archeonist said:
There is just one thing I don't understand about panning or bleu bowling gold wires. Why would someone take the effort in doing this as you just can put the incinerated powder in AR? The solids can be filtered of and almost all of your gold is in solution in the filtrate.
The one reason I can come up with is that you expect a lot of carbon in your powder, wich can adsorb gold in solution.
Yes – you can leach your pyrolyzed/incinerated chips (after milling) without first concentrating them
However – (as you pointed out) getting all of the (pyrolyzed) carbon reduced to (incinerated) ash is a problem (& yes carbon will absorb gold from solution) --- that is because in order to reduce the carbon to ash it needs to be exposed to oxygen when heat is applied --- therefore the carbon needs to be spread “very” thin – or the carbon under the surface will not reduce to ash due to the lack of oxygen getting to it – or – you have to “blow” oxygen through the carbon (if it’s not spread thin) so that oxygen contacts ALL the carbon beneath the surface
So – by not first concentrating (washing) off the vast majority of your “fine” milled pyrolyzed carbon – you are going to spend a
HUGE amount of time incinerating all the carbon to “insure” all of the carbon has been reduced to ash
Also – if you don’t first concentrate your pyrolyzed/incinerated (pyrolyzed – then incinerated) milled ash it will require MUCH more chemical to do the leaching because you have to “fully” saturate the fully volume of material you are leaching – AND – then you will also need to use a MUCH greater volume of water to “TRY” to wash all the chem out of that LARGE volume of ash
I say “TRY” to wash all the chem out because with each wash you have a “diminishing” return & the more material you have to wash – the harder it is going to be to get all the chem washed out --- in other words – the more material you are trying to wash – the GREATER the amount of wash water needed --- which means MORE waste to deal with in the end
To put it in perspective --- lets say you have one cup of ash to leach (without concentrating it) its going to take a cup (plus/minus a bit) of chem to leach it – then its going to take another 4 – 5 cups of water to wash the chem out (so 5 – 6 cups total to leach & wash)
Now – lets double that to 2 cups – so your starting with double the chem (2 cups) --- BUT – its going to take MORE then double the water to get that chem washed out --- something more like 10 – 12 cups water (due to the “diminishing” returns of trying to wash more chem from more material)
So – you have not just more then doubled the amount chem needed for leaching – but you have also MORE then doubled the wash water needed to insure all the chem is washed out – meaning you have also MORE then doubled your waste --- in other words – the washing out (of the chem) is not simply increased “equal to” the increase in material being washed – rather – it is increased by a rater GREATER then the increase in material
Therefore – the more you can concentrate the material “before” leaching the less chem needed for leaching in the first place AND the amount of wash water will also be reduced “substantially” !!!
And that is because the diminishing returns of each wash is more effective when you are washing the chem from a smaller (concentrated) amount of material
As a final note (on leaching the milled ash of IC chips) --- keep in mind that “ash” is alkaline (basic) so we are not only talking about using enough acid to dissolve the gold in the ash – but you also need enough acid to “overcome” the alkaline nature of the ash so that the acid can dissolve the gold
In other words – ash being basic is going to have a neutralizing effect on the acid & so enough acid needs to be used to overcome the neutralizing effect of the ash --- or you can wash “most” of the ash off to start with so you are not needing a bunch of acid just to overcome the neutralizing effect of the ash
To put this all in perspective – I have processed
MANY 50 – 60 pound batches of IC chips --- that is right close to a 5 gallon bucket full of (ball milled) carbon/ash --- can you imagine trying to reduce that much fine carbon to ash - & then trying to leach it without concentrating ---- I can’t – the amount of chem & waste created from washing would be
HUGE
I am able to reduce that 5 gallon bucket of carbon/ash to a bit less then half a gallon of concentrates which can then be effectively reduced to ash & then leached with minimal chems & minimal washing out of the chem
Bottom line – is that if you want to be successful at processing IC chips (epoxy) follow the instructions as they have been laid out by Pat, myself & a number of other members of this forum that have put a GREAT deal of time into methods “
that work” & then taken the time to post those methods here as the “proper” lead for others to follow --- if there were other – better methods – we would be talking about it here on the forum
Kurt
, meant to say "gold pan" same as prospector's pan.
