Sreetips' dinner guest: "That's an interesting choice of toilet Sreetips. Stainless steel is very modern." Sreetips: "That's not stainless steel it's silver. Running out of places to store it and I feel very powerful going on a silver throne" :D :D
@@DFPercush i literally just came here to say exactly this! Or, he could pull all the copper out of the solutions he already got all the silver out of, 6 and make an antimicrobial copper toilet and he could electroplate it in silver so he doesn't waste too much silver. Just coat the copper with a couple mm of silver and boom, same antimicrobial effects, same look, and Sreetips gets to keep most of his pure silver crystal. That's what I would do, personally. This way, he can use the copper nitrate he has sitting around in solution.
He has a 3 part series on refining sterling. It's very informative and he does the cementing out in a glass jar. You can you actually see it happen. It's my second favorite part of his videos, melting is the first.
another great vid and i watch them all but as an older fellow with hearing issues having the closed captions makes watching much more of a pleasure, help an old guy out, thanks.
Excellent video thank you for sharing your system and expertise with us!!!! One of my favorite hobbies by far!!! My copper almost pays for my nitric acid now
@jozefigueiredo8792 I think it's lab core just Google it, can't buy on Amazon. Prices vary all over the board and cheap prices means you pay more on shipping
Thanks to this channel I now have 380 gram bar of gold., 85% karat gold stock. 14% gold filled, 1% e-scrap. Never again will touch e scrap. , gold filled uses to much acid . Refining karat gold can be done from start to finish in half a day.
Also, I think I just realized that Sreetips house is basically Heaven for sterling silver flatware...it's made, it has a useful life, it languishes in storage until someone decides to sell it to Mr. or Mrs. Sreetips, then it's broken down to its basic elements, purified, and crystallized in its purest form to be kept with all the other possibly trillions of other crystals that Sreetips has in his various undisclosed storage locations. 😄
Great video. Really clarified the whole process. Would it make sence to add a lot of water to the cement silver bucket and mix it around in there to dilute the blue liquid? I'm thinking you could then use a vacuum to remove the rinse off the top once it settled, and repeat a few times. Mixing the hot water around in that small container with trying tk avoid tearing the filter paper seems like a real chore
It probably would perhaps speed things up but I think this is more for the novice. The main bucket of silver cement must weigh many kilos. So I may be wrong but he is probably showing it like this for people doing small scale production. And also the purity is also his main goal.
Fantastic process. Fairly simple and straightforward but the stress could easily well up if you’re not constantly at it leading to an overwhelming amount of work. Like juggling knives and Ming vases together. Thank you Sir!👍👍
The only thing prettier than natural polished silver crystals are the same thing in gold. Silver crystals are part blinding reflection and part frosty wonder. They are amazing to actually see irl. Sr, do you have a camera capable of doing a closeup of some of the crystals? Remember the gold ones? Wow. Once again, my thanks and appreciation.
Maybe when you go to throw away the cemented copper out, you could instead send some of it to BigstackD. He does all sorts of melts/smelting and casts with copper, brass, and aluminum. Could be an interesting "collaboration" and we'd get to see your copper be used to make a bar or something.
Nice very interesting and informative . These videos are so cool to watch . Because it shows us the viewers tips on what to do with our scrap precious metals .
he covers this in an earlier video on waste treatment, there was a pH adjustment to 7, and i think some bleach but i might be confusing that with a codyslab video where he used cyanide on dishes with gold trimmings
love watching you at work and if you listen well you find out much more iron to bring copper out of solution i did not even know-that. coper to cement out silver -its like watching a master crafts man at work each show
@Cameron Keillor The best way to deal with it would be converting it to copper sulfate by adding sulfuric acid, then distilling out the nitric acid that formed; then doing electrolysis of the copper sulfate. This way, nitric acid and pure copper would be recovered, possibly also remaining precious metals as anode slimes. NurdRage has a video on that. Platinum anode may be needed for the electrolysis cell.
I'm pretty sure that one of your subscribers made a video on making a Buckner funnel out of two five gallon buckets. That seems to be the point that you have reached.
So Sreetips... I have worked with silver compounds in the past and some were light sensitive. Light exposure gave a dark silver precipitate. Have you experienced any issues with light when handling your silver nitrate solutions?
Not so much with silver nitrate. Direct sun light may be a different story. But I have seen silver chloride turn color just from exposure to ambient artificial light.
How long did it take a accumulate all that cement silver, Mr Sreetips? have you ever melted down something you wish you hadn't? eg, item was more valuable left as jewellery.
Sometimes, when I have something nice, and I hate to have to destroy it. I close my eyes, put two big cutters on the piece, and chop it, and let it go, without regret.
Wow just did my 1st nitric acid boils for rendering .925, I have a greater respect for the time, energy and real work you put in with your channel, as well as all the knowledge you share, So much to learn, and so many questions, Thanks for doing the channel. I would have never done any of this without your channel! Quick question is the gray powder which clogs up the filter paper when filtering the silver nitrate solution actually silver cement? and should I keep it for melting down the silver cement?
