Barren Realms 007
In Remembrance
lasereyes said:
Your still on the newbies boat but be patient you will get upgraded in time. 8)
Questions about AP
- Thread starter firedan525
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Your still on the newbies boat but be patient you will get upgraded in time. 8)
joem
Well-known member
How about the blue freezer packs in a zip lock baggie?
joem
Well-known member
lasereyes said:
but they are enclosed and the baggie would be an added safety measure (and they are cheap too)
Hello everybody, I was recently advised by a mentor of sorts to simply put fingers in ar and forget the ap. I'm very new to this and it's a hobby of mine because, well I've yet to pull gold out! And have spent money on supplies. My first 2 batches were duds. My 3rd is currently showing some promise. It at first contained various gold pins, a few ozs, and 300 ml muriatic acid and 50 ml of hydrogen peroxide. But I noticed that no gold was showing up and all my pins looked solid, and after reading many posts on the forum I put in some fingers to put more copper in to push my gold out. Thinking that was going on, while doing this it sits on a hot plate on lowest setting. Thinking this batch was going to work out. I went ahead and made another batch of 5 ozs of fingers. With 300ml muriatic acid and a couple capfulls of hp, as per a post I seen. This too sits on hotplate. Both batches are covered. The all fingers batch turned emerald green while the mixed one was pretty clear. So impatience took a hold of me and I just combined the batch! For good or bad, I'mI'm now seeing gold foils. But again my pins remain copper looking goldish coloring. And let me also add that I put all pins into solution. Magnetic pins as well as non magnetic. Does this ruin my chances at gold? Please advise, I'm desperately needing some successful retrieval of gold to show my wife im not crazy! Very discouraged and might even try reverse electro plating ..?
upcyclist
Well-known member
The AP process requires oxygen--that's why we often kickstart it with hydrogen peroxide. Are you running a bubbler in your AP solution? Without it, your reaction will take quite some time to get moving (once the initial shot of peroxide is consumed).
Rreyes, please don't double or triple post on the same situation. It scatters information all over the forum, and you'll probably get confusing answers by including slightly different information in each post. I've deleted your other two posts. Take your time and compose your posts to include the details, then keep all your posts on that situation in the same thread.
Dave
Dave
Heat can be good or bad.
Heating the solution can drive out oxygen (bad).
Much Higher heat can also evaporate the needed water and fume off your acid (very bad)...
Too cold and the reactions can slow way down. so winter a gentle heat may be necessary. A box and a light bulb can be handy, or some other method to prevent freezing weather from putting things on hold.
If it is fair weather spring summer or fall fair days, it should not need added heat.
"sitting on the hot plate" that could be your problem or at least one of them.
The process with fingers to recover gold, is almost fool proof easy, it is probably just you do not understand the process. Even though it is so very simple, without understanding it, you could run into many problems.
Education is the key to unlock the mystery of your gold.
I suggest you spend some time studying. Laser Steve's web site has a good document explaining the copper II chloride etch. the General reaction list and Guide to the forum will also be helpful...
On the forum there are tons of information on this subject, some of the earlier years may be more helpful. Many of us have made several posts explaining how it works, or how we use it...
Heating the solution can drive out oxygen (bad).
Much Higher heat can also evaporate the needed water and fume off your acid (very bad)...
Too cold and the reactions can slow way down. so winter a gentle heat may be necessary. A box and a light bulb can be handy, or some other method to prevent freezing weather from putting things on hold.
If it is fair weather spring summer or fall fair days, it should not need added heat.
"sitting on the hot plate" that could be your problem or at least one of them.
The process with fingers to recover gold, is almost fool proof easy, it is probably just you do not understand the process. Even though it is so very simple, without understanding it, you could run into many problems.
Education is the key to unlock the mystery of your gold.
I suggest you spend some time studying. Laser Steve's web site has a good document explaining the copper II chloride etch. the General reaction list and Guide to the forum will also be helpful...
On the forum there are tons of information on this subject, some of the earlier years may be more helpful. Many of us have made several posts explaining how it works, or how we use it...
