Sodium Metabisulfite is hard to Get in norway...

[Jim Rocco]

Another reducer like ferrous sulphate...

Use urea to replace SMB

 

[Yggdrasil]

AP?

Selling your gold, I'd expect you could go into a jewelers (with a workshop) and he'd buy it.

Copper chloride etching, in short AP, or AcidPeroxide.
The AP is not what really goes on, but easier to say than Copper Chloride etching.

 

[Yggdrasil]

Use urea to replace SMB

Please inform us how Urea can sensibly be used as anything else than a fertalizer.
And more specially replace SMB as a precipitant of Gold?

 

[adrianbjorvatn]

Where in Norway do you live?
If I was home I could send you some, but bad luck, won't be back until summer.
I have not found it in small amounts so I bought 25Kg and shared with a friend.
I'll ask if he still have.

Live at Sørlandet, but i think my mom’s Old boss had a 1000kg bag, at his work

 

[adrianbjorvatn]

Curious Dane here, wondering where you get your feedstock (gold plate/-filled/carat) and how you do with other expenses, such as power and chemicals.
Here in Denmark, there's a heavy tax on power, silver and chemicals, so anything remotely golden or made from silver packs a premium in cost that you are unlikely to recover.
I don't refine or anything, just reading along, and I've found that refining is easier/less expensive/financially sustainable in other countries that don't have the same taxes.

So I was surprised to see a fellow Scandinavian actually doing it! Taxes are somewhat similar I guess but maybe you found a sweet spot somewhere in Norway.

I work with garbage, so found a lot Of the chemicals i need at work
But the nitric acid is forbidden for private persons to have, in norway after 2011 explosion... so making it my self

 

[Yggdrasil]

I sent you a direct message.
SMB eventually go.bad when subjected to air, but it takes time.

So if you can get some of it the good.
Test it by adding into HCl and if it evolves a strong sulfuric smell (SO2)
it will work.
Regards Per-Ove.

 

[adrianbjorvatn]

Most here start it as a hobby, and reading his post I assume he hasn't quite started yet.
The hardest part is getting a steady feedstock. I used to get free discarded Laptops from my work.
That was enough to feed my hobby.
With the AP process and cherry picking, the cost are quite low.
But so are speed which don't matter much if it is a hobby.
The next thing, and I have not done it yet, is to sell your gold.
I have no idea on how to do that.
Regards Per-Ove

Hobby here to, have started
You can Sell the gold to Bjørklund Gold Smith

 

[Yggdrasil]

I work with garbage, so found a lot Of the chemicals i need at work
But the nitric acid is forbidden for private persons to have, in norway after 2011 explosion... so making it my self

Not entirely forbidden, but you need a license as private business.
And a willing supplier.
I normally live in Bergen so I have found a wholesale supplier.
But sometimes that mean you have to buy much more than needed.
Regards Per-Ove

 

[adrianbjorvatn]

You can also use any other sulfite that is soluble in water, like sodium sulfite. It is available in shops that sell chemicals for developing classic photographs - scarce to find them nowdays, but here it is available in few places, when you buy it using your ID. Another name for metabisulfite is "pyrosulfite" - somewhat historical, but in wine making supplies shop here, it is still called pyrosulfite, even nowdays

Ferrous sulfate could be purchased from local gardening store as moss killing chemical. Just make sure it isn´t "rusted" - yellowish translucent solid with rusty hint isn´t very good. It should be green coloured. Altough, you can purify it by dissolving the stuff in minimal water and filter the oxidized ferric oxohydroxides out. Then you can use the filtered solution to precipitate gold. It will be less effective when partially oxidized, but it will still work.

Got a little glass of Sodium sulfite, gotta do a Aqua regia later and try with it

 

[Yggdrasil]

I was thinking about KA Rasmussen, but we'll see.

 

[nickvc]

Many countries have buyers for precious metals it’s finding an honest one that’s the problem , if you ever travel to the UK let me know I can suggest an honest buyer.

