Questions on processes

[authoriti29]

First off thank you to the founder(s) of this forum and the people who contribute and support it.

So rookie mistakes, bought from Shor international and purchased some material. Lessons learned. Below is what I purchased 98.5g.



My questions are these. Which process would be the best to start with on this type of material? Gold pins melted with whatever materials were in the pins and some borax. Based of my reading I'm thinking I should probably inquart them and then go to AR. Or can I just go to AR? Or am I way offbase (probablly the most likely)?

I figured I'd hit everyone up for thoughts while I get a little experience. I've read Hoke (on my second read and will be three times before I start), I've watched LazerSteves videos, and I've read numerous posts. I'm new to this and will be doing a batch of AP on fingers, pins and other items I have collected over the years prior to taking this on.

Any assistance and thoughts are greatly appreciated.

Randy

 

[goldsilverpro]

What are they composed of? Just melted pins? Or, what? Explain exactly what you did to get them.

If they are just melted pins, about all you can do is dissolve the base metals in nitric or HCl/peroxide. Then, dissolve the black powder residue in either aqua regia or HCl/bleach and precipitate the gold with a sulfite, such as SMB. Inquartation would be unnecessary.

 

[Geo]

authoriti29, i hope you didnt pay a lot for this material. this is the type of thing thats being discussed on the forum in different spots. the best you can expect from a pound of pins (453g) from the best pins is around 2g, and thats being generous. if its just computer pins, like PCI slot connectors, make that 0.5g and thats being way generous. so if you bought 98g of melted pins, the low side is 0.1g of gold content in what you have.

sorry, lessons like this shouldnt have to be learned this way.

 

[authoriti29]

Agreed lessons learned and ignorance costs money I didn't pay much for them so it's not a major loss. I'll chalk this one up to learning the chemical processes and see what I get. I'll post results once I have some.

I appreciate the feedback on this.

 

[authoriti29]

Well everything is finally dissolved and I'm moving on. Here is a shot of what I have left after filtering.

Question on AR. Will having a bit of tap water in with the residue cause a problem? From what I've read it doesn't sound like it. Right now I have it settling out in a dish. It's pretty dry here in CO, so I can just let the water evaporate off or I have a hot plate to assist it along if needed. Once I'm down to just residue I'm going to use bleach/HCL, filter and drop. Please correct me if I'm wrong on the steps or missing a step(s).

Also I'm still noticing a fair amount of grey in my filters. I'm assuming hold onto them as that could be residual gold residue?

Thank you again for an amazing forum.

Randy

 

[Lino1406]

Did you check the filtrate for silver?

 

[authoriti29]

I did not check for check for silver. I did do a stannous chloride test and it came back orange for platinum groups.

I have dome some more reading up and answered my question on the water. I have dropped my gold with SMB. I have a concern on this though. It went clear as was expected, then went dark grey and to a very almost coffee with cream color. I have it settling right now. Should I be concerned about the color difference or does it just need to settle. I have a feeling I have something in my solution that shouldn't be there or I was off on my numbers for mixtures.

 

[butcher]

You probably have some insoluble metal salts that may also precipitate with your gold, after it sits a while the solution may clear up some, the solution can also be colored with soluble metal salts.

Your gold can be washed and re-refined again.

 

[authoriti29]

Perfect and thank you.