Used to do PM chemistry a while back, definitely messy toxic and not too forgiving. Requires nitric acid and other chemicals that could get the undevided attention of homeland security as well.
Never get sick of seeing these videos Thanks. Would it be possible to suspend 9999 silver wire in the cell in an interesting shape and have crystals form upon it ? I have always wondered if this was possible and make for an interesting video .
@@scrappydoo7887 Good piont , If this is correct , Stainless figurines large enough for display , could be acid etched before being hooked up in a deeper stainless container . Crystals could coat the rough surface to the point were they become too fragile or practical to continue , before cutting free , as stunning original pieces .
Excellent video I never get tired of seeing this it's so interesting can you recover the copper if you wanted to? Keep up the great work five stars my friend thank you for sharing
Yes. He said in this video, that to recover the copper, the copper solution goes into a bucket with iron bars, which copper is cemented onto, just like silver cements into copper.
@@josephcormier5974 _"I was asking if he's started to keep it."_ No. You asked if he *_COULD_* recover the copper if he wanted to. That's what you asked, and that's what I answered.
This is FASCINATING to me. What advice would you have for someone (like me) looking to get into this sort of thing? I’m extremely interested in building a very professional and streamlined version of this operation. Thank you!
The blue liquid goes in waste treatment bucket full of iron. The copper cements out on the iron and is tossed. Then the acidic iron solution goes in a waste treatment bucket and sodium hydroxide is added to drop the metal hydroxides. These are filtered out and the solids disposed of.
cemented out silver have other uses? used for inquartation gold or cementing gold? or do you prefer to use thrifted silver for that kind of stuff? maybe cement silver is too small / packed to cement out gold?
It would work well cementing gold. Using cement silver to inquart is not recommended because palladium follows silver and it would tend to build up in the silver.
Would cooling the solution decrease the rate of crystal formation, increasing size of crystal? Just wonder if it could be a fairly profitable solution as I know you're selling the more well developed crystals.
For growing large monocrystals, special measures must be taken. There must be videos on TH-cam how large monocrystals of silicon are grown for electronics.
Seems like you would be busy for a month just dealing with all that silver and silver nitrate that you've got stored up. Might have to halt doing more gold refining for now haha.
The new microphone is sounding better every time you use it. I still get a little clipping here and there, but its a lot better than your first video with the new equipment
On another note, I vote that you start making cool castings with the silver and copper you have around. I liked the idea of casting a nice antimicrobial toilet out of copper and electroplating it in rose gold or pure silver to keep the antimicrobial effects and also keep the costs down by using copper from old copper nitrate solutions if you have old solutions from cementing out the silver in your gold refining.
Very important show tho the price of Silver is at a low point. I have now nearly 15kgs of sterling silver. And this should be a great heap. With the extras if your other shows.
Love your work. Two questions: 1.) Why don't you get a rotavap to reduce the enormous amounts of liquids you are handling? 2.) Did you ever try to substitute conc. nitric acid by dilute nitric acid / hydrogen peroxide? It should dissolve silver just as good minus the red nitrogen dioxide fumes.
I do this as a hobby aswell. With much smaller amounts, i tried the silver alloy - nitric acid - chloride out the salt - hydroxide and dextrose. It was a mess. Im redissolving all of it, it was not good
Can't believe I mist this one! Just one question for you Mr Sreetips, Will we ever see you refine the Copper you have in the stock pot or will you send it off to someone else?
@@sreetips As a metal caster from South Wales UK. I'm always using Copper! I just wish we could readily get nitric in this country so that I get the best out of the copper I use!
Have you made Gold Crystals? What solution did you have those crystals stored in? If crystals do tone, what would you suggest to remove toning? Acetone?
Hello, I love your channel. Refining noble metals is so important. Would you please make a video demonstrating the process of taking the silver to 9999 purity?
I’ve already posted that in a series a little over a year ago. Sent it off for analysis, came back greater than 99,999 parts per 100,000 as per guardian labs in the UK. That’s five nines fine.
I’ve got all the stuff to do it. I’m just so far behind. I’ve been working on silver all week and I’m still not caught up. My hobby is starting to feel like a job.
Afternoon Gunny, or, "Shark Tooth", whichever you're going by now 😂. I have a question for you. Silver Nitrate. Going by definition, it is a clear liquid. Mine always comes out blue. I noticed that yours does also. Copper is the antagonist. What I don't understand is, if I'm using pure Silver crystal, to make my electrolyte, why is there Copper present? The light blue color of the electrolyte doesn't impede the growth of crystal. It works wonderfully, just as yours does. Does the trace amount of Copper affect the three nines fine purity of the Silver crystal? I know that there is a way to remove all traces of Copper, to yield a completely clear Siver Nitrate electrolyte. Is it necessary to do this? I have collected 384 ounces of Silver Chloride and am about to do the conversion to Silver Oxide, with NaOH. Then glucose to drop the Silver metal. This process, I am to understand, will yield 99.9 Silver, if rinsed correctly. I am still going to run it through the Silver Cell. Would you be concerned with a pure Silver Nitrate solution, or, is light blue acceptable? I really appreciate your input and your willingness to mentor an old curmudgeon like myself! Thank you for all you do! I call you friend, and so you are! Maybe someday, I will be able to meet you in person, to shake your hand, buy you and Mrs. Shark Tooth a wonderful meal, and thank you as you deserve to be thanked! Your tutorials have been a life saver for a me. As always, your devoted fan, Wade
Goldsilverpro on the goldrefiningforum.com recommends adding some copper to the clear silver nitrate to promote fat crystal growth. But I always just let it build up from the impure silver that I add. Copper in your pure silver crystal probably means some parameter is off in the cell.
