What size mesh for foils? (Replacing coffee filters)

[haveagojoe]

I've been using coffee filters so far to filter foils from Copper Chloride solution. I rinse the foils out of the filter and have started reusing them, which seems to work fine.

I'm considering getting a nylon mesh sieve to use instead. That way I could use a larger funnel so that the mesh doesn't touch it, so there would be a larger usable area for filtering rather than just the small area at the bottom above the hole.

A brief google search suggested that coffee filters are equivalent to 100-200 mesh. What do you guys think, should I go for a finer mesh like 300 or 400? My foils are often finely divided and come out as black powder, but the coffee filter catches it pretty well so maybe 200 would be fine enough, I'm not sure.

Edit- ChatGPT reckons a coffee filter is more like 500-1000 mesh equivalent. 450 is the finest mesh I can find for a cheapo nylon sieve so I'll give that a try and report back with my findings.

 

[Shark]

Fiber glass window screen cut to fit the funnel, with the filter inside the mesh works great. It gives a larger area of usable filtering surface, but maintains the mesh size of the filter being used.

 

[FrugalRefiner]

I do the same as Shark.

Dave

 

[haveagojoe]

Fiber glass window screen cut to fit the funnel, with the filter inside the mesh works great. It gives a larger area of usable filtering surface, but maintains the mesh size of the filter being used.

Aha good shout. I'll try that, thanks.

 

[haveagojoe]

I ordered the 450 mesh sieve anyway. I could either put it above the coffee filter to catch the larger foils, and maybe stop the filter from clogging up so quickly... or alternatively, since my method requires multiple passes, I could just use the 450 mesh to catch most of the foils and save the coffee filter for the last pass to catch the muddy stuff at the end. Either way hopefully it will speed things up, and I'm thinking I can just turn the sieve inside out and give it a swish in the beaker rather than using the spray bottle, so I won't keep adding to the volume every time I retrieve foils for settling.