Non-Chemical Smelting in India

[ashir]

As I mentioned earlier to get stuck in smelting. Later on I cruch the slag , boil in hot water till all the slag dissolved .
Some pieces are still hard enough so that hot water can not dissolve them, I saperate these hard pieces.
I pan the remaining material after dissolving in water and luckily get a cupfull metal beads, which mathod should I prefer to treat these beads, dilute nitric and then AR?
I use litharge as a collecter metal, I still have the crucibles and the pot make for lead absorption. The pot was made up of Portland cement, what will be batter ways to get remaining little values from crucibles and the pot.
Thanks,

stay home be safe

 

[ashir]

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

Why only PD?
Why not gold , solve copper, indium, aluminium.....

 

[stella polaris]

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,

Can you post some pictures of your furnance? What type of fan are you using?

 

[ashir]

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,

Can you post some pictures of your furnance? What type of fan are you using?

Assure I will, I am on duty at the moment, early in the morning I will post pics of all my setup

 

[ashir]

 

[ashir]

And these are the beads that I am collecting from slag by crushing and panning

 

[stella polaris]

@Ashir

What striking me directly is the air intake. This should be as tight as possible. Just so you can get in the pipe. Now i think you might loose temperature by airflow losses. Try to pack some clay around it to stop leakage.

The pipe itself. You can actually just using a short pipe in to the furnance. The fan will cool itself.

Also the pipe seems to have a smaller outlet than the diameter of the pipe. This creates a resistance and less air comes in leading to lower temperature.

Have no idea about your fan.
If you have an old vacum cleaner laying around you could try that as a fan. Just connect the hose to the outlet and put the pipe in the hole. It should be enough.

What diameter and height does the furnace have and what diameter and height do your cru have? The furnance seems a little low and you might use a larger cru than its capacity.

Do you cover the cru with a brick or something?

 

[ashir]

@Ashir

What striking me directly is the air intake. This should be as tight as possible. Just so you can get in the pipe. Now i think you might loose temperature by airflow losses. Try to pack some clay around it to stop leakage.

The pipe itself. You can actually just using a short pipe in to the furnance. The fan will cool itself.

Also the pipe seems to have a smaller outlet than the diameter of the pipe. This creates a resistance and less air comes in leading to lower temperature.

Have no idea about your fan.
If you have an old vacum cleaner laying around you could try that as a fan. Just connect the hose to the outlet and put the pipe in the hole. It should be enough.

What diameter and height does the furnace have and what diameter and height do your cru have? The furnance seems a little low and you might use a larger cru than its capacity.

Do you cover the cru with a brick or something?

Yes I take more actions to avoid any leakage, pics are when setup was unused. And again now I have re part all things, I feel the leakage was from the lid from where I am loosing heat

Pipe length does matter? I will take more long pipe next time
The smaller out let, I discuss it already, I can not find or make a burner, so I got such thing made up of iron, it's both sides are of smal diameter and it's mid is bit bigger, I was told by seller that it's to mix the air and gas , it's the piece that might be the actual error
Crucibles are of graphite 8 inch high 6 inch wide
Furnance is 13 inch in hight and 12 inch in diameter.
I have a lid on it,
I also use a coke type coal still not get what's it, I place the crilucible fill the sides with that coal and turn on the fan, open as little gas as possible so it only give a simple burn to coal, because sellers told me that this coal not become the ash, it not burn by itself, it need regular fire and air to glow, coke net or coal( no one knows here)

 

[butcher]

What type of fuel are you using?
What size orifice (drill size) on the burner fuel jet?

What type of refractory insulation (hard, soft, brick, blanket)?
Does the burner burn blue or smokey yellow?

 

[stella polaris]

Yes I take more actions to avoid any leakage, pics are when setup was unused. And again now I have re part all things, I feel the leakage was from the lid from where I am loosing heat

Pipe length does matter? I will take more long pipe next time
The smaller out let, I discuss it already, I can not find or make a burner, so I got such thing made up of iron, it's both sides are of smal diameter and it's mid is bit bigger, I was told by seller that it's to mix the air and gas , it's the piece that might be the actual error
Crucibles are of graphite 8 inch high 6 inch wide
Furnance is 13 inch in hight and 12 inch in diameter.
I have a lid on it,
I also use a coke type coal still not get what's it, I place the crilucible fill the sides with that coal and turn on the fan, open as little gas as possible so it only give a simple burn to coal, because sellers told me that this coal not become the ash, it not burn by itself, it need regular fire and air to glow, coke net or coal( no one knows here)

Pipe does not need to be long. It is the opposite. the shorter the better. But it is not a big deal. You can use the one you have. If you must have fire i understand you want to keep away the gas bottle.