I love your videos and I highly respect your attention to process and detail. So did you basically turn your garage into your lab or did you buy/lease a separate property to work in?
7:57 did you know that if you crystalize out copper nitrate then distill it destructively you can recover the nitric acid. same holds true for iron nitrate.
He's talked about that in past videos and how the time and energy cost plus danger of nitric acid vapours during the distillation simply does not stack up against the convenience and cost of simply wandering down to the hardware store for a bottle of nitric acid. I'm slowly buying kit myself to try refining gold as a hobby scale on old computer parts. And due to local laws restricting access to nitric acid, I'd have to make my own. Mixing copper sulphate (farm footrot treatment) with calcium nitrate (hydroponic nutrient) to form copper nitrate and calcium sulphate (gypsum) then Thermal decomposition of copper nitrate to nitric acid and copper oxide IS viable for me. Through I'm actually planning on the potassium nitrate and sodium bisulfate method. The copper oxide crust from thermal decomposition of copper nitrate can then be cleaned off the distillation flask with Hydrochloric acid to form copper chloride which is easily electrolyzed to pure copper on a graphite electrode off gassing the chloride as chlorine gas. So you get your copper back rather than disposing of it. But for Sreetips, he's worked out it's just not worth it with nitric acid available on the shelf.
@@CatboyChemicalSociety I mentioned chlorine gas offgassing. Fume hood and extractor fan and exhaust the gas away from dwellings and it's diluted enough to be harmless. You breathe plenty of chlorine gas in enclosed public chlorinated pools. It's simply a matter of concentration/dilution. Just use common sense.
@@rhysfirth3506 Take a look at this video if you're interested in making your own nitric acid: th-cam.com/video/HN6tv7NKtPk/w-d-xo.html - Making Nitric Acid From Air - Elementalmaker
@@rhysfirth3506 Check out a video of NurdRage on copper nitrate, the proposed processes recovers both nitric acid, copper, and sulfuric acid. You also don't need to decompose anything, just distill.
You could filter your own rain water by collecting it in a water butt. You have free distilled water forever, all though it isn't expensive. I think in these hard times it's good to save as much as you can.
@@sreetips Wow. That must get expensive. Look into the water butt idea. The filtering off can be slow as I use a paint filter inside a coffee filter. 1 gallon would only take around 5 to 10 minutes to get rid of any mineral particulate.
@@bormisha Hence the filtration. Also, if left to settle, the pH levels out. If it's fresh rain water, then I also agree that the pH will be too high. I have made the mistake before and it cost me a lot of time and effort.
From what I've seen, if you clean the cement silver until clear with distilled water and boil it in HCL it'll be .999 fine. The silver crystal is easily .9999 fine!
Guess: Anything more reactive than silver stayed in solution when the silver was cemented out on the copper and got rinsed off in the funnels. And anything less reactive than silver stayed in the anode baskets (1) because the voltage was set low enough that it only picked up the silver and (2) because it wasn't soluble in the electrolyte.
The contaminants are insoluble and remain trapped in the anode filter. Only copper and silver get through. If the electrolyte is acidic (excess nitric) and there is palladium in the slimes, then the nitric could dissolve the palladium and it would contaminate the electrolyte turning it green.
How do you feel about refining silver smelting instead of using acids to remove all base metals? The only time I need to use nitric acid would be to separate gold from silver.
What’s the rate of speed that your cell is dissolving a kg of silver shot at, given the settings you run it? Does bowl size affect the plating speed given more or less surface area?
No, the speed is determined solely by the electric current passed through the cell (current is a rate of charge transfer). Calculation is easy. You divide the current (in amps) by the electron charge (1.6e-19) to get the number of atoms deposited per second. Then you divide the result by the Avogadro constant (6.02e23) to get the number of moles of silver deposited per second. Multiply the result by the silver's standard atomic weight (107.87g/mol) which yields the silver deposition rate in grams per second. Dissolution rate is the same as the deposition rate. For example, for 1A current, the rate is about 0,001g/s, which is about 4g/h. In 10 days typical cell running time of Sreetips, 967g of silver would be processed.
@sreetips question. I've binge watched at least 3 days worth of videos, maybe more. In one of your videos you are torching some sterling silver candle holders to add to your gold refining byproduct pot. Is it possible to just start from there with sterling silver and create the silver nitrate solution and then use the copper to cement out the sliver?