 

[Zhazham]

I had a problem finding sodium metabisulfite from here in Finland. It was available but wine and beer shops sold just big packages and price was ludicrous. Eventually i found 1 kg bag from Turkish manufacturer from Aliexpress. As it came outside EU, i had to declare it. Not a biggie.

Another thing i found out is that it is sold under diffferent names. When looking from sources selling food preservatives, it's E-code is E223.

 

[Martijn]

I got mine here:
https://www.naturalspices.com/sodium-metabisulphate-e223

 

[Martijn]

And yes, I know is says sulfAte, but it is sulfite. E223.
Spelling mistake I guess.

 

[orvi]

I don´t know how it works in more developed western countries tho. But sodium sulfite or metabisulfite is dirt cheap chemical manufactured on industrial level, used in numerous applications all across many fields of chemistry. It is transported in wagons, 1m3 bags, dumped to chutes, shoveled to the reactors (seen with my eyes ) etc...
I will try to find a facility where it is used/manufactured a lot, and try to email them with request of an small sample (in their meaning small sample is somwhere around kg ) for this and that - you must be creative say you want to develop old photos but do not have this chemical for chemical composition of developing solution...
Be very polite in your communication, explain your situation with no other publicly available options... etc
As the chemical is non-toxic, cheap and is not regulated, there is chance that you will be sucessful.
It cost nothing to send few emails, maybe you will be lucky...

I was sucessful from time to time with sample request mainly about refractory materials from bigger companies - some willing to get them for free, some charge me some money for them etc it is all about chance, you must have luck for generous and understanding salesman many will not write back, many will politely reject you, some could give you the options - for free or for small fee + 99% times you need to arrange the shipment from them to you on your own.
Many people were successful with samples of chemicals from Alibaba and other big manufacturers in eg India or China, but I never succeeded with foreign companies.

 

[Zhazham]

I guess in nordic countries, weak supply is just because of small markets at consumer level. I don't know anyone else in Finland who need small amounts of SMB to drop gold

 

[nwinther]

I guess in nordic countries, weak supply is just because of small markets at consumer level. I don't know anyone else in Finland who need small amounts of SMB to drop gold

Many chemicals in the nordic countries have been banned or we simply stopped using them so stores stopped stocking them.

When I was a kid (i'm 42), we had stores in every town (Materialist in Danish, I guess something similar to chemist (the english version) where you could buy any number of acids and compounds, such as sulphur, soda, lye, nitric and HCL, alcohols (not liquor) and petrolium products.
They began carrying perfumes and make-up which was just a small part of their business, when I was a kid, and now you can't buy anything else.

The reason was, probably, that people stopped using lye when cleaning, but instead bought cleaning products and soaps at the supermarkets, stopped pickling and curing their own foods etc.

I know a younger woman at work who was trained professionally in such a store, thinking they'd be dealing with makeup and perfumes. The professional school she went to, had one day of makeup, the rest was how to store and care for chemicals and their containers, such as this product weren't allowed to be stored next to that product, and other products' containers had to be wiped down every so often because the chemical would somehow leak.

Then came 9/11 and everything concievable that could be made to assist in terrorism was banned. Sulphur, potassium nitrate and carbon powder at first couldn't be bought all at once and eventually it was banned or they stopped carrying those items.

So now the most basic products are very exotic to most Danes, and if you are familiar with any it's because you have a certain profession or work in farming, and then you only know a few, and can only buy in bulk and with certain permissions/limitations.

 

[adrianbjorvatn]

Curious Dane here, wondering where you get your feedstock (gold plate/-filled/carat) and how you do with other expenses, such as power and chemicals.
Here in Denmark, there's a heavy tax on power, silver and chemicals, so anything remotely golden or made from silver packs a premium in cost that you are unlikely to recover.
I don't refine or anything, just reading along, and I've found that refining is easier/less expensive/financially sustainable in other countries that don't have the same taxes.

So I was surprised to see a fellow Scandinavian actually doing it! Taxes are somewhat similar I guess but maybe you found a sweet spot somewhere in Norway.