Method for Recovering Silver From Silver Plated Items

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[@d.pierce.6820]

My local thrift stores all have piles of old silverplate-no one wants it anymore, and no one wants to polish it,either. I'm always on the hunt for Sterling, and I've found that Sterling items are ALWAYS marked "Sterling" -especially things made in the US. If you are serious about finding Sterling "in the wild", you have to know foreign hallmarks also-they won't say "Sterling" on them, but maybe just a stamped ".925" or something similar. British hallmarks are more involved, but you are always looking for the lion with the raised paw. At every thrift store, I always go through all the silverplate and old silverware-I've found an amazing amount of overlooked Sterling. My most common find are "weighted Sterling" candleholders-I've found dozens of them in the past two years. They are all just a thin skin of silver around a heavy cement or plaster base, but it all adds up.

[@AndyGraceMedia]

The little symbol A is a good guide as to the quality of the silver plate. There are tons of different systems and no standard but a century or so ago, many British makers used followed the gradings ... A1 = Superior, A = Standard and then lower and lower grades below that B, C, D, E based on how many pennyweight was plated on. A1 was usually a troy ounce of silver per 12 tablespoons or forks. Also don't get confused with stamped in Old English font which looks like a hallmark. That's electroplated nickel silver and usually pretty thin.

[@dawncawthra3519]

Thanks, really good to know :)!

[@helengren9349]

There is also Extra 1a NS, 1a NS & Alpaca markings in Europe..

[@matthewlawrence7570]

You are the Superman of recovering precious metal videos. Always worth watching and thanks Superman.

[@d.pierce.6820]

I think of him as the Walter White of home refining....LOL!

[@frankzahn7773]

There is a much cheaper way of doing silver plate. The formula is 19 parts sulfuric acid to one part nitric acid. Heat but only to about 140 F. The silver plate will turn white as it dissolves in the solution. When the white is gone, that piece is done. I use three buckets and a plastic colander. I let one batch drain while the next batch is working in the solution. After a batch is drained, I rinse in bucket number one, still in the colander, then bucket number two, then dumped in an empty bucket. Buckets one and two have two gallons of tap water in them. When the solution is spent, it will be very dark and will not take any more silver. I let the solution cool down to ambient temperature. I pour half the solution in each of the water buckets and add a saturated solution of un-iodized saltwater to turn the silver into silver chloride. Work it into silver metal as you wish. You might want to try it in one of your great videos. You do a great job. I enjoy them very much.

[@sreetips]

Frank, I printed this comment for future reference. I may try this later on. Thank you for the suggestion.

[@143timbo]

Same as sree I have over 30 plates cups bowls ectect collecting

[@grovejack9580]

I would love to see the process used.

[@joshuabuttles3104]

Hi frank zahn, my name is Joshua. I processed some e-waste a decent amount of it for gold and I have a lot of the waist but I know there must be silver in. Personally, I think there’s a lot of silver, but I can’t figure out why it won’t precipitate. I don’t know if I neutralized the solution or not so I’m going to try that one more time, but can you give me any advice? I really need help on this because I could use the silver right now. Do you have the time please answer me back. Thank you.

[@joshuabuttles3104]

@@sreetips hello sir, my name is Joshua. I asked the same question to the gentleman above. You seem like someone who is busy so I didn’t think to even ask you first. I processed some e-waste a while back, and the waste made a very deep, dark green solution. I know there’s a lot of silver in it but I can’t figure out how to precipitate it out. I have added hydrochloric acid to it. I’ve put copper in the solution hoping to cement it out. Can you please help me?

[@gw10758]

Your videos have gotten much better over the last several years........ This one is new to me, but important for me to learn how much effort I should put into plated vs. sterling pieces.... Thanks

[@GMCLabs]

If you undershoot a little bit with the HCl, so you leave just a little silver nitrate in solution. You can filter out your silver chloride, and save the filtrate. You can then use the filtrate to dissolve more silver items, because when you add the HCl you also create nitric acid. You just want to undershoot with the HCl, because if some is left over it will react with the silver and form a AgCl coating keeping the nitric from dissolving it. That way you can save some money on buying more nitric. I actually just did this, it worked out pretty well.