First and foremost let me apologize for my double a triple posts, I wasn't where my post should be to get the help I sought. I'm learning as I go. So a quick update, I scraped the last batch I wrote about, well I took the fingers out , which still had most the gold on them. And put them into a 2.5 gal? Bucket with holes drilled into bottom and air bubbler tubes inside. I added blank curcuit boards with various quantities of gold plating. The circuit boards are cut into smaller pieces and they weighed roughly 11 ozs. And the fingers ( which were wet still) added another 6 to 8 ozs. The bucket went into a 5 gal bucket and I added 1000ml of muriatic acid (low fume stuff), and 150 ml hydrogen peroxide (regular store bought 3%?) So does anyone see any issues with what I've got going? The big bucket required I use lots of muriatic acid to cover materials. Too much hydrogen peroxide? It's coloring is an emerald green kind of dark but not too much. I've been reading Steve's material like crazy and my problem with last batch other then heat was too small of a beaker, and magnetic gold platedpins? Am I correct? Thank you for all the advice! Tomorrow im attempting to do reverse electric plating with stainless steel and copper mesh for plated pins and can I do gold filled and the same time? The cell will contain sulphuric acid, battery charger for power. Any advice is welcome. And thanks again!
You may have a little more hydrogen peroxide than would be ideal, but if you do not add more you should be fine. if you did use too much peroxide you will have gold dissolved some gold, which will plate back onto copper until the copper is consumed, leaving you with fine gold powders, with foils and solder mask trash. if this happened, just let the solution settle in the bottom of the bucket before decanting so you can recover any fine powdered gold.
Use a fish tank air compressor to supply air,and a stone. Or an air hose melted shut, and poke the tubing with a hot needle to put pin holes in sides of tubing.
magnetic pins, probably Kovar, the iron displaces the copper from solution,(you can have a solution of both copper and iron chlorides) if enough iron is added to the solution will become iron chloride, basically a different solution, than the copper II chloride your using to dissolve copper.
I know your excited about what your studying, and want to try everything, and get gold from as much materials as you can. That can be an easy way to loose gold, when your first learning, using some very good scrap to learn on and and make mistakes with. When I first started, I done the same thing, I had some good material that I wish I would have saved, until I learned more. I recovered gold from it, but I believe it would have been more gold if I would have saved that material until after I had learned more.
I suggest being patient, work on learning one project at a time, follow it all the way through, your gold will still be there when your ready, and when your ready you will recover more of it...
Use a fish tank air compressor to supply air,and a stone. Or an air hose melted shut, and poke the tubing with a hot needle to put pin holes in sides of tubing.
magnetic pins, probably Kovar, the iron displaces the copper from solution,(you can have a solution of both copper and iron chlorides) if enough iron is added to the solution will become iron chloride, basically a different solution, than the copper II chloride your using to dissolve copper.
I know your excited about what your studying, and want to try everything, and get gold from as much materials as you can. That can be an easy way to loose gold, when your first learning, using some very good scrap to learn on and and make mistakes with. When I first started, I done the same thing, I had some good material that I wish I would have saved, until I learned more. I recovered gold from it, but I believe it would have been more gold if I would have saved that material until after I had learned more.
I suggest being patient, work on learning one project at a time, follow it all the way through, your gold will still be there when your ready, and when your ready you will recover more of it...
Rreyes, as butcher has suggested, you should slow down and spend more time studying before you jump in. The low fume HCl may cause you problems. Don't use stainless steel in your stripping cell. Gold filled will not do well in a stripping cell. All of this has been discussed before. Read, read, read. It will help you avoid these mistakes.Rreyes097 said:
Dave
Why will the low fume ma be a problem in my ap solution? And I understand about going slow, I really do, but I've attempted the ap a time or 2 before this with out reading and failed miserably. That is why I have been reading but I ask those questions because I couldn't remember or must have seen multiple answers. I'm simply discouraged and was looking to reverse electro plating. Ive seen the stainless steel work in re plating.
Oh and i have the bubbler going too. Secondly, I asked about the golid plated pins that I'd like to try the reverse ep. On.
Rreyes, if you have yet to recover any gold with the AP method which is among the most basic of recovery processes taught here, then why in the world would you go straight to reverse electroplating that uses electricity and concentrated sulfuric acid?
If you fail at AP you can misplace some gold. If you fail with the sulfuric cell you can misplace some body parts.
As always Butcher and Dave have given great advice. Please do listen to them and devote time to studying before you get yourself or someone around you seriously hurt.
Out of curiosity, what have you done with all the acid and materials from your 'failed attempts'?
If you fail at AP you can misplace some gold. If you fail with the sulfuric cell you can misplace some body parts.
As always Butcher and Dave have given great advice. Please do listen to them and devote time to studying before you get yourself or someone around you seriously hurt.
Out of curiosity, what have you done with all the acid and materials from your 'failed attempts'?
I have them stored in jars for possible recovery later on, all coffee filters too. And I appreciate the concern, but im so frustrated. I've watched every video I've read everything I can without falling asleep to it forgive me for that, but I've devoted time to study, and every time it seems I miss one key factor such as magnetic material in ap solution, or too much heat. Etc... I'm safe with all my dealings with the acids, I have resperator, chemical resistant gloves, im working out side. I slowly go about my work and don't rush. Believe me I've got the message be safe! Now can someone please help? I listen to advice, just got too many sources telling a Lil about this and Lil about that. Plz, it is my hope to not come off rude. But all I hear is how simple it is. Then plz show me step from step 1 to the end and I will absorb the knowledge I promise u.
