RMcFadden94
New member
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2017
- Messages
- 2
Hey all,
So I have started refining sterling Silver recently as a new hobby/business venture. It has been going swell, but I got a little cocky the other day.
I learned the hard way and was reminded that surface area means everything when dissolving silver with nitric acid.
400g of Sterling silver ware vs 400g of Sterling silver jewelry needs to be handled entirely differently.
I was doing the jewelry outside during a sunny dayand had my standard Amy of nitric ready to go. Well because of the extra warmth from the sun and all the nooks and crannies of the jewelry the reaction fired up ALOT faster then the prior evening's silverware and I had a boil over. BIG TIME. Luckily I had gloves, but forgot the capture dish. I spent my afternoon trying to remove nitric acid/silver nitrate solution from my work table. Even with gloves it got EVERYWHERE. I had to answer a lot of questions from the kids on my son's tball team why my hands were so "dirty".
Needless to say I relearned my lesson. SLOW addition of acid in increments always is the best approach.
I hope this helps any readers of this thread.
Happy Refining!
~Greg
So I have started refining sterling Silver recently as a new hobby/business venture. It has been going swell, but I got a little cocky the other day.
I learned the hard way and was reminded that surface area means everything when dissolving silver with nitric acid.
400g of Sterling silver ware vs 400g of Sterling silver jewelry needs to be handled entirely differently.
I was doing the jewelry outside during a sunny dayand had my standard Amy of nitric ready to go. Well because of the extra warmth from the sun and all the nooks and crannies of the jewelry the reaction fired up ALOT faster then the prior evening's silverware and I had a boil over. BIG TIME. Luckily I had gloves, but forgot the capture dish. I spent my afternoon trying to remove nitric acid/silver nitrate solution from my work table. Even with gloves it got EVERYWHERE. I had to answer a lot of questions from the kids on my son's tball team why my hands were so "dirty".
Needless to say I relearned my lesson. SLOW addition of acid in increments always is the best approach.
I hope this helps any readers of this thread.
Happy Refining!
~Greg