Alarming is that you need regular fire to keep it glowing. For me that is a sign for bad coal. That might be your problem. I never had to use gas more than to start the fire. Try to get hold of a blacksmith that are using coal. He will not use such a coal. Get some from him and try. I am convinced it will work better.

Also i have the feeling that the furnance is a little to low for that cru. a cru 50% of furnance height feels better when using coal. Have you any time tried with a lower cru and have more coal under?

 

[ashir]

Yes I take more actions to avoid any leakage, pics are when setup was unused. And again now I have re part all things, I feel the leakage was from the lid from where I am loosing heat

Pipe length does matter? I will take more long pipe next time
The smaller out let, I discuss it already, I can not find or make a burner, so I got such thing made up of iron, it's both sides are of smal diameter and it's mid is bit bigger, I was told by seller that it's to mix the air and gas , it's the piece that might be the actual error
Crucibles are of graphite 8 inch high 6 inch wide
Furnance is 13 inch in hight and 12 inch in diameter.
I have a lid on it,
I also use a coke type coal still not get what's it, I place the crilucible fill the sides with that coal and turn on the fan, open as little gas as possible so it only give a simple burn to coal, because sellers told me that this coal not become the ash, it not burn by itself, it need regular fire and air to glow, coke net or coal( no one knows here)

Pipe does not need to be long. It is the opposite. the shorter the better. But it is not a big deal. You can use the one you have. If you must have fire i understand you want to keep away the gas bottle.

Alarming is that you need regular fire to keep it glowing. For me that is a sign for bad coal. That might be your problem. I never had to use gas more than to start the fire. Try to get hold of a blacksmith that are using coal. He will not use such a coal. Get some from him and try. I am convinced it will work better.

Also i have the feeling that the furnance is a little to low for that cru. a cru 50% of furnance height feels better when using coal. Have you any time tried with a lower cru and have more coal under?

The gas inlet is connected with long pipe
Blacksmith is on other part of world, hard to get coal from him, but the coal I use is glow like iron pieces. It's light in weight than normal coal. I also try to use the coal avail in markets to use in winter as a heat source.
I also try to use a little crucibles , even 5inch high to melt gold and take 1 hour and not melt all the powder, (which is main reason to make me feel fail in furnance)
Can you mention some posts about coal furnance?
Thanks alot

 

[ashir]

What type of fuel are you using?
What size orifice (drill size) on the burner fuel jet?

What type of refractory insulation (hard, soft, brick, blanket)?
Does the burner burn blue or smokey yellow?

LPG inlet with air blower, use a type of coal that I describes already, light in weight from normal coal, not burn just glow as an iron piece is heated, and it need regular fire to keep glowing.
And butcher be avail I will post complete parts of furnance with more delatils as I end the duty today, thanks

 

[stella polaris]

@Ashir

It sounds like you are using Alum shale.

Do a test with ordinary char coal (wooden coal). No extra fire. Just fan. If that works better (even if much higher fuel consumption) then your coal is to bad. Simple practical test.

Have you tried the coal for house warming? It should burn without additional flame and even without fan. I think it might be better. U can try that with only fan.

Post a close in picture of a coal sample. And as Butcher asked, what is the smoke like?

Just an weird idea..
I have never worked with an additional flame. It seems you put the gas in the pipe. Can it be so it steals most of the O2 leaving to little for the coal?

 

[butcher]

I was a bit confused by the pictures, the furnace is made in a style more for natural gas or propane (not the best design for a coal furnace or forge). A coal forge is built completely different using airflow tuyeres at the bottom to distribute air often adjustable controlling the supply of airflow through the coal and coke bed, the design is more open like a pit.

https://www.google.com/search?q=coal+forge+tyre&sxsrf=ALeKk00bDEVhw76RcibVI2z1zHETxIofUg:1586282313798&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjq986O8tboAhULgp4KHfxVDScQ_AUoAnoECAwQBA&biw=1024&bih=705

The LPG gas burner if properly made can be used as the only fuel source, the burners can be made to run with an additional fan or oxygen source (air source) for combustion or as a venturi to pull in the surrounding air without the aid of a fan or bellows.