I think I used clean cement silver a long time ago to start my silver cell. Afterwards I saved some silver crystal from each harvest to use to make electrolyte for my silver cell.
@@sreetipsI planned on using some pure .999 silver like you did with that massive silver coin to create my silver electrolyte for the silver cell. Is this correct? I'm talking about skipping the gold inquartation process and going straight to creating the solution using the hot dilute nitric acid to dissolve the silver from the sterling silver to start the process. (Creating silver nitrate and copper nitrate solution) Then cement out the silver onto copper. After that drying and melting into shot. Then using a silver cell to grow the silver crystals. I know you use
@@Camelguy069 I think it should work this way. It's just that Sreetips refines both silver and gold, to the benefit of both processes. It saves on nitric acid and labor.
When dealing with that much cement silver, I honestly have no experience or knowledge on this other than your videos, would it be easier to fill the bucket with distilled water to dilute then tip off/filter off the excess liquid and continue that way until it's clean instead of doing multiple tiny batches trying to pull through a blocked filter?
So you’re buying the sterling silver to inquart gold, then you recover the silver… does this actually make you money or is it simply to recapture silver that you have previously used to buy more sterling silverware to use for gold inquarting?
Sreetips' dinner guest: "That's an interesting choice of toilet Sreetips. Stainless steel is very modern." Sreetips: "That's not stainless steel it's silver. Running out of places to store it and I feel very powerful going on a silver throne" :D :D
As a bonus, it's also anti-microbial!
@@DFPercush i literally just came here to say exactly this! Or, he could pull all the copper out of the solutions he already got all the silver out of, 6 and make an antimicrobial copper toilet and he could electroplate it in silver so he doesn't waste too much silver. Just coat the copper with a couple mm of silver and boom, same antimicrobial effects, same look, and Sreetips gets to keep most of his pure silver crystal. That's what I would do, personally. This way, he can use the copper nitrate he has sitting around in solution.
What an operation!!! I applaud your attention to detail in how you manage the waste from all your refining. Excellent work!
When you really look at it, his setup there is pretty darn amazing. I think he has done a pretty good job.
This is my first cement silver and silver nitrate refinery video! Thanks for this!
He has a 3 part series on refining sterling. It's very informative and he does the cementing out in a glass jar. You can you actually see it happen. It's my second favorite part of his videos, melting is the first.
As an ex-Automobile Technician I have to salute your awesome vacuum gauge! I have that same model in my tool box.
It’s big and readable,
Current mechanic. I haven't had to use a vacuum gauge in many moons. That is a good gauge though.
another great vid and i watch them all but as an older fellow with hearing issues having the closed captions makes watching much more of a pleasure, help an old guy out, thanks.
Thanks for the information. You have a very organized progression that you follow!
Excellent video thank you for sharing your system and expertise with us!!!! One of my favorite hobbies by far!!! My copper almost pays for my nitric acid now
Where do you buy the nitric acid? Thx
@jozefigueiredo8792 I think it's lab core just Google it, can't buy on Amazon. Prices vary all over the board and cheap prices means you pay more on shipping
Thanks to this channel I now have 380 gram bar of gold., 85% karat gold stock. 14% gold filled, 1% e-scrap. Never again will touch e scrap. , gold filled uses to much acid .
Refining karat gold can be done from start to finish in half a day.
Also, I think I just realized that Sreetips house is basically Heaven for sterling silver flatware...it's made, it has a useful life, it languishes in storage until someone decides to sell it to Mr. or Mrs. Sreetips, then it's broken down to its basic elements, purified, and crystallized in its purest form to be kept with all the other possibly trillions of other crystals that Sreetips has in his various undisclosed storage locations. 😄
Awesome! thank you Sreetips. Love the silver videos.
Received my silver crystal and gold sponge. Thank you! Beautiful specimens.
As lovely as high purity gold is, the color of that ultra pure silver is also amazing.
Great video. Really clarified the whole process. Would it make sence to add a lot of water to the cement silver bucket and mix it around in there to dilute the blue liquid? I'm thinking you could then use a vacuum to remove the rinse off the top once it settled, and repeat a few times. Mixing the hot water around in that small container with trying tk avoid tearing the filter paper seems like a real chore
makes sense to me
It probably would perhaps speed things up but I think this is more for the novice. The main bucket of silver cement must weigh many kilos. So I may be wrong but he is probably showing it like this for people doing small scale production. And also the purity is also his main goal.
Love it. Make it look easy, although it isn’t. It is still inspiring me to start my own small scale project.
Fantastic process. Fairly simple and straightforward but the stress could easily well up if you’re not constantly at it leading to an overwhelming amount of work. Like juggling knives and Ming vases together.
Thank you Sir!👍👍
I had absolutely zero insight about this stuff until I came across this channel. It's really cool
Welcome!
The only thing prettier than natural polished silver crystals are the same thing in gold.
Silver crystals are part blinding reflection and part frosty wonder. They are amazing to actually see irl.
Sr, do you have a camera capable of doing a closeup of some of the crystals? Remember the gold ones? Wow.
