Smelting cons

[IDAu]

The whole assay ton sample thing is cool, but I quickly realized without an analytical balance it’s nearly useless to me.

Does this sound like a good way to approach something I can pull data from?

If my math is correct, 1/2 OPT should come out as 1g per 141 pounds.

So if I pull a 70 pound sample, run it, and smelt the cons, I should get a roughly 0.5g button if it’s 1/2OPT. It gets me something I can actually weigh, and don’t have to miserably try to separate tiny varying mesh gold to weigh, losing some along the way.


If that’s a good approach, is this a decent flux recipe for sulfides? I don’t know the exact composition of my cons. I see a tiny bit of copper, possibly some Pb or Hg, and lots of iron.

For every 30g of cons-
40g litharge
28g sodium carbonate
30g borax
3g silica
A few iron nails

Thanks

 

[goldshark]

Without knowing what your cons consist of, your recipe will probably work to a degree. The only problem with crushing and grinding, then panning, is that it is not nearly as accurate as a good fire assay. You will lose Gold either to floating away, or still locked in the middling.Since I can't afford a scale down to .0001 gram, or better, I have adopted a ten assay ton method. This is accurate for a .1 Toz/ton assay using an $80.00 .001 gram accuracy scale. Another technique is to use a caliper to measure the diameter of the prill. This works best on Au that has been in quarted, Ag removed, then heated to melt temperature. This will produce a nearly perfect sphere of Au. Another thread discusses the diameter verses weight conversion. I gave a link to the table, but it has been a while, so I don't know the name of the thread, or where it may be found.

 

[IDAu]

Without knowing what your cons consist of, your recipe will probably work to a degree. The only problem with crushing and grinding, then panning, is that it is not nearly as accurate as a good fire assay. You will lose Gold either to floating away, or still locked in the middling.Since I can't afford a scale down to .0001 gram, or better, I have adopted a ten assay ton method. This is accurate for a .1 Toz/ton assay using an $80.00 .001 gram accuracy scale. Another technique is to use a caliper to measure the diameter of the prill. This works best on Au that has been in quarted, Ag removed, then heated to melt temperature. This will produce a nearly perfect sphere of Au. Another thread discusses the diameter verses weight conversion. I gave a link to the table, but it has been a while, so I don't know the name of the thread, or where it may be found.

Yeah, that’s what I’m worried about. I was crushing and panning and not finding much gold. But as soon as I got my shaker table set up and ran my sample through that, I found a lot more colors.

I figure if I take the cons from a 70 pound sample I will at least get something weighable. Or I won’t… and I’ll know to move on.

Where do you get a 0.001 scale for only $80?