first attempt at self PM recovery

[EcoSafe]

I have about 15 lbs of key board mylar, so I am going to try to recover the silver myself. this seem to be the simplest of the recovery processes. any tips would be apreciated.

[scrap lap]

Good luck. Ill be watching this one.

I'm getting ready to dabble with PM recovery myself. Please post up as much as you can!

[Ballymoss]

NEVER DO THIS INDOORS

First off, cut them in half to make them easier to handle.

Next, get yourself a shallow dish, glass or ceramic not metal.

Mix up a 50/50 mixture of Nitric acid and Distilled water. MUST be distilled (or ionised, i use ionised)
and carefully pour it into the dish.

With a pair of plastic tongs, gently swish the mylar around in the solution until the silver traces disappear or turn jet black.
That piece of mylar is done.

I have a seperate rinse bucket of cold tap water to rinse the used mylars clean of acid.
The rinse water will turn a milky colour eventually, That is Silver Chloride which can be converted into Silver metal later.

Once you have finished all the mylars, filter the solution to get rid of any floating impurities.
Carefully pour it into a clean tallish beaker type vessel.
Get yourself a clean piece of copper bar and place it into the beaker.
Watch your Silver magically appear!

Give the bar a nudge every now and then to dislodge the Silver growing on it.
Keep the bar in there until the solution goes a clear deep blue colour.
That's when you know all the Silver is out of solution.

Filter your Silver out of the solution and keep rinsing in distilled water until the rinse water is absolutely clear.
Dry and melt.

That's how i do my mylars anyway!

NOTE: When you drop the copper bar into place, if there are any signs of reddish brown fumes coming off, move away from them. Those fumes are very bad for you, in fact they can kill you if you get enough inside of you.

[gustavus]

To Quote Ballymoss,,,, NOTE: When you drop the copper bar into place, if there are any signs of reddish brown fumes coming off, you must move the beaker outside.Those fumes are very bad for you, in fact they can kill you if you get enough inside of you.

I'm not targeting anyone here, but what the hell are you doing working with acids indoors. For this very reason this and any other posts pertaining to the refining of precious metals belongs over at the gold forum where the folks with knowledge of these things are able to correct a bad situation.

Never work indoors with out a fume hood.

Hokes Refining Precious Metals Wastes

Reactivity Series of Metals

[Mechanic688]

I would hate to hear of a bad accident due to something I posted on a forum. That little dribble of silver or even gold is not worth someone's life,,,,,, Just saying.

[Ballymoss]

I agree with Gustavus, never work with acids indoors unless you have a fume cupboard.

I also agree that PM refining questions are better answered on the Gold refining forum.
I do my own PM refining but if i explain how i do it on this forum and miss out an important step
no one is going to pick me up on it, except maybe Gustavus of course!
this how mistakes can be made and you could hurt yourself.

Gustavus, thanks for pointing that out. I've edited my post to reflect the safety issue.

Regards

[EcoSafe]

pardon me but, are you all assuming this is the only forum I read or belong to. secondly I have a comercial fume hood I bought on govdeals. thirdly it is out side.
fourth you are all absolutly correct, do not attempt this unless you have studied the process. the very dangerous chemicals used. and studied all safety issues and are prepaired to use them.
I will not post the process as im not qualifyed to relay the info, I plan to post only costs/profit and wieghts of scrap material and results.

[Ballymoss]

I will not post the process as im not qualifyed to relay the info

Neither am I to be honest.

I'm wondering now whether i should remove my post explaining how i do it.
What do you guys think?

Regards

[gustavus]

Neither am I to be honest.

I'm wondering now whether i should remove my post explaining how i do it.
What do you guys think?

Regards

I would leave it we have made the necessary recommendations, its all part of breaking down scrap to maximize value.

When it comes down to actually refining your precious metals you should read the attached book in my earlier post Hokes Refining Precious Metals Wastes then join the gold forum to keep safe.

Olddude you may very well have a fume hood, but are you aware of the many silver compounds that one can accidentally or unwittingly make refining silver. Yes compounds that go BOOM

Shock sensitive compounds, here is a link to a gold forum thread explaining some of those compounds. Silver Chloride and Ammonia

The bottom line is that there are not enough gold forum members that belong to the scrap forum to keep an eye on us keeping us safe.

[gustavus]

pardon me but, are you all assuming this is the only forum I read or belong to. secondly I have a comercial fume hood I bought on govdeals. thirdly it is out side.
fourth you are all absolutly correct, do not attempt this unless you have studied the process. the very dangerous chemicals used. and studied all safety issues and are prepaired to use them.
I will not post the process as im not qualifyed to relay the info, I plan to post only costs/profit and wieghts of scrap material and results.

