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CarlClassen

Member
Joined
Apr 14, 2008
Messages
24
Location
Ottawa Ontario
Ok noob question time.

So I’m trying to inquart my scrap gold. I first tried to heat up the crucible like in lazerSteve’s video. But I quickly realized that the small jewelry butane torch aint going to get thing hot enough.

I know nothing about torches. What do I need to get? Is one of those hand held plumbing torches good enough?
 
Steve has a great melting video but it will be complicated to use an acetylene torch from the begining.
My scientific adviser once told me "Feel the flame first."(Sounds like Feel the force :lol: )
The first thing i tried myself was a butane torch.It made an ore from the powder. Then i tried propane/butane.It works much better.At least it is possible to melt. But acetylene has really good temperature in the gas flow and i usually use acetylene/oxygen torch (In the country house of course).
If you are not familiar with torches start with propane/butane torch. Because it will be dangerous for you to mix oxygen with other burning gases.
Try something like Rothenberger burner with piezo ignition using propane/butane or butane. That's what i tried first.It costed me about 50 bucks to buy it. I think it's the most simple way.

I like bricks most of all. Once you've heated it enough it will hold temperature much longer than the dish. But of cource dish is more comfortable so it's up to you to decide.
 
SapunovDmitry said:
If you are not familiar with torches start with propane/butane torch. Because it will be dangerous for you to mix oxygen with other burning gases.
Try something like Rothenberger burner with piezo ignition using propane/butane or butane. That's what i tried first.It costed me about 50 bucks to buy it. I think it's the most simple way.
Click to expand...

Awesome thank you for the advice. I'll see if I can find that torch. Most of them here seem to be either butane, or propane, or Oxygen/Acetylene

Is Oxygen/Acetylene that hard to use? Will I just want to upgrade to that later?
 
Well, actually it's not so hard. I have no doubt that you will likely upgrade to acetylene/oxygen in some time cause it's much better. But you have to buy oxygen cylinder, acetylene cylidner, two reductors for pressure control and a burner.You have to connect it properly. It's kind of labour intensive and spooky for a person who never made it before. It's much easier to go to the Obi or other supermarket and buy a single lamp and only one small propane/butane gas balloon :) there.
It's up to you to decide though.
 
If you are sure you are going to want to upgrade later get the larger oxy/Acetylene tanks instead of the 1 foot tall mini tanks. The small tanks cost almost the same to fill as the large ones and last 10 times longer. Then you can do welding and cutting as well w/o running out of gas all the time. The bigger tanks are a bit more expensive but you will save enough after 1 filling to recover the expense by not having the 10 trips and 10 refill charges.
 
Use and air/acetelene thats what I use for refrigeration repairs. I do not know the temp it runs at but I can melt copper very easily.
 
Carl,
Here in the states you can rent the large tanks from the companies that sell the gases. Of course if you rent them, then only the company that you rented them from will fill them for you. It's a much cheaper way to get started than forking over alot of cash(they are very expensive) for them.

Mark
 
Refrigeration supply companys, johnstone supply, graingers.
If you go to a local refrigeration place they can also get you on a bottle
exchange program that is pretty cheap. I use the smallest bottle, I think it is size A, because I have to carrying everthing up on roof tops and into
ceilings etc.

The torch will have 1 knob to turn the gas on and it has breather holes at the base under a guard, other than that it looks exactly the same as a
brazing/welding torch.
 
The small oxygen tanks make it really expensive to melt gold. I found a guy at a bike shop who lets me use his torch. I give him some money for gas and everybodys happy. I'm sure you could find someone in the neighborhood who would let you use their torch. Once you tell them what it's for their eyes will light up and they will be very interested.
 
James,

Are you sure that is acetylene your burning? When I light my torch on acetylene only, it burns very dirty with carbon floating in the air until I kick in the oxy to get a clean burning flame. Some people even soot their molds with straight acetylene so the gold doesn’t stick when poured. If you were using compressed air with acetylene it might work, but it sounds like you are talking about a torch that operates like a plumbers propane soldering torch.
 
Ok well I couldn't get a normal plumbers propane torch to work either. The ace-oxy torch is $300 and the propane one was $20. The problem is that whenever I go to heat up the crucible the flame goes from a blue flame to a red flame and then the torch goes out. It doesn't seem to like being held at the 90 degrees angle I need to heat the crucible on the ground.
 
Oz said:
If you are sure you are going to want to upgrade later get the larger oxy/Acetylene tanks instead of the 1 foot tall mini tanks. The small tanks cost almost the same to fill as the large ones and last 10 times longer. Then you can do welding and cutting as well w/o running out of gas all the time. The bigger tanks are a bit more expensive but you will save enough after 1 filling to recover the expense by not having the 10 trips and 10 refill charges.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the Tip Oz. That will definitely save me some $ later since I would have gotten the smaller ones.
 
Isnt a clearer way to use PROPANE + OXY ? :)
I use it.
SO u can start with propane only to "get confidence" to upgrade to oxy too l8er...
 
Dunno there... But acetylene is more expansive then propane here in Italy... And sounds a more "dirty" flame then pure propane...
Acetylene i see is use to cut pipes and so on... All gold masters i know use propane here. With Oxy or simply with air ("mouth using" in a plastic pipe!) to liquify little gold parts or to sold.
 
After much thinking i decided to splurge and buy an oxy/act torch. My next question is what head do people use?

small single, medium single, large single, or multiple "star" head?
 
Carl,
I'm not an expert on the subject but, I do have a bit of experience with these animals. This oxy-acetylene torch is usually set up for cutting metal
or, certain types of welding such as braizing and sweating metals together.
The tip you choose to use is usually dependent upon the job you need to do. Since I haven't used it to melt any gold with yet, I wouldn't want to offer much advice here. I would think that the smaller tips would offer plenty of heat while narrowing the possibility of blowing any of your material out of your melting vessel of choice( don't hit the seperate oxygen lever). Also keep in mind that I have read too that acetylene is not the best choice for pgm's as it reacts chemically to form certain hard to break bonds. I think for gold it is fine though. I hope this helps you.

Mark
 

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