Place to assay and extract gold from ore

[ghosttownhuntress]

In case anybody's interested, not that the gold we found in Gold HIll was that great, but I do have info on a place that will assay it and extract the gold from the ore. However, they charge 33% to extract it, so it's probably not worth it.

[Mark1955]

I'm not interested in paying someone to extract it although you might be surprised at how much there actually is in some of that ore... there are others that might like to know though. So post awway... Personally I'd be more into using Corey's backed potato method...

Mark

[Patrocks94]

I definately agree with the baked potato method. I read about it and it is quite simple really. The only problem is, the mercury is darn expensive. According to Unitednuclear.com, mercury is going for 45.00$ an ounce. You would need a ton to get any decent amount of ore out of the rock.

[Mark1955]

WOW! I remember back in elementary school there was a huge bottle of the stuff in the sdcience lab that probably weighed 25 pounds! Of course in those days they didn't know how poisionous it was and every kid got to play with some... I'm probably suffering from mercury posioning since I was 8 years old .,

Mark

[Danb]

I didn’t think there was any free milling gold at Gold Hill.
To find out, get a mortar and pestle (or improvise with a hammer and old frying pan). Crush up the ore to a very fine powder until you get about a ¼ cup. Then add about a pea size droplet of Mercury. Continue the crushing action so the Mercury comes in contact with all the material. Or put the material into a gold pan with some water and the Mercury and work it down. If the Mercury starts to get pasty instead of just little rounded balls that means it is loading up with gold and silver. This is called Amalgam. Separate the Amalgam and then use the potato method or my preference 26% Nitric Acid to burn off the Mercury. Do this out side and stay away from the fumes. Very toxic in either case. If anyone needs Mercury I have a fair amount and get more each year from my placer claims in Idaho. They are loaded with it. I won’t sell it but will donate some to anyone who needs it. Also you may want to roast the ore before crushing. I took a tour of the Mercur mine in the mid 80’s. They had just installed and Autoclave which heats up the ore to a very high temperature before processing and increased their gold production by 10%.

Dan

[Dawn_CL]

Hi Dan, Id be quite interested in some of that mercury for use in my gold mine here in AZ. Is there a way you could send me a quantity if i were to pay the shipping? Also, could you explain how to do the 'potato method'? Where would one pick up the nitric acid or sulphuric acid at the easiest and without all the needless bs and licensing?

Thanks, Dawn

[Danb]

Hi Dawn, Since it is a toxic substance, I don’t know about sending it in the mail or UPS. If you would look into that and let me know what you find out. These are 1oz. plastic vials. I have about 6 vials to donate. 2 are set a side for local MU members who I will contact this weekend. The rest are up for grab.

Thanks,
Dan

[Dawn_CL]

Hi Dan, Fedex handles toxic things as i ordered some blasting stuff that was considered toxic not long ago and all they did was label it as a "Hazmat" item. It is all in the labelling. Only thing was was they charged a "hazmat fee' for handling and shipping it. You may want to get an exact weight on what the remainder of the vials would be then call Fedex and they will give you a ship price plus the hazmat fee. I THINK, if i remember correctly, they charged a 20 dollar fee for the Hazmat thing plus what the shipping was. That was why i offered to send whatever they told you the shipping would be because i had already known about the Hazmat fee thing.
Also you wont need to specify what the vials are, i dont believe, as the shipper of the chemicals i ordered didnt. All they did was specify to the carrier (Fedex) that it was a toxic substance and needed to be treated as a Hazmat shipment. However, some people i have dealt with just sent what i needed without all the extra fees and stuff (the hazmat fees) and took thier chances because it saved the 20.00 fee. Its all up to what you feel is best in shipping. I can go either way. If you can and will, id like the rest of the vials that you have up for grabs becuase i have alot of microscopis stuff im wanting to process at my mine.

Disregard about where to get the nitric acid and stuff at as the folks i got my other chemicals off of has it.

Btw, the picture in my avatar is my mine but it was the way i first discovered it. It looks quite different now though since we redone alot of things in it.

Dawn

[lefler]

So here is a few thoughts on how to do this safely.

1. Nitrile gloves are the best for preventing penetration into the skin
2. The Hg and the Nitric acid will react and make the mercury more water soluable and therefore easier for your body to absorb. The waste will be dangerous
3. This stuff can be absorbed through the skin.
4. The nitric acid is taking the Hg into solution and is leaving the gold behind because gold reacts poorly with nitric acid.
5. Any other questions on how to do this safely let me know I can probably give you a heads up about what could go wrong. I have had my share of lab accidents like the day my experiment blew up and covered my arm with cyanide containing compounds. Luckily all it did was turn my arm puke orange.