[@SMOBY44]

Glad to see you back. Was worried that the little fiasco sapped your will to make videos. Keep them coming.

[@OwlTech333]

what little fiasco?

[@authorunknown7262]

@@OwlTech333 In the video of refining the stock pot. One of the beakers spilled all over the floor.

[@OwlTech333]

@@authorunknown7262 Thanks

[@SMOBY44]

@@OwlTech333 the platinum recovery spill from his last series.

[@ewastegold6619]

This bar sold for $53.00 because it was a Sreetips Original!

[@candicedownard9939]

Love your videos my husband done his first gold recovery from scrap fingers. Thanks for the videos please keep them coming!!!

[@sreetips]

I'm trying to get my wife to make her own videos on how she finds the scrap for me to process. Without her I wouldn't be able to do this.

[@tracymcknight8978]

@@sreetips not sure if you will get to see my question to you but thought i would try to catch you here. I have some silver electronic wire pieces that dont dissolve in a hour of the acid. Will not turn blue niether in the dissolve state. Only in the copper bath does it turn blue. Any thoughts?

[@Shad0wBoxxer]

@@tracymcknight8978 some silver looking wire may be aluminum…

[@glockumollie1230]

Just as plating I would never have imagined you could get that much silver off of that lid. Understand I dont doubt you a bit as I have learned how sharp you really are at this stuff. Im also extremely jealous at how productive you are and could only hope that I could ever do anything like what you do. I dont like toxic chemicals or agents. I would never work in a trade or plant that would put me anywhere near dangerous lab work. I worked in a production machineshop for just under 28yrs but I would bolt when they had painters painting the floor with very toxic paint. Whenever they painted in that building I bolted to get away. One of the painters never wore a mask I couldnt believe it. You would get a headache right away if you were anywhere near it. Im not exagerating. But you I have learned know exactly what you are doing. Do you have a chemistry degree because you work like a Scientist, I do really enjoy watching what you do and most of all when you end up with an incredible bar of Gold and Silver too. I always wonder if you really should be wearing a good mask or ventilator but I think you know what your doing.

[@sreetips]

My degree is in Aviation. I’m a retired Naval Engineer. I get whiffs of fumes every now and then. SO2 gas is the worst for me.

[@adammonahan687]

He uses respirators and fume hoods when needed. Chemicals are perfectly safe when handed with safety and respect. No need to " bolt away " just be smart and safe. You sound kind of childish actually

[@frankz1125]

I started buying junk silver from my area. I cant wait to try to do some refining.

[@allenjester3228]

Why? The junk silver is worth more than the silver you claim is pure. How can you prove that purity? I know the silver dime is 90% silver and I have a good idea of its weight and value.

[@frankz1125]

@@allenjester3228 not when you call it just. Its worth less. Our testing things as humans have evolved over time. It was once used as currency. You don't think our means of testing is accurate? Do your thing . Do what makes you happy. Life is short.

[@allenjester3228]

We’re headed for an economic catastrophe. I’d rather have the constitutional / junk silver than take someone’s word for the value of an item that I don’t recognize. Junk silver has recognizable value. Practice with silver plate or obscure foreign coins and save the junk for us stackers.

[@frankz1125]

@@allenjester3228 I get bars from my bank. Its all good.

[@freddyp8429]

@@frankz1125 What bank do you bank with ?

[@jeffreyfelton8887]

Thank you for taking the time and using your chemicals and shop to show us how to do what you do & now we know to just turn it into a recycling center as the base metal under the silver. ❤❤

[@erikbrandy816]

Mr Sreetips there is a very easy way to de-plate silver. A tub of salt water with a piece of stainless steel for the negative contact and hook the positive contact to the piece of plated silver. Run a current through it for 10-15 min and the silver will flake off

[@lifeindetale]

Then what?

