how to process gold foil on mylar film ?

[moshik3]

Hi

what is the best way to process gold foil on a clear mylar carrier ?
it was used for book bindery .

these are small strips of clear plastic like foil with a thin gold foil on one side, it should be 23K gold.

i've been told that it's possible to do in a microwave.
i'd like to avoid chemical processes.

what about just burning the whole thing and then grinding it into powder and melting it ?

 

[qst42know]

Lazersteve has attempted this with silver from keyboard Mylars. I doesn't sound quick or easy.

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=711&p=6438&hilit=keyboard+mylars#p6438

With the proper respect the chemical way would be easier. Hydrochloric acid and Clorox bleach.

 

[nickvc]

Burning would create a real mess and even worse smoke and unless you could keep the material covered you could lose some in the process. If you have volumes of this material I'd be tempted to run it all through AR but not to hot as it will dissolve fairly quickly. I don't think you will recover fortunes from this material as if it's gold leaf it's incredibly thin and test to make sure it is gold before attempting large scale recovery.

 

[arthur kierski]

nick, are you saying to put the millar strips with gold traces in ar ,without a pre- treat of the millar? do you think that ar will attack the plastic and liberate the gold? if so ,it would facilitate many members work-----any way ,i will give a try monday and pass the results (if it works)
regards
Arthur

 

[joem]

Are you sure these are karat gold? I have many rolls of gold on mylar heat stamp foil used to emboss (metal stamp) a micro thin layer of gold (coloured) onto books and paper. But the gold does not react at all in HCL and bleach. As a comparison gold on ceramic reacts well in hcl+bleach.

 

[Claudie]

I have done some Gold plated dishes with HCL and Clorox. It is a very fast way of stripping Gold from any surface as long as there aren't other metals present. If I were doing this, I would at least experiment with the acid bleach to see how it worked. :|

 

[nickvc]

Another good idea Claudie, I must admit I'd try either method using the least amount of oxidiser as possible and without heat and definitely trial batches first so any problems would cause small messes rather than kilos of congealed sludge with values locked inside.