removing carbide

Originally Posted by dkeith

thanks alloy 2, i did not understand how the induction furnace worked. 1 can do these fast i have a steel box made that i put 99 teeth in at a time.they are small pieces of 3/4 pipe i place the teeth carbide tip out. i run a wire brush over the ends to get any dirt off this helps them to heat up faster. i have used every tip i think to get the best heat for my money from a rosebud to a #1 tip.i now use a#5 scorpion tip it only takes about 3 sec. to heat one up and tap it off the carbide then falls in a steel box below the teeth.when all are off i then raise the frame all the steel is on and it dumps in my backhoe bucket. when i get it about 1/3 full i take it to my trailer. i can keep up with how many boxes are on the trailer when i get app. 5000# it goes to scrap yard.the steel at one time paid for the ox. and propane i retired from gas co. get emp. price. only problem i have every piece of carbide has a very small piece of slag on it. this was not a problem when they needed the carbide but now they dock me 1.00 a # just sold 3000#
that is 3.000$.Ox. here in al. at the right place a 276 ox bottle swap out is only about 13.00 and i have 7 bottles. i use a 30# propane bottle it holds app. 7 gal of propane for me that is about 7.00$ .it will last for about 6 ox. bottles. it depends on how much carbide is on the tips i can get about 30#of carbide per bottle last carbide i sold was 5.75# so 172.50 in a couple hours is not bad for a old retired man but this is not every day i half it with my kids that have the co.

The slag your yard is docking you on is silver solder, which is worth more than the carbide. You have two choices, first you could clean up the silver by soaking the nibs in a dilute warm nitric acid. To recover the silver cement it out as a gray power using some scrap copper. To get the full details on this procedure I suggest you go over and hang your hat over at the goldrefiningforum.com

Your second choice would be to find an honest yard to deal with.

Todays spot on silver is $17.98 troy ounce.