[@Matt-xw1xx]

@@lifeindetale I suppose dissolve in nitric and precipitate as AgCl or cement out with copper. In my experience the silver only plates off if you are lucky. It cements back onto the brass, and base metal oxides form at the anode and create a nasty foam. They can be converted to soluble salts by adding HCl, but then chlorine gas evolves at the cathode.

[@chosen1one930]

some companies call it Ultraplate, some call it Extraplate. I only found about it awhile back because my grandma had a bunch of it, than I started looking into it. It is very common, mostly older pieces but some newer ones can be found. Yes you can find several pieces with with very thin plating but thick plating isn't rare

[@glOckcOma]

I really enjoyed the calculation of the worth at the end there. Would love it if you did that in every video where you yield some precious metal.

[@jonathonmallory2864]

C. M Mmmm?m K

[@jovencasagrande2405]

Thank you for sharing your calculation and satisfy my curiosity about the costs!

[@TechneMoira]

Hello and welcome back :) I'd wish you a happy New Year, but I think it would be nicer to wish you a BETTER year than last year :) And don't think what happened with your stockpot was a disaster...it'll be really exciting and interesting to see how you manage to get all the platinum back. Personally I can't wait to see how you're going to do it :) I'm sure a lot of viewers will agree with me. Thanks for another entertaining video

[@sreetips]

I'll me getting to it starting Friday

[@joeissa9548]

Hey sreetips ! Thank you for all the great content you keep on making ! I have 10kg of silver plated items , it wont make sense to dissolve them in nitric as i will need alot of nitric to do that . I was wondering if sanding the silver off and refining the dust would be a better option ?

[@objvst]

Good thought that way you would need much less nitric acid. Flat areas would be easier, relief areas would be tough.. Good idea though.

[@vishwaksen1534]

1

[@fuatakagunduz3493]

Ceviri

[@lonnieosullivan1331]

I have wondered how using a very course ceramic grit in a vibrating or even in a rotating polishing setup would work. I initially had the idea to strip gold off of pins and fingers etc. as a way to speed up the process by not having to devolve all of the copper

[@readoryx373]

sanbladt and screen

[@njanderson4342]

Yay you're back! I was worried about your wrists at times with that platinum.

[@ArizonaAdam]

Glad to see you back on!!!

[@rrodefeld1]

This was fun to watch but from a personal point of view, I believe the dish was more valuable as an attractive silver plate. Thanks.

[@sreetips]

It was a good looking dish, with an unusually thick coating of silver.

[@zmcfarling]

glad your back, was concerned you stopped doing videos or something, keep up the good work!

[@sreetips]

Thanks Zach

[@Supernova_sapiens]

Glad you're back, thanks for the vid!

[@mikewhitfield8425]

I'm thrilled that you are making videos again. I was happy to make a small contribution to help continue this awesome content.

[@sreetips]

Mike, I am grateful to you, thank you! More videos are coming.

[@schabj3]

In your experience, what is the range of silver to total metal? It was 4.6% here but what is the general range? Thanks!

[@Mr_badjoke]

I finally got the store and I have huge silverware & scrap I gotta go through. It's time for me to learn it now. I told you I'd get that pawn shop in negotiations & now I own it😊

[@sreetips]

Nice! Treat your customers right and you’ll do fantastic.

[@alfredogarciasalinas]

Thanks for your great Video, very instructional as always ! One question, It´s possible to "UnPlate" the item, that is, using the appropriate electrolyte can electrically remove the thin layer of silver ? Maybe this way is economically feasible.

[@dawncawthra3519]

Yes it is, there are a few people who've posted videos on this :)!

[@sreetips]

There is a way to do it, but I’ve not mastered it. Maybe when silver gets up around a hundred bucks.

[@zombieprinting2670]

I'd say it is a profitable venture seeing where the bidding is, at current time. Quite Profitable if I do say so myself. Great video. Once again you don't disappoint.

