Gold or brass

[Chujybear]

Recently going through some jewelry equipment that I bought used I opened up the shop vac ..
In it there is a great deal of gold color chips.
It seems most likely to me that these are brass chips collected from the toussant bright cutter (which also came in the lot), but I figured that I shouldn't assume that it is not gold.
First thing I did was to melt down a small amount to see if I could see the zink seperate out from it. But, being the dregs of a vacuum bag it was pretty inconclusive, because it was so dirty.
Next step I put the newly melted beads into a mixture of lemon juice and salt to see if it would oxidize (have had good results from straight copper with this solution), but a day and a half later, no results.
What I'm wondering is: does anybody here on the forum have any other DIY ideas on how I can test this for goldiness?
I should note, I am pretty far from a city, and its amenities, which is why I'm asking DIY.
Thank you.

 

[Southern Custom]

One way is with nitric acid. If not available, a bit of battery acid will work in a pinch but it's a bit hard to tell unless you have a known control to go against. We do this by rubbing the piece on a hard frosted piece of stone or black glass. Rub known gold on it then your test piece to get a small gold streak. Next apply your acid and watch the reaction compared to the gold. Gold will either be unaffected or will slowly lose color, brass will disappear. You can also drop it straight onto the test piece and if you get green bubbling, it's likely brass.
I don't need to tell you to do this with ventilation and rubber gloves I'm sure!
Layne Z

 

[Chujybear]

Would it work in muriatic acid as well?


I suppose I could do the scratch test without controls, since I am only trying to define gold, or not. If it disappears, not gold.
Might be able to find a battery to cannibalize. Starts to turn into real work . Could use a bit of lead anyways

 

[Chujybear]

Thank you by the way Layne

 

[dlilazteca]

Keep us updated

Carlos De La O III

 

[monk]

unless there's a lot of weight involved, and given maybe brass mixed with the gold, would it be worthwhile to even fiddle with the stuff ? sort of like picking fly poop out of black pepper. when i was a bad kid my mother would threaten me with that nasty task !

 

[Chujybear]

If its gold its worth the mucking.. The gold material is must of what's in the can.. If it is gold, its at least 4oz. At least.
I know holds down a bit, the karat might be low, but its still a couple bucks more than yesterday..
Or worst case, I've got a bucket full of shredded door knob.
G

 

[BlaineA]

We send in all of the dust from our vacuum cleaner to a refiner. if this bag came out of a jewelry shop I would send it in for refining even if the shavings turn out to be brass. It doesn't take much gold to get a good amount of money.

http://www.dhfco.com/

that is a refiner that I have used and feel are very fair.

 

[Chujybear]

I will be sending it in with my sweeps eventually.
A positive result just might speed up my cycle.

 

[Chujybear]

Am I on the total wrong track with this lemon juice and salt thing. It's been days no reaction.
I know that citric acid can be a pickling agent. So I know this might have been a dead wrong approach. The experience I'm drawing on is a lemon and salt salad dressing from a picnic left for a day in my car with a copper scouring brush, and the beautiful blues and greens it produced.
Maybe I better add a little extra vergin olive oil, and small chips of lettuce ?

 

[LVVP]

Chujybear,

I did it many times and it was very successful, however- IT IS a VERY POISONING,you have to do it with a very good ventilation (better outside).

Very simple steps:

1. Melted gold chips with Zn, when still hot this melted material put it into cold water (like rain, drop by drop). As a result you have granules
2. Take chemical glass (because you will have a chemical reaction with a high temperature), put inside your granules and add acid (N3PO4)

You will see brown toxic smog - it is a result of chemical reaction
After reaction finished - you have brown powder. Very accurate put together with paper + borax and finally

3. Melted it

You have pure gold - 24 carat

 

[Brian Marshall]

Wow... never in my life have I seen a thread on gold that featured fly poop, pepper, lemon and salt salad dressing, extra virgin olive oil and lettuce chips...

Dunno who keeps track of these things, but that's gotta be a world record contender?


Brian

 

[DKanger]

add acid (N3PO4)

I have no idea what this is??? Perhaps you should give its chemical name and strength to avoid confusion.

Na3PO4 is trisodium phosphate.
HNO3 is nitric acid.
All acids have H (hydrogen) as the first element in their nomenclature.

 

[LVVP]

My apologies, I translated and this is - HNO3 - nitric acid. About strength - I was using 50%.

Do not forget I am ESL ( English Second Language ), sorry

 

[DKanger]

Vlad,
No apology is necessary. We all understand the translation problem. It is just that when giving operations that require dangerous chemicals, a person should always be specific about the chemical required and their concentrations. Otherwise, people may not get the same results.

Shor International sells two inexpensive kits for refining gold.

https://www.ishor.com/refining.php

If you scroll down the the Subzero product, there is a description link to click on that describes the acid recovery process. Their product is a acid substitute powder so that one doesn't have to handle the concentrated acids and $55 for the basic kit seems reasonable.

 

[LVVP]

Thanks Dive for the info, very usefull. I will buy this product.