you don't create a lot of scrap, you could divide the material up you have over the course of a year, processing a certain amount every month adding to it your monthly sweeps and scrap supplementing your income or in this case your raw material over the next 12 months. Then after that, just simply process the small amount you have at the end of each month, make it part of your SOP.

 

[Harold_V]

I made my way in life for several years, processing, primarily, wastes from the jeweler's bench. I processed floor sweeps, bench sweeps, polishing wastes, including filters, plus carpets. It can be done by an individual, but you must have the ability to incinerate and to procure, use and dispose of acids safely. You can learn everything you need to know by reading Hoke's book. There are a few exceptions---she treats silver with contempt, but the readers, here, can help you with silver. The other thing she does not address is how to process carpets. That's easy enough to master, although carpet must be burned and roasted in order to recover gold contained within. That may or may not be an issue for you to confront.

Read Hoke, then decide if refining is for you. Be advised, refining in your work space is NOT a good idea. The fumes from refining and the storage of acids tends to rust everything in the area. Even well ventilated rooms suffer. Armed with that idea, consider refining away from your shop, where you'd most certainly ruin a lot of your tools over the long haul if you didn't heed this warning.

Harold

 

[qfinej]

Thanks everyone for your prompt replies, this seems like a brilliant forum people offering advice so quickly, I'm glad I joined! I'm reading the book now I'm going to have to skip the first platinum walk through sadly as I don't have any separated platinum filings the only platinum I have is in my white gold.

I will persist with refining I don't really have the choice with the tough economy we're in I believe we have to do everything we can just to survive and this will be a way to reduce costs. Sadly working in a luxury industrie we get affected alot when times get tough, I love my job so that makes it worth it.

Thanks for the tip on the corrosive affects the chemicals will have on my tools, I can't have that I love my tools . I saw this Amrit group refiner that neutralized the gases and I just read that the book deals with the gases in chapter 12 or there abouts. I live in a town house so I might find it difficult finding a suitable location, in your refining experiences is there a safe way to neutralize gases or is that a pipe dream.

Regards,
Aaron

 

[NobleMetalWorks]

I live in a town house so I might find it difficult finding a suitable location, in your refining experiences is there a safe way to neutralize gases or is that a pipe dream.

Regards,
Aaron

Aaron,

There are only a few ways to deal with NOx

Do your process outdoors, in a well ventilated area staying out of the downwind path so that you don't breath in any fumes.

Acid resistant ducting and fan to vent away from your work area

These two examples don't neutralize the gas though. Filters will not work, not even carbon filters. There is evaporation in the AR process, carbon works like a sponge. Once the carbon is saturated with whatever you are evaporating it no longer can absorb anything.

There are several posts in the forum on how to deal with NOx. Hoke even has an illustration I believe, of a beaker, sitting in water with a glass bell over so that the gas is trapped, and eventually absorbed into the water, it is on page 42 in Hoke's book. There are other systems that utilize different neutralizing methods. When NOx gas goes into water though, you get a weak Nitric Acid, among other things your system or scrubber may have captured, that's where the actual neutralizing should happen. You might want to do a forum search on the subject, you will come up with all kinds of interesting ways to deal with NOx and other gases created in this process.

I am currently building a scrubber based on 4Metals design, here is the link.

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=9115&hilit=fume+scrubber

Living in an apartment or town house makes it difficult, I wouldn't do this in an area where so many people are so close if I were you. The potential for an accident affecting your neighbors is too great, plus you don't want anyone seeing any of your chemistry equipment, they might assume you are running a meth lab. Hahahaha.

 

[qfinej]

I just read about the beaker covering the solution in small pool of water, quiet simple and effect it seems.

Yeah better find somewhere outdoors don't want to look like I'm running a meth lab...... Although breaking bad was a cool show haha.

I have a question and I know this is virtually impossible to answer but roughly how long would it take to process 100gm of 9ct yellow gold clean scrap using the method in chaper V. Also is it better to decrease the carat to say 6ct using silver so that can also be recovered too? Should I be melting the gold into granuals or should I roll it into thin strips?

Thanks again everyone

 

[NobleMetalWorks]

I have a question and I know this is virtually impossible to answer but roughly how long would it take to process 100gm of 9ct yellow gold clean scrap using the method in chaper V. Also is it better to decrease the carat to say 6ct using silver so that can also be recovered too? Should I be melting the gold into granuals or should I roll it into thin strips?

Thanks again everyone

You are right, it's impossible. I would say it will take as long as it takes for you to read Hoke totally + your skill, equipment, etc. Sorry for harping on that, but being as new as I am, while it's fresh, I can say that I didn't come close to understanding the value of reading Hoke, until I actually did.

If you read Hoke a little further, she talks about inquarting on page 52.

There are variables in what type of material you inquart with, for example, if your material is more than 10% copper, and then there is what you are using to drop the gold out of solution and how it will be affected by the metal you use to inquart with.

Hoke also says you want to have the total percentage of gold, if under 9k, to be 25% or less or else Nitric Acid will not react with the base metals readily enough. If you are going to use nitric acid, then the bleach/HCl method, then AR to refine, you are going to want to inquart.

 

[qfinej]

Thanks I'll keep reading, should I read until I finish or should I be stopping at doing little trials of each process?

 

[NobleMetalWorks]

Thanks I'll keep reading, should I read until I finish or should I be stopping at doing little trials of each process?

However you learn best. I read the entire book before I did any experiments. I am lucky, I have a pharmaceutical background, it sounds like you have some experience that can be applied also. So it just depends on how confident you feel about mixing acids that could potentially do great harm, or worse. But the trials are good to do, you can get an idea of what to expect when you do larger quantities. I would do the trials before attempting to run something through the entire process for the first time with significant values.

But everyone learns differently. It just depends on your confidence and competence.

 

[butcher]

SBrown
I like this discussion,especially the part where you say:

I can say that I didn't come close to understanding the value of reading Hoke, until I actually did.

well done.

 

[Harold_V]

SBrown
I like this discussion,especially the part where you say:

I can say that I didn't come close to understanding the value of reading Hoke, until I actually did.

well done.

Indeed!
One of our trusty readers, Rusty, confessed the same thing to me some time ago. I had admonished him to read the book, but didn't understand that he had not. A year or two later, he contacted me and told me he now understood why I had promoted the book relentlessly. Fact is, it's the ONLY book that will take a complete fool by the hand and teach him/her how to refine, and how to test properly. That's not to diminish the value of other books, but many are written for those with knowledge and experience. Not so with Hoke's book, a point she makes clear.

Read Hoke.

Read it again.

Harold