[@Matt-re8bt]

Welcome back. You've bee missed, @Sreetips. I like the addition of the cost vs return calculation in the vids. It's interesting to see the return on investment.

[@sreetips]

I'll try to give a brief overview of the roi in my videos from now on. I don't track expenses for each batch so it will be crude.

[@marysalinas3961]

We are now in 2023 : and It looks like that value is going up. There are three tangible items that will be worth so much after the dollar collapse. Everything else will be digital currency if we get lucky. Thank you for your demonstration it works for me.

[@sreetips]

Gold, silver, period.

[@lifeindetale]

Digital a good thing? Crazy thought.Must say at least you can physically hold paper bills..

[@sreetips]

Long after Apple, Amazon, bitcoin, and U.S. dollar are gone and forgotten, gold and silver will still be here. And they will still be valuable.

[@lifeindetale]

@@sreetips great to think that civilization may possibly be trending towards a 2nd bronze age! 😅

[@sreetips]

Hopefully not.

[@topher6_9]

I don’t know about you guys but that blue liquid looks like it tastes delicious.

[@countryboyc130]

Great to see you back again! I was hoping that the stock pot refining disaster did not take the wind out of your sails for continuing your videos.

[@sreetips]

Mike. I'm going to process all the paper from the mess I made. Should be several hundred dollars worth of metal.

[@renagillum8439]

I have a question? When you melted your silver cement in the wet filter. Did you use any flux like Borax? I know you glazed you dish before melting? Did you add borax to that silver burn? Streetips your my favorite you tube channel. I have learned so much. Never stop doing your vids. Thxs so much

[@sreetips]

I don’t think I did. But if I did it was very small amounts only

[@Gainn]

Watching this now shows how much your processes have changed in the last few years.

[@ThePhillipnielsen]

No commercials, I subscribed. love your videos!

[@butt_farve29]

Wondering about sandblasting the silver plate off of the items, then separating the sand and metals with simple tap water and a gold pan. Would allow you to drastically reduce the amount of nitric acid required to pull this off. Could maybe boost the financial feasibility of this specific operation.

[@jacobshrewsbury1938]

I use reverse electroplating to remove silver plate it's actually rather simple to use and drastically reduces the amount of copper contamination to be removed later with the acids (also saves time because the removed silver plate falls off in small thin pieces and copper contaminant is a fine powder that desolves quickly). I use salt water as electrolyte and a car battery charger as a power source...

[@tres155]

​@Jacob Shrewsbury make sure to check your electroplated solution for silver after u get the silver flakes out, is usually leftover silver suspended in solution u can't see.

[@angelarogers6268]

Best to melt into a sheet and electroplate the copper out with copper sulfate and sulfuric acid in a cell will get pure copper and anode slimes being able to reuse the acid many times lowering the acid cost

[@sreetips]

I don't have any experience with that. Can you make a video and show how it's done? Thanks for watching.

[@OwlTech333]

sodium sulphite is even better, non-toxic, cheap alternative.

[@erichansen2418]

@@sreetips Great video Sreetips. Glad you are back. :-) Nurd Rage has a video converting copper chloride, from PCB etchant, to copper sulfate then plates out copper to recycle... essentially I would think it's pretty close to the same thing your doing converting the copper & silver nitrate to copper and silver chloride with HCL ... anyway check out the link. kzbin.info/www/bejne/fJuooIWfmduaj6c

[@SomeAustrianGuy]

Look up "growing copper crystals". Electroplating with CuSO4 is actually the industrial process for refining copper. You just need a DC powersupply, a bucket and some CuSO4. Silver won't dissolve in sulfuric acid, but copper will. You're transfering copper from the anode to the kathode, pure silver will collect under the anode, as the copper gets dissolved. Also as you use dichromate for your testingsolution, I've no doubt that you can get CuSO4

[@SomervilleBob]

I just sell my silver plated trays and such to my refiner for $1.75 per pound. Works for me.

