Smelting in India

[ashir]

Cupeltaion was done in this way,
Mix portland cement and white cement, make the pot. Place the lead dore bars and place the wood coal around and start blower. Cover it with a local made lid, keeping a hole so they can see whats going inside.

So finally get this 200 grams approximately

 

[ashir]

Ok so i got 3 gram gold . While there was 30 kg mobile phones ics and pins mix. Approximately 4 kg weight of crushed stuff. I kbiw i can not get values. Any one can tell where my values are staying, in slag? In cupel pot?

 

[kjavanb123]

Hi

Re melt the slags I believe your values are there

 

[ashir]

Hi

Re melt the slags I believe your values are there

Thanks kj.
I did try to crush the slag. Some slag is not so hard but some pieces are too hard so that they are not easy to be crushed.
Can i put this slag in boiling water for few hours? And it might be easy to broken in pieces. Later on dry it and remelt again?
And second question is what flux ratio should i use?
Third question is should i use collecter metal?

 

[ashir]

so i try to make a furnance

i use lpg with air blower. it use too much lpg as 2kg lpg was not enough to smelt a one kg material.
i did visit to the user of this setup. they did not try to get any blue flame, they just shorten th valve of gas and air and do smelt. i got that actually tgey were not smelting tgey were just melting tge material.
i resmelt tha slag with some more flux and i still get beads hanged in flux. i did not use collecter metal. flux was as mentioned by kurt to resmelt the slag,
furnance is still a problem here.

 

[rickzeien]

Do you have a roof or lid for the furnace. If not you should make one with a 3 inch hole in the center. Make a smaller one to partially cover that hole so you can vary the exhaust when you turn air/fuel mixture up or down.

Also on your tube from the blower should be sealed as it enters the furnace.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

 

[ashir]

Do you have a roof or lid for the furnace. If not you should make one with a 3 inch hole in the center. Make a smaller one to partially cover that hole so you can vary the exhaust when you turn air/fuel mixture up or down.

Also on your tube from the blower should be sealed as it enters the furnace.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

sorry i forget to upload

 

[rickzeien]

Are you sealed where the air/fuel mixture pipe enters the furnace.

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[ashir]

Are you sealed where the air/fuel mixture pipe enters the furnace.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

yes i did sealed it , its welded then mix the red clay mud with pieces of clithand round aroung it, let it dry then use it

 

[ashir]

so here the whole story!
after a long expiriments with motgerboards and mobile bords, ( using wet ways) i decided to go throug the smelting way.
many members help me to prepare and in recognation of equipment especially gaurave, kj
thanks man
i collect 4.7 kg of ics and mobile connecter pins.
use lead way to smelt,
i recover only 6 grams of gold. 150 grams of silver.
resmelt the flux and get 100 gram more silver but no gold. i remelt slag 3rd time and get no silver but 4 gram of gold.
the orignal ics were 3.1 kg ic chips from nokia and motorolla phone. remaining 1.6 kg were BGA chips
i want stop smelting way untill i find my fault and recover it
i just want know at the time how i can recover remaining values fron slag without smelting

here are some shots of last smelt

 

[4metals]

What are you using as a flux in this process? It seems to me that a thinner flux will not hold up as much metal resulting in better recovery on the first smelt and eliminating re-processing of your slags.

 

[ashir]

What are you using as a flux in this process? It seems to me that a thinner flux will not hold up as much metal resulting in better recovery on the first smelt and eliminating re-processing of your slags.

flux was ss mentioned by kj
40 % borax
50 % soda ash
10 % silica
i use lead as collecter in form of lead oxide
remelt slag as you write the flux for slag
with caf2
i am not pretty assure about calcium florite but i buy it from a supplier faar away!

 

[snoman701]

ashir


Sorry I have not posted more lately - I have been gone on a trip & just got back & as well I am currently sick


Could you provide a better picture of the chips --- I would like to see "more" of what is in the mix of the chips

A few chips in your hand (with the rest in the back ground) does not really tell me much


Kurt

i am far from my work area today,
i ask my worker to send me fotos but he is not understanding. though he send me this
image.jpg
i clean mobile boards(ic chips from mobiles) BGA chips from p3 / laptop mother boards. ic chips from p2 motherboards.ic chips from rams. guys are working still, collecting more ic's
untill i start smelting, so looking for your more guide

Ashir,

After burning and grinding these chips, are you running the powders through a sieve to remove the legs seen in those photos? If you don't have a sieve, you can just use a magnet placed in a plastic bag, as the legs are magnetic. Spread your ash on a large piece of paper and run the magnet over it by hand. By removing the magnet from the bag, you will then drop all the legs again. Do it a couple times and you can perform a good separation of magnetics and powder. Process the legs directly in acid.

How much silver/copper are you using as a collector when you are smelting 1 kg of ash?

Are you mixing your melted alloy when it is molten with a graphite rod?

When you remove the rod, how does the slag flow off the rod? Like water? Like oil? Like honey?