Once again, my thanks and appreciation.
Maybe when you go to throw away the cemented copper out, you could instead send some of it to BigstackD. He does all sorts of melts/smelting and casts with copper, brass, and aluminum. Could be an interesting "collaboration" and we'd get to see your copper be used to make a bar or something.
That is quite the operation you have Sreetips. You make it look easy 🙏 God Bless
I love it! Still stacking until I can start to refine.
I have learned so much from watching just a couple of your videos thank you I’m glad I found your channel 👍🏽
Welcome!
Sreetips the only guy that scoops silver like most people scoop ice cream 🍨. LoL 😂
Nice very interesting and informative . These videos are so cool to watch . Because it shows us the viewers tips on what to do with our scrap precious metals .
Wish I had the knowledge to do that.Right on man good for you.
I do love the blue of silver nitrate. Beautiful
Clean silver nitrate is colorless like distilled water. Blue comes from the copper that is also contained in those (impure) solutions.
@@bormisha yes I know. I was taking about the video
Hello Mr sreetips. Arne here🙂. Thank you that you let the clip coming😀. Remember to rest also.
Have a Nice Day both of you. Nice clip...
Very cool, what happens to the liquid after you cement out the copper on the angle iron? Can you finally run it down the drain?
he covers this in an earlier video on waste treatment, there was a pH adjustment to 7, and i think some bleach but i might be confusing that with a codyslab video where he used cyanide on dishes with gold trimmings
@@m3sca1 so eventually it is determined safe to dump it into the city sewer?
@@weasel6three597 yeah once it has all the metals dropped and neutral pH it is fine, i will see if i can find his video and give you the title....
love watching you at work and if you listen well you find out much more iron to bring copper out of solution i did not even know-that. coper to cement out silver -its like watching a master crafts man at work each show
I would love to see you melt the silver crystal down, and mold a bar of pure silver, like the size kept in Ft.Knox.
Wow, you stay busy with the silver,thanks for sharing!
There need to be a 24 hour Sreetips channel. Constant refining. I want my SreeTV..........
Fun stuff Sreetips. Are you going to be working with your filter and paper storage anytime soon?
I CAN'T WAIT FOR you to melt up a huge bar of silver. This is pretty cool stuff SREETIPS . GOOD FOR A LIKE AND A THUMBS UP 👍
Amazing you definitely are the best I ever seen Streetips
Thank you!
What a horrible problem to have, all those silver solutions backing up!
every time you show this process I look at my etched tequila bottle with the crystals in it and say thanks man for showing me how to do that
Have you ever had your copper cement tested to see if there is any recoverable yield?
@Cameron Keillor The best way to deal with it would be converting it to copper sulfate by adding sulfuric acid, then distilling out the nitric acid that formed; then doing electrolysis of the copper sulfate. This way, nitric acid and pure copper would be recovered, possibly also remaining precious metals as anode slimes. NurdRage has a video on that. Platinum anode may be needed for the electrolysis cell.
No
So cool you share these with us… WOW
I'm pretty sure that one of your subscribers made a video on making a Buckner funnel out of two five gallon buckets. That seems to be the point that you have reached.
I remember.
So Sreetips... I have worked with silver compounds in the past and some were light sensitive. Light exposure gave a dark silver precipitate. Have you experienced any issues with light when handling your silver nitrate solutions?
Not so much with silver nitrate. Direct sun light may be a different story. But I have seen silver chloride turn color just from exposure to ambient artificial light.
Your mic is a little too close to your mouth..... I absolutely love your videos and watch every single one and I appreciate your time and effort sir 👍
Fixed it.
How long did it take a accumulate all that cement silver, Mr Sreetips? have you ever melted down something you wish you hadn't? eg, item was more valuable left as jewellery.
Sometimes, when I have something nice, and I hate to have to destroy it. I close my eyes, put two big cutters on the piece, and chop it, and let it go, without regret.
Reminds me of a homemade clay I made as a kid. Once the water is pulled out that is.
Learning more and more! Have a silver cell running now!
Seeing the blue liquid come out of the grey cement silver is quite something.
so many good episodes this week! Hope you're doing well sir
friend, why don't you boil the silver precipitate after reduction with copper in sulfuric acid?
and then silver will be purer on electrolysis
Wow just did my 1st nitric acid boils for rendering .925, I have a greater respect for the time, energy and real work you put in with your channel, as well as all the knowledge you share, So much to learn, and so many questions, Thanks for doing the channel. I would have never done any of this without your channel! Quick question is the gray powder which clogs up the filter paper when filtering the silver nitrate solution actually silver cement? and should I keep it for melting down the silver cement?
I don’t know what the gray powder is. I save all my filters and process them later on.
I didn’t realize how much filler powder was inside of sterling knife handles , it is probably some of that, as well, as cement
Very nice.
Thank you for Sharing your time and knowledge
Used to do PM chemistry a while back, definitely messy toxic and not too forgiving. Requires nitric acid and other chemicals that could get the undevided attention of homeland security as well.
