N00b with Vinegar

[iwkya]

Im a completed n00b at this so sorry for any repeated stuff.

I am using the vinegar method with salt and an air pipe. I was just wondering how much salt is required as everything I read people just put "some" in. Also do I need peroxide and how does that help?

My vinegar has been at it for a few days and its gone cloudy - is this ok ?

Again I really do apologise for asking this stuff. If anyone can help, or point me in the right direction I would appriciate.

Cheers,

 

[Martijn]

You're from England. Why are you using vinegar and salt to create weak HCL with acetates if you can just buy clean and stronger HCL?

On what kind of material are you using it? The queens crown jewels or black sand concentrates from the river Thames?
The air bubbler makes me suspect gold plated PCB fingers, but give some more info please. Cloudiness could come from CuCl₁ or from milk, again, I don't know what you've put in.
But to keep it short, forget vinegar.

Martijn.

 

[iwkya]

Hi and thank for you reply,

I am using some simple pcb fingers such as ram, cpu etc.
I was looking in to the stronger route but didn't want to dive in too soon and too fast. I am not hoping to make and was just curious that white vinegar could do this heh.

I have added white vinegar and some table salt. Some of the things I read added peroxide but again I believe this creates quite a corrosive gas but I am not 100% sure about this stuff.
I understand your forget vinegar comment, but my curiosity is with the vinegar so that would be pointless - otherwise im buying HC and Nitric and it isn't cheap - and I still would satify my curiosity about vinegar.

Cheers,

 

[nickvc]

I hope your patience is as good as your curiosity as the process you are using will be a very slow and long winded experiment.
No disrespect but as a noob I suggest you stick to what works and what the forum members are using in the majority of cases, using weak acids causes large amounts of toxic wastes which you will have to treat to dispose of properly at some point, read and study on here and pick a process that’s well documented and easy for you to understand and follow, we have had many new members who want to go for the more gentle chemical options but the one point none seem to get is that the metals we are after are some of the worlds most un reactive elements and creating huge volumes of toxic waste solutions will be very time consuming to treat.

 

[Martijn]

In that case, your cloudiness is probably copper 1 chloride which is quite insoluble in water. You need some free HCL in solution and air to convert it to copper 2 chloride which can dissolve metallic copper.

Like Nickv said you need to add a lot of vinegar and salt to achieve this, creating lots more of just as toxic and chemically loaded waste as in the AP process. Maybe even more toxic.
H2O2 is used to start the AP process or to dissolve gold in HCL.

To refine gold foils, you don't necessarily need nitric.
Only for silver you can't do without nitric.

But the most important thing to know is:
We are working with toxic, deadly chemicals and metals in solution. Also with your seemingly harmless vinegar salt method. You need to know how to handle them safe and dispose of the waste responsibly.

Some links to start:
Welcome to all newbies:
https://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=796&p=294922#p294922

Help! where do I learn these skills?
https://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=28521
Read the dealing with waste part until you understand it.

Example of what not to do:
https://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=29898

Ask here before attempting anything else or when you need further guidance.

Please.
Be safe, live long.
Martijn.

P.S. Forget vinegar :wink: :lol:
Your curiosity will be more than satisfied. This rabbit's hole is deeeep.

 

[iwkya]

Thank you for this,

I am overly careful with everything because I just don't know at this point. I have put Hoke on my kindle ready to read and try to understand a bit of chem (im a game developer lol). I have my vinegar in a shed 10 meters from the house, in a glass beaker with a bathroom ventelation pipe engulfing it, pumping the gas out of the vent in the wall hah.

I suppose as a n00b im scared of HCL but I would like to look into it more, I do find this fasinating. I know that vinegar and salf give of quite dangerous gas. I appriciate any help, videos to be pointed at or documenation that helps. I will try to trawl the forums for helpful stuff before posting but there is just soooo much stuff hah.

Cheers, again - and yes i have patience

 

[FrugalRefiner]

It's true, there is sooooo much information on the forum. If you're interested in a particular subject, the search function can help narrow it down. Try searching for the word "vinegar". You'll find many past discussions where members have described what happens when you combine vinegar and salt; which is that it creates weak HCl.

It's not safer, because it does create HCl, and once metals are dissolved into the solution it creates a dangerous, toxic solution of metal salts.

It's not cheaper, because the vinegar is usually much weaker than HCl you can buy for less at the hardware store.

It creates a greater volume of toxic waste that you have to deal with.

Look at the upper right corner of the screen for the search function.

Dave

 

[iwkya]

Thanks. I didn't think of it like that. Very nervous about having hcl and the prices I was looking at were so expensive. Is there a cheaper hcl out there, is brick cleaning acid the same stuff.
Also I read the whole thread on what not to do link... Jees, even with the video not there that guy sounded crazy stupid.