It looks like your trying to use an LPG furnace for a coal forge.

The coal forge and the gas furnace are two different animals, built differently to operate on different fuels and burner design...

If using LPG improve the burner design.


If using coal, I would build a better coal forge, with decent tuyeres...

Is your coal hard or soft, anthracite hard coal, soft coal-like bituminous, or lower grades of brown lignite coal?
Can you get or buy coke fuel, or make it yourself from the coal you have?
Wood charcoal can be mixed with lower-grades of coal and used in a good forge design...

How high sulfur content is your fuel, how much ash do you have afterburning (high ash will clog the tuyeres easily blocking airflow through the coal and coke-bed...

Refractory in a furnace can be as important as the fuel or burner design, using the wrong refractory or poorly design furnace can suck up the heat as fast as a poorly made burner can produce fire, leaving almost no heat left to melt your metals...

 

[ashir]

The burner burn yellow with blue ended flame.
We use coal to warm houses burn without air blower but it make too much ash.
The coal I am using give no smoke no ash. Remain same as it is after cool down.
As butcher said it's looking more accurate that I am using LPG furnance as coal furnance. The ideas were changed during the construction. First it was to use LPG. But LPG burner that I got was not good enough to produce hrd flame to melt the metals with out air blower, when air blower use then it start consuming too much LPG. Then the idea of additional fume was tried.
The coal I am using is hard but lighter in weight than wooden coal

 

[butcher]

The burner looks to be built more like a natural gas burner than a propane burner, although the major difference is the position or size of fuel orifice.

Besides types of fuel, of major importance is getting a good fuel to air ratio in a burner, torch, furnace...
Getting a good mixture this is different for different types of fuel, some fuels may need to be aspirated and sprayed into the air stream like heavy or waste oil burners, some burners are designed to pull in the air on their own like a venturi and may have a choke adjustment, others the fuel may be delivered under pressure and the airflow is regulated with dampers, and some a combination of both.

Just like in getting good gas mileage in an old truck having a well-tuned carburetor will get you better gas mileage and keep your furnace hotter...

It is helpful to be able to adjust the burner or forge from a reducing flame (colder, yellow, smokey) to an oxidizing flame (bright hotter blue, no smoke) or environment by adjusting either fuel delivery or air or oxygen delivery of the well-desighned burner or furnace...

 

[stella polaris]

The coal I am using is hard but lighter in weight than wooden coal

Lighter than wooden coal??????? What in earth are you using? It feels impossible that a stone coal should be lighter.
I think your furnace should be ok for coal. No major difference, exept of the height, to the one i used. Yours have a lower height/with ratio.

If your coal remains the same then you have to take it out before filling in new coal. That is not a good way to go. The coke process i mentioned will not work with such coal.

I say it again. Try House warming coal together with the fan. Fan must be used or you never get the temperature.
It probably goes faster and consuming less fuel and thereby you get less ash. Ash have to be accepted but its not too much. At least not with the coal i used. (Hight quality black coal.)


An idea. Think you still use steam locomotives in your country? If so try to get hold of the coal they use.

I feel pretty sure that your coal is not a better one.

 

[butcher]

I agree with Stella Polaris, the mineral coal should not be lighter than wood charcoal, and with proper packing of the furnace with coal and airflow should be able to produce enough heat to forge steel bringing it close to its melting point fairly easily.

I also suspect the coal you are using.
The other concern is control of air through the coal bed, besides how the coal is packed or the ash clogging the flow of air through the bed, can you control the fan speed or use dampers to divert air into or bypass the coal bed so you have control of the heat produced...

 

[ashir]

Thanks butcher and Stella Polaris.
Coal is really too light in weight. And it gives no ash, and I use it again and again. Every time it glow as before.
Air blower is with constant speed. No controller but I can add a dimmer with it,
And I want to use more smaller size crucible instead of making new furnance with more height.
Packing of furnance will be taken more serious. I have 2 kg mlccs with mix smallest IC chips, soon I am trying to smelt them to see what's happening. Thanks both I will post pics of coal that I use already, thanks allot

 

[Yggdrasil]

Thanks butcher and Stella Polaris.
Coal is really too light in weight. And it gives no ash, and I use it again and again. Every time it glow as before.

Are you sure you are not using spent coke?
One should not be able to use coal more than once, I think??
If so, the glow comes entirely from the LPG not from the coal itself.