Never get sick of seeing these videos Thanks. Would it be possible to suspend 9999 silver wire in the cell in an interesting shape and have crystals form upon it ? I have always wondered if this was possible and make for an interesting video .
I think the wire might have to be stainless steel but it would look cool if it works
@@scrappydoo7887 Good piont , If this is correct , Stainless figurines large enough for display , could be acid etched before being hooked up in a deeper stainless container . Crystals could coat the rough surface to the point were they become too fragile or practical to continue , before cutting free , as stunning original pieces .
@@GR19611 yes that would be very cool. I'd like to know how fragile the crystals actually are to be honest because they would make excellent gifts
@@scrappydoo7887 Yes , I wonder what Sreetips might say about this. Use the figurine as the Cathode . Cheers👍
That wet silver cement looks like alien mud, the way light reflects off it.
Excellent video I never get tired of seeing this it's so interesting can you recover the copper if you wanted to? Keep up the great work five stars my friend thank you for sharing
Yes. He said in this video, that to recover the copper, the copper solution goes into a bucket with iron bars, which copper is cemented onto, just like silver cements into copper.
@@xenaguy01 yes but in previous video he stated that he doesn't recover the copper he tossed it away I was asking if he's started to keep it
Copper is very useful for refining silver. But after it’s been used it becomes waste. I have fallen way behind with the silver.
@@josephcormier5974 _"I was asking if he's started to keep it."_
No. You asked if he *_COULD_* recover the copper if he wanted to. That's what you asked, and that's what I answered.
Silver Day!!! Who else is celebrating??
I wonder if a final dilute HNO3 (5%) rinse would bring the purity up to 99.99, it happened to me... anyway great video
I just watched a Jeff Williams video where he inquarted with lead, it was very cool.
This is FASCINATING to me. What advice would you have for someone (like me) looking to get into this sort of thing? I’m extremely interested in building a very professional and streamlined version of this operation. Thank you!
Check the goldrefiningforum.com there’s folks there that can help get you started.
We're gonna need a bigger buchner funnel 😀
This is kind of like a lesson on how to deal with waste products. Could you go into more detail about the chemistry behind this? Thank you.
The blue liquid goes in waste treatment bucket full of iron. The copper cements out on the iron and is tossed. Then the acidic iron solution goes in a waste treatment bucket and sodium hydroxide is added to drop the metal hydroxides. These are filtered out and the solids disposed of.
Ahh so shinny. I hope to do triple 9s some day.
Gooood evening from central Florida! Hope everyone has a great night! To much silver isn't always a bad thing lol.
I love silver. But refining it is a giant pain. That’s why I’m so far behind.
@@sreetips Still not as much pain as with Platinum!
Awesome tutorial. Thank you.
cemented out silver have other uses? used for inquartation gold or cementing gold? or do you prefer to use thrifted silver for that kind of stuff? maybe cement silver is too small / packed to cement out gold?
It would work well cementing gold. Using cement silver to inquart is not recommended because palladium follows silver and it would tend to build up in the silver.
Hey Sreetips, @ 6:49 what are those long thin green crystals forming around the silverware at the bottom of that large jar?
It could be silver or copper nitrate crystals.
I don’t know. I’ve seen them before and it’s usually when the solution is shaded green.
Thanks for the upload!
Would cooling the solution decrease the rate of crystal formation, increasing size of crystal? Just wonder if it could be a fairly profitable solution as I know you're selling the more well developed crystals.
For growing large monocrystals, special measures must be taken. There must be videos on TH-cam how large monocrystals of silicon are grown for electronics.
Seems like you would be busy for a month just dealing with all that silver and silver nitrate that you've got stored up. Might have to halt doing more gold refining for now haha.
The new microphone is sounding better every time you use it. I still get a little clipping here and there, but its a lot better than your first video with the new equipment
On another note, I vote that you start making cool castings with the silver and copper you have around. I liked the idea of casting a nice antimicrobial toilet out of copper and electroplating it in rose gold or pure silver to keep the antimicrobial effects and also keep the costs down by using copper from old copper nitrate solutions if you have old solutions from cementing out the silver in your gold refining.
An anti microbial toilet. Now that would be something.
Just when it's getting good dam commercial break
Great video as always
Can u give us more details about liquid name and water temp and everything if u want?!
Very important show tho the price of Silver is at a low point. I have now nearly 15kgs of sterling silver. And this should be a great heap. With the extras if your other shows.
Love your work. Two questions: 1.) Why don't you get a rotavap to reduce the enormous amounts of liquids you are handling? 2.) Did you ever try to substitute conc. nitric acid by dilute nitric acid / hydrogen peroxide? It should dissolve silver just as good minus the red nitrogen dioxide fumes.
I’m too poor for a rotating evaporator. I’ve heard of using hydrogen peroxide but I’ve never tried it
What do you do with all that copper cement that’s left ?
AFAIK, he gives it to a scrap yard.
Toss it.
just finished break bad and youtube thinking, i might also like to watch some silver refining in a home lab😂
I’m curious-do you live out in the sticks somewhere? Any issues with neighbors/fumes, etc?
