Need some advice with metal powder (Ni, Cu, Ag, Au)

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mls26cwru

mls26cwru

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Jan 11, 2012
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okay, I have been pondering this question for a while and figured I would ask for some advice from you guys.

I have 35lbs of metal powder/flake that has a the following concentrations (analyses done by ICP)
Nickle ~74%
Copper ~21%
Silver ~3.5%
Gold ~0.5%

my obvious problem is the nickle/copper mix that eats acids like crazy before I can even get to the Ag/Au. My thought was to go about this my smelting the powder down and using its own copper as the collector metal. then putting the rest through a copper cell.

I was thinking just a standard flux of sodium carbonate, borax, and possible flourspar (and possibly some niter as well) to hopefully put the nickle into slag. I am aware I will probably need to add copper to the resulting metal to bring up the copper concentration for the cell.

Does anyone have any experience with a similar material and/or any other advice or guidance? I have been going through Bugbee's book on fire assaying and this is the direction I am leaning based on my reading.

And one final note... the material was deposited in fine layers, so there is a stratification aspect that would hinder the use of a cyanide leech unless all the flake material is ground down to a very fine powder... which i am not sure how practical it is since the metal is malleable to a degree.

Thank in advance!
Mike
 
Yuck

I don't believe the nickel will oxidize off to any appreciable degree, without first oxidizing off much of the copper.

In the assay scale, you can either add sulfur, or use scorification...neither really scale up well (at least for the back yard scale operator).

I'd contact proper refineries, and see what you can get outright. They may be able to blend it in to other feedstock with low nickel and avoid the penalty that gets charged on high nickel blend alloys.
 
mls26cwru said:
Lino1406 said:
Have you considered use of thiosulphate + H2O2, should leave the nickel alone
Click to expand...

I did not, but I will look into it now :)
Click to expand...

Hey if you need some to play with I will send you some for shipping I bought it years ago and never did anything with it.
Eric
 
[/quote]

Hey if you need some to play with I will send you some for shipping I bought it years ago and never did anything with it.
Eric
[/quote]

Thank you Eric, I will keep you posted if i decide to try to go that route!

Mike
 
Mike

I know we don't always agree however I would honestly suggest that taking the money you're (edit) offered from a proper assay would far outweigh what you would get trying to do this stuff yourself.

Jon
 
As you have this as a powder and not in solids I’d try a few tests to see if you can reduce the volume of base metals, AP would I believe remove both the nickel and copper and been in powder it should react quickly but try a few small scale tests to see how it reacts and what volume of base metals it will dissolve, the one advantage of this method is that it’s known and if the reaction dissolves the gold an additional small amount of powder would cement it back out, this might be a bust but worth a try, boiling in simple Hcl should remove the nickel leaving a mix which might be more suitable for a copper cell or simply follow Jon’s advice and sell on a reliable assay.
 
anachronism said:
Mike

I know we don't always agree however I would honestly suggest that taking the money you're (edit) offered from a proper assay would far outweigh what you would get trying to do this stuff yourself.

Jon
Click to expand...

Thank you sir... I value your opinion as I do respect your refining knowledge.

It seems that all the information I am looking at is pointing in the same direction too... something about the copper and nickle together that makes it a pretty tough separation.

nickvc said:
As you have this as a powder and not in solids I’d try a few tests to see if you can reduce the volume of base metals, AP would I believe remove both the nickel and copper and been in powder it should react quickly but try a few small scale tests to see how it reacts and what volume of base metals
Click to expand...

This was the direction I tried going first and with a couple different approaches... The biggest problem was the amount of acid it consumes and waste it thus generates. By the time I figured in costs of materials, time, disposal costs, it was close to a break even. And to deal with that much stinky nickle chloride, it better be worth it!

Thanks a bunch guys!
M
 
If you dissolve the nickel in Hcl you can plate it out, I’d treat this as a job to do in between other more profitable ones as a time filler that way the costs are spread especially time and if you can strip the nickel out the costs of disposal should go down.
 
nickvc said:
If you dissolve the nickel in Hcl you can plate it out,
Click to expand...

Nick

I assume you mean to actually "plate" the nickel out - as in electro-win - & "not" cement it out

That (electro-winning) makes the most sense to me as that should also (at least to some degree) allow him to re-use the HCl for dissolving more nickel --- or am I wrong about that ? (re-using the HCl)

The down side would be cost of the anode as you would want/need a Pt anode - which can be spendy

Kurt
 
Thank you for the suggestion... I will look into it abit deeper. This is for a friend, so I am really trying to see what I can figure out... even if it ends up that he has to sell it off.
 

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