 

[butcher]

The flux is a chemical composition, the ore or charge to be smelted also has a chemical composition, even the furnace or torch used can also add to this chemical conversion by being a reducing or an oxidizing agent for the melt.

You may have to do some tests to find the right flux composition.

Your material being smelted can be of an oxidizing or reducing nature for your flux.
The flux composition your using can be of an oxidizing or reducing agent.



In an assay they will do some tests on the ore to see if the ore material itself is an oxidizing agent in the melt or a reducing agent, checking to see that all of the collector metal (lead oxide) is reduced along with the metal intended to be reducing from the charge, if the litharge is not all converted to lead in the test melt the flux is adjusted to be more of a reducing type flux, and if too much-unwanted metals are reduced in the test melt the flux is prepared to be more of an oxidizing flux.

 

[ashir]

ashir


Sorry I have not posted more lately - I have been gone on a trip & just got back & as well I am currently sick


Could you provide a better picture of the chips --- I would like to see "more" of what is in the mix of the chips

A few chips in your hand (with the rest in the back ground) does not really tell me much


Kurt

i am far from my work area today,
i ask my worker to send me fotos but he is not understanding. though he send me this
image.jpg
i clean mobile boards(ic chips from mobiles) BGA chips from p3 / laptop mother boards. ic chips from p2 motherboards.ic chips from rams. guys are working still, collecting more ic's
untill i start smelting, so looking for your more guide

Ashir,

After burning and grinding these chips, are you running the powders through a sieve to remove the legs seen in those photos? If you don't have a sieve, you can just use a magnet placed in a plastic bag, as the legs are magnetic. Spread your ash on a large piece of paper and run the magnet over it by hand. By removing the magnet from the bag, you will then drop all the legs again. Do it a couple times and you can perform a good separation of magnetics and powder. Process the legs directly in acid.

How much silver/copper are you using as a collector when you are smelting 1 kg of ash?

Are you mixing your melted alloy when it is molten with a graphite rod?

When you remove the rod, how does the slag flow off the rod? Like water? Like oil? Like honey?

No, I did not saperate magnetic pins
Lead oxide was equal in volume of orignal material( in weight)
Flux was like oil and it was boiling vigouriously , though I introduce caf2 in 2nd smelt( that's why I said I was not assure about caf2 as it's original or something else)

 

[stella polaris]

Ashir mentioned that he could not get proper temperature with stone coal. I see 2 possible mistakes for this.

1. No air blown in to the coal. This should be done in the bottom of the furnance. A standard fan from a oil boiler, used to warm up houses, can do the job if a smaller furnance.

2. Wrong stacking of the coal. The coal shall be feed from above, around the cru, and not in to big pieces. If correct done the coal will transform into Coke on its way down due to the temperature. (High temperature pyrolysis since it is not yet burning)


I have used a rejected 20 litre cru as furnance. Made a hole on lower side for the pipe from the fan. filled the cru to 3/5 with coal. Then i simply put the smelting cru on top on the coal and stacked coal around. With a torch i lid the fire trough the hole and connected the fan to the hole. Then i placed a furnance brick over the smelting cru.

This method is somewhat work demanding since sometimes you have to lift up the smelting cru a little and let the coal flow down, put it back and stack additional coal around the cru. However you can smelt with coal this way. Another backside is a smelly sulfur smoke. If using coke you have a much cleaner smoke and less odor.

I suggest you talk with a blacksmith using coal how he is working with the coal. The princip is the same.

 

[Behnam2070]

My friend where is videos link?
I can't see that

 

[zohacomputer]

Hi I m from India Mumbai I started to recover business all metal I m in last 20 year computer business I need help to palladium recovery

 

[ashir]

Why only palladium while you write you are collecting all metals ,

 

[ashir]

Ashir mentioned that he could not get proper temperature with stone coal. I see 2 possible mistakes for this.

1. No air blown in to the coal. This should be done in the bottom of the furnance. A standard fan from a oil boiler, used to warm up houses, can do the job if a smaller furnance.

2. Wrong stacking of the coal. The coal shall be feed from above, around the cru, and not in to big pieces. If correct done the coal will transform into Coke on its way down due to the temperature. (High temperature pyrolysis since it is not yet burning)


I have used a rejected 20 litre cru as furnance. Made a hole on lower side for the pipe from the fan. filled the cru to 3/5 with coal. Then i simply put the smelting cru on top on the coal and stacked coal around. With a torch i lid the fire trough the hole and connected the fan to the hole. Then i placed a furnance brick over the smelting cru.

This method is somewhat work demanding since sometimes you have to lift up the smelting cru a little and let the coal flow down, put it back and stack additional coal around the cru. However you can smelt with coal this way. Another backside is a smelly sulfur smoke. If using coke you have a much cleaner smoke and less odor.

I suggest you talk with a blacksmith using coal how he is working with the coal. The princip is the same.

Thanks for guide, these were the basic and much needed principles you mentioned. I follow rules as much as possible but I still have issues to get the right temp. I am looking a furnance expert but can not find,