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.
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. 😄
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 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.
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!👍👍
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 .
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
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.
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.
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
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.
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?
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.
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?
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.
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.
@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.
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.
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.
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.
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?
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.
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.
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 .
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!
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!
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.
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.
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?
Hey what's up brother..is it normal to get a gas off from the copper cementing or did i have a delayed nitric reaction? I left a fork in to assure all nitric was used up but seems after adding more distilled ( wash out) it reignited? Also the cement top half has an obvious copper tone where as the bottom has pure clean silver appearance. Does your cement look like that? Wondering if i should smelt and then redissolve before putting in the cell. I appreciate any feed back you can give me!
Outgassing (with fumes) happens when there’s excess nitric. To reduce this I add some sterling and heat until all fumes are gone. But even then I still get some gassing. Going back to nitric isn’t necessary. I’d just melt into shot and run it.
@@sirridok Same here. I'm actually working around all of this equipment putting in all the plumbing at an old mine in Ca. Everything used in the video's explains everything I've seen or had to move out of my way multiple times.
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.
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 RU-vid how large monocrystals of silicon are grown for electronics.
What i got out of all of this was... first you make gold bars.. and then you make silver.. and between all of that, its basicly a "put shit in waste to refine later" process that basicly never ends :D
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.
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.
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
ok i have a question are you able to sorta do the same process wiht say like gold or platinum to get high purity crystals of said metals or does it only really work with silver
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!
Does the Stainless Steel bowl cathode get displaced by the silver in solution, or is it inert? Also your electrolyte becomes blue. Why doesn't the copper contaminate the silver crystals?
The stainless is inert. The copper stays in solution and doesn’t plate out with the silver as long as copper concentration stays below 60g per liter and the voltage is kept constant at 3.5 volt DC
@@sreetips Thank you for your response. I don't doubt you but I find it counterintuitive that voltage can be used to select for silver over copper. Copper is higher on the reactivity series so one would think it requires a weaker electric field to be reduced.