No issues with neighbors. I do this fairly infrequently. It’s my hobby, not my job.
I do this as a hobby aswell. With much smaller amounts, i tried the silver alloy - nitric acid - chloride out the salt - hydroxide and dextrose. It was a mess. Im redissolving all of it, it was not good
It takes some getting used to doing it.
Can't believe I mist this one! Just one question for you Mr Sreetips, Will we ever see you refine the Copper you have in the stock pot or will you send it off to someone else?
I don’t have much use for copper from the waste bucket.
@@sreetips As a metal caster from South Wales UK. I'm always using Copper! I just wish we could readily get nitric in this country so that I get the best out of the copper I use!
Have you made Gold Crystals? What solution did you have those crystals stored in? If crystals do tone, what would you suggest to remove toning? Acetone?
I’ve never seen pure gold tone.
Hello, I love your channel. Refining noble metals is so important. Would you please make a video demonstrating the process of taking the silver to 9999 purity?
I’ve already posted that in a series a little over a year ago. Sent it off for analysis, came back greater than 99,999 parts per 100,000 as per guardian labs in the UK. That’s five nines fine.
@@sreetips Thank you sir. I must have missed it. I'll check it out.
Have you ever tried to reverse polarity on your silver cell to see what the outcome would be? Would there be a different outcome? Thank you!
No
@@sreetips can you use Sterling silver in the collector or would that be a bad idea
It would saturate the electrolyte with copper very quickly
@@sreetips thank you..
Looks like you might want to add another silver cell :D
I’ve got all the stuff to do it. I’m just so far behind. I’ve been working on silver all week and I’m still not caught up. My hobby is starting to feel like a job.
@@sreetips Definitely pace yourself if you need to. We'd all survive if you took a vacation ;)
Afternoon Gunny, or, "Shark Tooth", whichever you're going by now 😂. I have a question for you. Silver Nitrate. Going by definition, it is a clear liquid. Mine always comes out blue. I noticed that yours does also. Copper is the antagonist. What I don't understand is, if I'm using pure Silver crystal, to make my electrolyte, why is there Copper present?
The light blue color of the electrolyte doesn't impede the growth of crystal. It works wonderfully, just as yours does. Does the trace amount of Copper affect the three nines fine purity of the Silver crystal?
I know that there is a way to remove all traces of Copper, to yield a completely clear Siver Nitrate electrolyte. Is it necessary to do this?
I have collected 384 ounces of Silver Chloride and am about to do the conversion to Silver Oxide, with NaOH. Then glucose to drop the Silver metal. This process, I am to understand, will yield 99.9 Silver, if rinsed correctly. I am still going to run it through the Silver Cell.
Would you be concerned with a pure Silver Nitrate solution, or, is light blue acceptable? I really appreciate your input and your willingness to mentor an old curmudgeon like myself! Thank you for all you do! I call you friend, and so you are! Maybe someday, I will be able to meet you in person, to shake your hand, buy you and Mrs. Shark Tooth a wonderful meal, and thank you as you deserve to be thanked! Your tutorials have been a life saver for a me. As always, your devoted fan,
Wade
Goldsilverpro on the goldrefiningforum.com recommends adding some copper to the clear silver nitrate to promote fat crystal growth. But I always just let it build up from the impure silver that I add. Copper in your pure silver crystal probably means some parameter is off in the cell.
I love your videos and I highly respect your attention to process and detail. So did you basically turn your garage into your lab or did you buy/lease a separate property to work in?
It’s my garage
Can I purchase a quantity of that silver shot? My Grandkids would love that stuff!!!
7:57 did you know that if you crystalize out copper nitrate then distill it destructively you can recover the nitric acid.
same holds true for iron nitrate.
He's talked about that in past videos and how the time and energy cost plus danger of nitric acid vapours during the distillation simply does not stack up against the convenience and cost of simply wandering down to the hardware store for a bottle of nitric acid.
I'm slowly buying kit myself to try refining gold as a hobby scale on old computer parts. And due to local laws restricting access to nitric acid, I'd have to make my own.
Mixing copper sulphate (farm footrot treatment) with calcium nitrate (hydroponic nutrient) to form copper nitrate and calcium sulphate (gypsum) then Thermal decomposition of copper nitrate to nitric acid and copper oxide IS viable for me. Through I'm actually planning on the potassium nitrate and sodium bisulfate method.
The copper oxide crust from thermal decomposition of copper nitrate can then be cleaned off the distillation flask with Hydrochloric acid to form copper chloride which is easily electrolyzed to pure copper on a graphite electrode off gassing the chloride as chlorine gas. So you get your copper back rather than disposing of it.
But for Sreetips, he's worked out it's just not worth it with nitric acid available on the shelf.
@@rhysfirth3506 electrolysis of copper chloride will release copious amounts of chlorine gas.
@@CatboyChemicalSociety I mentioned chlorine gas offgassing. Fume hood and extractor fan and exhaust the gas away from dwellings and it's diluted enough to be harmless.