Figuring out cost is easy,

It takes about 38 ml of nitric acid to dissolve 1 troy oz. of silver.
It takes 48ml of nitric to dissolve 1 troy oz. of Sterling Silver.
It takes about 79.3 ml of nitric acid to dissolve 1 troy ounce of copper.

Over at GRF you will find threads pertaining to the percentage of silver one should expect to recover per pound of mylars your processing. Since everything I process is my own I have no need to create and keep analytical charts.

[gustavus]

Olddude have you considered pyrolysis of your 15 lbs of mylar then treating the ash to reclaim your silver.

Pyrolysis is essentially heating a material with no combustion during world war two many farmers ran their trucks and tractors from a wood gasifier - wood gas

If you use pyrolysis to reduce your mylars you will be left with ash containing silver. Much easier to work with a pound of ash versus 15 lbs of mylar, Saves time and chemicals.

[Ballymoss]

Hi Gustavus,

I've got a hard back copy of hokes and been a member of GRF since 2007.
I'm known as Buzz over there

I only recover PM's, i don't bother refining.
I agree with you that anyone wanting advice regarding chemical recovery or refining should get it from the Gold forum.

I just remebered what Silver Nitrate will do to your skin, so i will amend my post again.

Regards

[Recycle This, LLC]

For those of you curious about the silver yield of a typical keyboard Mylar. 25 keyboards yielded approximately 4.5 grams of .99 silver. Quick calculations tell us that one would need roughly 155 keyboards to produce a troy ounce of silver. At today's market value, a single keyboard would yield approximately $.20 silver.

[gustavus]

My one time effort at mylars was enough to show that there was not enough profit to cover the cost of chemicals, However it is a good learning experience for those who would like to get their feet wet.

In the picture below I have removed the silver contacts from an oven thermostat from a pre - electronic electric range. The contacts are solid buttons not plated, it's my estimate from an electric range there is over an ounce of silver if you include the thermostats from the heating elements.

The silver contacts are not pure silver, the buttons in this case have been alloyed with palladium to toughen them up.

Ballymoss I beat google in scanning the Hokes books by a year or more then posted the scan to GRF, you may recall that Hokes Testing Precious Metals was purchased with donations made from GRF members, I received the hard copy then scanned it making the digital available to all.

Nothing beats having the hard copy, I have Butts and Cox, the Economics of Silver and Its Uses, plus both of the Hokes and Ammens 2nd edition plus a few more titles on Electro-refining and recovery. Not to mention the numerous books I have downloaded from openlibrary.org

We should be discussing where to find silver not how to process or refine it on the scrappers forum, I tried to initiate an interest in this subject in the past but it seems most are only interested in posting about a broken fingernail or some idiot making a gesture with a box knife just to name a few off topic threads.

The we have the nerve to post in another thread that we're professionals, hope that person was not speaking for - ALL.

[EcoSafe]

I think I said, most here were profesionals. am well educated on explosive properties of chemicals iron oxide, aluminium, magnisium. and silver. im also very respectful, and very careful of all.
I am doing this for self eduation not profit. there may come a day in the near future when that knowlege will be invaluable. just my .o2

[PartTimeScrapper]

I would like to know what you get from them olddude. Im saving my mylars now and have about 60 of them. If it works out and you want to do my batch afterword ill split it with ya or something.

[EcoSafe]

silver

[PartTimeScrapper]

LOL I know silver i ment your breakdown.

[Otto]

In the picture below I have removed the silver contacts from an oven thermostat from a pre - electronic electric range. The contacts are solid buttons not plated, it's my estimate from an electric range there is over an ounce of silver if you include the thermostats from the heating elements.

Gus, it seems to me these silver contacts are in all kinds of devices. Today, I found some in a dishwasher relay and in the power switch for a monitor. It got me to thinking that there might be some money to be made out of them. Personally, I'm not interested in playing with chemicals to extract the silver. I would rather just sell the contacts. There are a few people selling silver electrical contacts on Ebay in lots of around a pound to a bit more. From their pictures, it looks like they managed to remove the actual contacts from the substrates. I don't know how they would go about this since the ones I've seen so far are riveted onto aluminum or brass substrates. I've read that the contacts contain cadmium, so it's probably not a good idea to be cutting them and putting dust into the air. Any feedback on this issue would be appreciated.

[Mechanic688]

On a related note, I have a couple hundred keyboards ready to be tore down. I'm not interested in the process itself; it's interesting to read about but I know I could hurt myself. I have been saving the mylar films and was just wondering where the best market would be to move them when I get a good sized stack. Here, Gold Forum, Ebay or some other I don't know about, Thanks,,