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Refining silver from photographic solution

Jewelry Discussion
#1

Dear Friends,

Do you know what is the process to clean silver recuperated from a
photographic solution?

This Silver has been recuperated via an electrolytical process, but
is contaminated with a black stuff. The owner says it is carbon, but
I melted the metal and it remained with widespread black covering.

Also, when melting, it gave up a foul smell. I do not know what
chemicals do the photographic process use, but I want to know if it
is dangerous.

Thank you for your input.

Best regards,
Juan Pablo Martenez Mansilla

#2

Hi Juan,…i just got back from a trip to a refiner a few weeks
ago, where we melted about 200 pounds of an accumulation of
photographic recovered silver. (among other melts) The smell you
noticed was sulfur,…which burns off and at the refinery they
have a venting system that sucks off the gas as it reaches the lip
of the crucible. You’re not likely to have such a system,…so
avoid brething the fumes as much as possible.

Our batch also had some black on the edges and one side,…the
other generally was silver in color. Nice thing about the stuff is
that it generally is of a very high finess,…ours worked out
to the high 98-99% range.

Joe T
Joseph Tousignant
303 Hulett Street (2nd Floor)
Schenectady, New York 12307
(518)346-9137