Spaceman,
Read Hokes, to learn the basics, doing the getting acquainted experiments in her book, these are a very valuable learning tool to teach you how to deal with these metals in solutions, and the problems that can develop from them when in solutions, and these experiments also teach you how to test for the values in solution when you cannot see the metals any longer.
The forum has tons of information on the subject of platinum group as well as most all of these valuable metals.
Laser Steve has some great DVD's at a very reasonable price, and some good free videos and some supplies and information on his web site, while there try out his search engine for the forum, I prefer to use it to search for information here on the forum, when I wish to find something or have a question.
I also think starting with a simpler material like gold foil from memory fingers, and learning the testing procedures and basic processes, and then work up to the more complicated PGM's, as there can be a learning curve, reading about it, and doing it are similar, but also completely different, by working with a simpler material first you do not have the problems that can come from some materials, and you can get acquainted with how things are processed, doing this as you study the more complicated material you plan to work with.
Most of my lab equipment mainly can be found in the kitchen section of the second hand store, most of my chemicals come from the local grocery, hardware, auto part, and pool chemical stores.
Welcome to the forum it sounds like you bit off a lot to chew, and have an awful a lot of reading to do, you will soon see that the education is the real gold mine.