Rreyes, I promise it's not that difficult to do this IF you take the time to learn it the right way. (Also, no text lingo on the forum. It doesn't translate well to other languages)
Start with reading Hoke. Do the acquaintance tests she recommends as you read along. Those small scale tests will give you a great deal of understanding of the way these metals behave in solution and with each other. Do the tests and read as many times as it takes for it to sink in. Just stay with Hoke for now. Forget all the videos and other bits and pieces you've seen so far.
Stay with it and you will be holding a nice shiny button before you know it. But it's not going to happen in a few days or weeks. Most of us have spent months studying before starting any small processes. Just be patient and do the study required and you WILL get there. Then you will find your place along side the rest of us lunatics!
Start with reading Hoke. Do the acquaintance tests she recommends as you read along. Those small scale tests will give you a great deal of understanding of the way these metals behave in solution and with each other. Do the tests and read as many times as it takes for it to sink in. Just stay with Hoke for now. Forget all the videos and other bits and pieces you've seen so far.
Stay with it and you will be holding a nice shiny button before you know it. But it's not going to happen in a few days or weeks. Most of us have spent months studying before starting any small processes. Just be patient and do the study required and you WILL get there. Then you will find your place along side the rest of us lunatics!
upcyclist
Well-known member
I'm with Benben. I know it's frustrating to get started, but it really does help to just some reading and ask a few specific questions here and there.
For your current problem with magnetic pins, try searching here on the forum for "Kovar pin processing" (the name for the common steel alloy used in magnetic pins) and/or "magnetic pin processing" and other similar variations. At the very least, you'll want to do them separately from your non-magnetic pins, as the dissolution rates will be different.
As an exercise, try writing down your process from start to finish: exactly what you will be using, what you will be doing, why, and in what order. Think of it like you were going to post your process here (which you don't necessarily have to do), and you needed to be very specific about your planned process so we understand what's going on. For example, if you just write "I will dissolve my pins in A/P", people here would ask you: How many pins (weight)? How were they prepared prior to this step? How much HCl? How much hydrogen peroxide and when? Are you using a bubbler? What size & type container? For how long? Heat or no heat? What do you hope to accomplish? When will you know you are done? How do you prevent dissolving your gold, and what do you do if that happens? How are you testing?
It's a long, tedious exercise, but it will really help you focus on where you may not know as much as you think you do. There's not one correct answer to a lot of the questions above, but there are definitely some wrong ones (like, "equal parts HCl and peroxide"). If you can't answer every one for your process, then you haven't fully planned it out yet. And of course if you plan and execute it properly, your neighbors and heirs will thank you
For your current problem with magnetic pins, try searching here on the forum for "Kovar pin processing" (the name for the common steel alloy used in magnetic pins) and/or "magnetic pin processing" and other similar variations. At the very least, you'll want to do them separately from your non-magnetic pins, as the dissolution rates will be different.
As an exercise, try writing down your process from start to finish: exactly what you will be using, what you will be doing, why, and in what order. Think of it like you were going to post your process here (which you don't necessarily have to do), and you needed to be very specific about your planned process so we understand what's going on. For example, if you just write "I will dissolve my pins in A/P", people here would ask you: How many pins (weight)? How were they prepared prior to this step? How much HCl? How much hydrogen peroxide and when? Are you using a bubbler? What size & type container? For how long? Heat or no heat? What do you hope to accomplish? When will you know you are done? How do you prevent dissolving your gold, and what do you do if that happens? How are you testing?
It's a long, tedious exercise, but it will really help you focus on where you may not know as much as you think you do. There's not one correct answer to a lot of the questions above, but there are definitely some wrong ones (like, "equal parts HCl and peroxide"). If you can't answer every one for your process, then you haven't fully planned it out yet. And of course if you plan and execute it properly, your neighbors and heirs will thank you
jason_recliner
Well-known member
This is great advice for new players. I did all of this in my head; I was sure that I could see the full plan from start to finish before I commenced. I'd been reading and youtubing for several weeks.upcyclist said:
Boy, was I wrong. Writing it down would have been far better, as I made mistakes, had to rely on my memory, and ultimately changed process midstream.
Writing down a full plan, including safety contingencies and disposal, may also be helpful if the neighbours freak out and call the police - and you suddenly need to demonstrate that you are not running a meth lab.