[@ymnyymny5037]

How are you doing all the report??? When I pour raw silver, there is no shine, all the tin. I ask you to explain to me, and I wish you all the success in all your work. 🙏✍️

[@sreetips]

Sorry, I don’t understand your question

[@ClassicallyNamed]

Holy S.. we got to see sreetips in the 3rd person!! I pictured you so much different. Fantastic! Now I can picture you and Mrs Ips, when you tell stories about where the scrap gold comes from 😄 Did you dye your hair for this.. if not, I'm jealous.

[@ClassicallyNamed]

Oh hell, this is 5 yrs old!? FYI, I'm a future follower 3 1/2 years from when this was shot.

[@modenam9046]

Usually plated will have an “A” or “community plate”

[@stevenfeil7079]

Several other items missing from the cost analysis. Not a very cost effective way to obtain silver, but the chemistry was interesting. I am glad YOU did it.

[@sreetips]

Me too

[@gasks1979]

First time watching! Stumbled upon video while researching Büchner funnel uses. I have a bunch of those Büchner funnels. Are they worth waiting to sell to people on eBay?

[@sreetips]

If you find the right buyer. Not many even know what they are.

[@gasks1979]

@@sreetips Great use of chemistry by the way! 👍

[@-shortsfeed]

I'll buy some

[@gasks1979]

@@-shortsfeed I’ll send some pictures after work. How many do you need?

[@travelinjohn2163]

Awesome, I’m clumsy so I wouldn’t try my ideas myself. I have a box of gold and silver plated jewelry and some 40%coins I’d like to eventually get the gold silver and copper from. are their trustworthy refiners I could send to that don’t charge an arm and two legs for it. But seriously I pretty much can do it but I’d need instruction step by step on paper just so I don’t miss any steps

[@user-wd8cj6qj3p]

"Thick" silver plate is often silver "clad" rather than plate. This is done when the flat sheet of metal is made, already clad in the silver then it stamped out and presses into shape.

[@d.pierce.6820]

Reed and Barton was (is?) a maker of high quality sterling and silver plate items. They would heavily plate their items-I see some things marked "Quadruple plated" also.

[@kpatton-ir9oc]

Alright, here we go again. When you get to the end, please be careful and don't spill it all. Thanks for coming back to teach us

[@TenmaFN]

Great video +Sreetips, enjoyed this as always!

[@420growers3]

Nice vid, thanks. Do you think buying scrap silverplate is worth it?

[@sreetips]

Right now, with silver at $16, it would cost more to get the silver than it's worth. But that can change.

[@strykergames2195]

Where do you buy the acid from

[@timjlarsen]

Hi Sreetips, I am a new watcher and you have me hooked. QUESTION: what is the orange gas and would it make the reaction and therefore nitric acid use more efficient if a condenser was used to drop it back into the beaker?

[@sreetips]

Orange gas = nitrogen dioxide. Refluxing it would improve efficiency.

[@the_internet_332]

What do you do with the copper solution, can you recover from that?

[@toomuchdebt5669]

Check nurd forge . You can recover copper metal and nitric acid.

[@ewastegold6619]

I contacted you on eBay. I have a bulk lot of Silverplate. I can sell the items by the piece, but shipping adds too much cost. Their size and shape make it hard to stuff a priority mail flat rate box full of it. I can deliver if you want it.

[@renagillum8332]

Question??? Why didn't you just use plain non iodine salt in place of the hydrochloric acid to drop the silver out of solution? Is the result different? All your vids get my mind working in over drive .. thank you so much for the education.

[@sreetips]

Plain salt can be used. I have plenty of hydrochloric acid and I like the convenience of just pouring it in.

[@margoreally1]

I really enjoyed this video and learning more about silver plate. I was surprised by the amount at the end. I also really liked going through the costs and seeing that it is not worth it to separate it. I wonder also though about how much the copper is worth that was in it. 😀😀

[@doncachorron]

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, i'm working in a mining lab so we assay gold and silver from ore and pb concetrates. I dissolve the dore button with nitric acid with the purpose to dissolve silver and get a gold button and calculate its content in the samples. I generate a lot of silver nitrate solution every day and I precipitate it with HCl. I will suggest a method based on yours to take benefit of this waste and recover some silver. Greetings from Mexico.

