jimdoc said:
grimsqueaker said:
Had you contacted Garfield Refining in Philadelphia?
https://www.garfieldrefining.com
I have no affiliation, just curious. I have purchased small, name-branded ingots from them on several occasions at what appeared to be a reasonable mark-up over spot, but never sold to them. On my purchase trips, I had the impression that they were pretty honest, but without experiencing the other side of the transaction, that is only speculation. I will say that I would never carry valuables on my person in their neighborhood after dark, and even in daylight, I was as well-armed as I thought I could get away with. I presume most refiners (at least those that integrate their office business and refining operations) are located in neighborhoods that are somewhat questionable, at best...
I used to live near Garfield Refining in Philly and drove by there all the time, and never knew what was there. I have only heard bad stuff about them. No dealings with them to know for sure. I try to stay out of Philly completely now, it's all a mess.
I had lots of experience with Garfield several years ago. I was recycling for a major manufacturing company in the DFW area. The waste came from a step in their manufacturing process that involved brazing the manufactured parts and then grinding the brazed areas smooth. The braze had significant silver content. The waste was of 2 types- solids ranging in size from micron sized, up to big chunks weighing 2-3oz., and ventilator dust that is so fine it will float on water. Some of the solids I refined myself, but I took most of it to refiners in the DFW area. But refining the vent dust is a totally different matter. I could do it, but refining it is much more complicated and time consuming. It's well worth paying someone who is better set up for it. So I sent samples to several refiners around the country. Garfield had the best yield, so I began sending them 1 or 2 medium flat rate boxes a week by USPS. All was well for a few months. There was very little fluctuation in the yields from package to package. Always plus or minus 0.1% from the previous package. But then after a few months, the yield began to slowly decline. It was like 50.1, 50, 49.9, 50, 49.9, 49.8, 49.9, 49.8, 49.7, 49.6, 49.7, 49.6, 49.5 ........ not down every time, but the trend was clearly lower. When I mentioned it to my rep at Garfield, he just passed it off as normal fluctuations. I dealt with my customer for years and I can say with absolute certainty that the source material was always very consistent. I won't say that the drop in yield was intentional. But it really doesn't matter to me. Whether incompetence or outright theft, the bottom line is that after watching the yield gradually drop more than 3%, I found another company to do my refining.
Sadly, this is not an isolated experience. There are several refiners in the DFW area. I would travel there every 2 weeks, bringing the solids I had recovered and cleaned since my previous trip. I started with one that was recommended to me. The first time there, the assay was pretty much what I knew to be right. All was good for several trips. Then a noticeable decline in yield and the lower yield remained for a few weeks until I tried another refiner. Then, (surprise, surprise) the next refiner assayed back at the higher level again. Again, almost predictably, after a few months, the yield began to fluctuate much more than normal. Always to the downside.
I have tried 5 different refiners in the DFW area. The only one that didn't eventually begin to decline in yield is Central Refining on Anjon Street. I've been doing business with them for over 3 years now.