You breathe plenty of chlorine gas in enclosed public chlorinated pools. It's simply a matter of concentration/dilution.
Just use common sense.
@@rhysfirth3506 Take a look at this video if you're interested in making your own nitric acid:
th-cam.com/video/HN6tv7NKtPk/w-d-xo.html - Making Nitric Acid From Air - Elementalmaker
@@rhysfirth3506 Check out a video of NurdRage on copper nitrate, the proposed processes recovers both nitric acid, copper, and sulfuric acid. You also don't need to decompose anything, just distill.
another great video from you :-)
You could filter your own rain water by collecting it in a water butt. You have free distilled water forever, all though it isn't expensive. I think in these hard times it's good to save as much as you can.
I use about 20 gallons per month.
@@sreetips Wow. That must get expensive. Look into the water butt idea. The filtering off can be slow as I use a paint filter inside a coffee filter. 1 gallon would only take around 5 to 10 minutes to get rid of any mineral particulate.
Rain water isn't exactly clean. I remember measuring its pH to be somewhat acidic in my area. Also, some dust often falls together with the rain.
@@bormisha Hence the filtration. Also, if left to settle, the pH levels out. If it's fresh rain water, then I also agree that the pH will be too high. I have made the mistake before and it cost me a lot of time and effort.
Mr. Sreetips, do you keep most/all of your silver? Or do you ever sell any of it to larger refiners or mints like you do with your gold sometimes?
I sell small quantities on my eBay site
@@sreetips And the rest you store for personal use/wealth building?
From what I've seen, if you clean the cement silver until clear with distilled water and boil it in HCL it'll be .999 fine. The silver crystal is easily .9999 fine!
Why does only silver crystallize out on the bowl? Why don't contaminates come through?
Guess: Anything more reactive than silver stayed in solution when the silver was cemented out on the copper and got rinsed off in the funnels. And anything less reactive than silver stayed in the anode baskets (1) because the voltage was set low enough that it only picked up the silver and (2) because it wasn't soluble in the electrolyte.
The contaminants are insoluble and remain trapped in the anode filter. Only copper and silver get through. If the electrolyte is acidic (excess nitric) and there is palladium in the slimes, then the nitric could dissolve the palladium and it would contaminate the electrolyte turning it green.
hello, can you make a video of the path installation for the vacuum
I’ve got a video titled “How to Build a Reliable Vacuum System” posted on my channel detailed show flow on paper diagram
Nice video I've missed. Wow!
How do you feel about refining silver smelting instead of using acids to remove all base metals? The only time I need to use nitric acid would be to separate gold from silver.
I don’t know how
What’s the rate of speed that your cell is dissolving a kg of silver shot at, given the settings you run it? Does bowl size affect the plating speed given more or less surface area?
No, the speed is determined solely by the electric current passed through the cell (current is a rate of charge transfer). Calculation is easy. You divide the current (in amps) by the electron charge (1.6e-19) to get the number of atoms deposited per second. Then you divide the result by the Avogadro constant (6.02e23) to get the number of moles of silver deposited per second. Multiply the result by the silver's standard atomic weight (107.87g/mol) which yields the silver deposition rate in grams per second. Dissolution rate is the same as the deposition rate. For example, for 1A current, the rate is about 0,001g/s, which is about 4g/h. In 10 days typical cell running time of Sreetips, 967g of silver would be processed.
@@bormisha awesome explanation! Thank you 🙏🏼
@sreetips question. I've binge watched at least 3 days worth of videos, maybe more. In one of your videos you are torching some sterling silver candle holders to add to your gold refining byproduct pot. Is it possible to just start from there with sterling silver and create the silver nitrate solution and then use the copper to cement out the sliver?
I think I used clean cement silver a long time ago to start my silver cell. Afterwards I saved some silver crystal from each harvest to use to make electrolyte for my silver cell.
@@sreetipsI planned on using some pure .999 silver like you did with that massive silver coin to create my silver electrolyte for the silver cell.
Is this correct?
I'm talking about skipping the gold inquartation process and going straight to creating the solution using the hot dilute nitric acid to dissolve the silver from the sterling silver to start the process. (Creating silver nitrate and copper nitrate solution) Then cement out the silver onto copper. After that drying and melting into shot. Then using a silver cell to grow the silver crystals.
I know you use
@@sreetips also, thank you for responding!
@@Camelguy069 I think it should work this way. It's just that Sreetips refines both silver and gold, to the benefit of both processes. It saves on nitric acid and labor.
When dealing with that much cement silver, I honestly have no experience or knowledge on this other than your videos, would it be easier to fill the bucket with distilled water to dilute then tip off/filter off the excess liquid and continue that way until it's clean instead of doing multiple tiny batches trying to pull through a blocked filter?
Do you think you would sell any of those silver nitrate bottles?
So you’re buying the sterling silver to inquart gold, then you recover the silver… does this actually make you money or is it simply to recapture silver that you have previously used to buy more sterling silverware to use for gold inquarting?
Silver is a by-product of my gold refining.
Awesome I’m going to try it