[Dawn_CL]

Hi Dan, Was you able to get the mercury out to me, or are you? I can PM my mailing address(street address) if needed.

Actually i already know the dangers or toxic effects of mercury but what i wanted to know is the way to use it to seperate the gold.

Im also planning on using a small leaching process using sulphuric acid or nitric acid in a 5 gallon plastic bucket. The reasoning for the bucket is so the wastes can be disposed of properly and not becoming an environmental issue since im just working on a small scale. My plans on that is adding about a cup of crushed 100 mesh or less concentrate into the bucket, then adding water, then adding the acid and leaving it set for awhile. Dunno how correct this is but thats how ive heard the best way to do it without having to worry about all the large leach feilds and tailings ponds. Im really not at the large scale level for all of that but the amount of concentrate i like to work with, the plastic bucket solution would fit my needs perfectly.



Thanks, Dawn

[Pete]

Let me know how that process works for you. I'm looking for a good way to process crushed material myself.

[Dawn_CL]

Hi Pete,

I sure will.

I watched some program on TV( i think it was on the discovery channel) about a week ago about some gold mine in Nevada using the sulphuric acid leaching method but they did it at a very large scale. I mean they had conveyor belts and whatnot moving the rock around to different places and even guys around the conveyor belts, which i guess, was sorting the ore from the waste rock as they was pitching rocks on different conveyor belts. I know one belt went to the leach ponds and the other went to the tailings pond and refuse piles.
It was that program that i got the sulphuric acid idea from and i trust that a bit more than the murcery method. Even though i have no problem using the mercury but i just have heard its a bit more difficult to use, referring to the use of retorts and whatnot. I just wanted something i could just pour in a bucket and let set for awhile. Then after the leaching i could screen the acid for reuse until it no longer has strength. Then its off to proper hazardous waste disposal. I figured that would be uch more considerate than causing an environmental hazard (ground hazard).

Dawn

[Pete]

I've heard of using Nitric acid, but not sulfuric. I would be very cautious with sulfuric acid. We use it at work in one of our processes and it is very dangerous. Not only will it severely burn you, but it does not combine with water and also emits hazardous fumes.
I'll have to do some more reading. It seems like nitric acid will dissolve gold and silver. You can then use a piece of metal (aluminum for gold or copper for silver) to get the gold or silver to come out of solution. This is coming from memory and I have not tried it yet, so don't take my word for it. I need to do more research. Leaching seems to be the best way to recover that microscopic gold and silver.

[Danb]

Hi Dawn,
Sorry it took so long to get back to you on this subject. PM me with your contact info and we can work out the details for shipping, and shipping costs.

Also, there are 3 methods I know of to recover gold/silver from hard rock mines. They all use hazardous chemicals (unless you come across a very rich vein of free milling gold). Also the cost of the chemicals may out weigh the amount of gold recovered. But it’s a hobby in my case. My claims have natural accruing mercury and spills from the mills in the late 1800’s.

1. Crush it up, pan it down and use mercury to collect it from the other heavy minerals. Then use a retort to vaporize and recover the mercury leaving the gold and silver. Or the potato method (don’t eat the potato J), or nitric acid. And I have seen people put the amalgam in to a spoon or metal cup and heat it up. No mater what method you use to separate the mercury, do it out side, stay up wind.

2.Cyanide leaching. I’ve never used this process, as my mining claim is a placer mine. It is used to separate the decimated (microscopic gold) from the ore.


3. Aqua Regia. This is a very dangerous mixture of Hydrochloric Acid and Nitric Acid. It is used to recover gold from gold plated electronic parts, jewelry etc. The process dissolves the gold into solution. Then Sodium Bisulfate is used to precipitate the gold back to a solid. The solid is a brown powder, and when melted down results in 99.9% Fine gold. I have a video (some where) from the GPAA detailing the process. I don’t know if it is still available.

Thanks,
Dan

[Dawn_CL]

Hi Dan, Actually im looking more on the lines of using the sulfuric acid method. Something most simple to use. I also was thinking of trying the recirculating sluice to recover the microscopic stuff(which is all im getting from my mines, but a good amount of it) but am not sure if those sluices will work on the microscopic stuff. My hunch is that it wouldnt which is why i wanted to try the bucket method leaching using sulphuric acid and just leaving it diluted with water in the bucket along with the crushed concentrate.

I dont know how to use the 'potato method' as i have never heard of it. Could you fill me in on how to do that?

The cyanide i cant get and id be a bit afraid to try so that one is out of the question.

Im looking to process far more per day than just a panful, im looking to produce about 75 to 100 lbs of concentrates per day so that was why im looking for something more in the small leaching process or concentrating sluice methods so panning would not do the trick for me.

So would the sulfuric acid methos used alone do the trick for me or would i need more chemicals?

Dawn