[@sreetips]

Nice, glad you gained something. Thank you.

[@frankroberts9320]

Diluting with 35% hydrogen peroxide instead of water will extend your nitric acid by oxidizing the brown NO2 to reform the acid. H2O2 plus 2NO2 --->2HNO3 You can also precipitate the AgCl with kosher salt (straight NaCl, no iodide), instead of HCl. One trick to greatly reduce the acid needed is to dissolve the plated brass only long enough to dissolve the silver plating while leaving behind as much base metal as possible. Dissolving all that base metal is very wasteful of acid.

[@gregoryhajek118]

Hello, thanks for sharing your tips. Do you have any more advice conserning working with silver plated material? Regards!

[@williamarmstrong7199]

In the UK most silver plated items have the "EPNS" stamped on them. This stands for Electro Plated Nickel Silver.

[@sreetips]

Ive seen it. I look for EP (electroplated) but I can also tell by the texture of the surface.

[@azazyezat6598]

Hello, the greatest chemist in the world, thank you for spreading your experience to the viewers. I have an urgent question. I am working on extracting gold from rocks and stones crushed with aqua regia, and I work on large quantities. I have a problem, which is how do I know that the solution is saturated and will not be able to dissolve more gold and I have to replace it? Thank you

[@sreetips]

Extracting gold from crushed rock is not something I have experience with.

[@jamesmclaughlinprimitivele4587]

FYI sulphuric acid stripping cell better way to go.

[@ManMountainMetals]

Yeah or salt water. Seems a waste of Nitric Acid

[@shaneroberts7676]

What grade mask filters are you using?

[@sreetips]

3M P95

[@intothecalm420]

Glad to see you back. That last video was devastating.

[@sreetips]

I'm going to get some metal from that paper and cardboard. Watch for the video.

[@intothecalm420]

@@sreetips We are all looking forward to seeing that. This is absolutely one of the best science channels on KZbin.

[@marjorieprezioso4750]

OK, some questions and comments. 1) I saw another video where the guy just used salt, water and a battery charger. What's the difference? 2) You never explained how to safely dispose of all those toxic acids. 3) Copper is recyclable too. Is there a way to separate the silver from the copper and save both for reprocrssing?

[@sreetips]

1) not sure 2) waste treatment 3) to a refiner, copper is waste

[@marjorieprezioso4750]

reprocessing?, one more question. Can the same process be used with gold plate? Or like separating gold fill?

[@sreetips]

No, gold plated is best processed in a sulfuric acid stripping cell.

[@anarchy_79]

What's the composition of the fumes that leave the solution?

[@sreetips]

Nitrogen dioxide

[@garygeahos4363]

Having your wife showing some of her shopping trips with hints would be great. The secret to making this a profitable hobby is a good, steady source of reasonably priced raw materials.

[@sreetips]

I agree - would make killer videos.

[@ewastegold6619]

I tried using a Sliver Cell setup to strip Silver plate from objects like that. I used Potassium Nitrate as the electrolyte. It seems to work. Pretty quickly too.

[@sam66696]

only potassium nitrate no acid in the electrolyte...

[@sreetips]

I’d like to try it.

[@sam66696]

i send you the formula and the steps to operate the bath if you like... so you can tray it in small scale to anderstand the process its very economical and kwicly done.

[@kromair22]

Thank you for this video very informative. I am interested to know what the copper solution is. Is it copper oxicloride?

[@sreetips]

The blue liquid is copper nitrate.

[@UncalBertExcretes]

Problem with nitric its so damn expensive, atleast in 2023... Im not sure about US prices but in the UK its £106 for 5 litres of nitric, if you need to use 800ml to extract 10g of silver then its costing you money. I was thinking about refining karat gold scrap but the cost of the nitric just eats away all the profit plus some more :(

[@sreetips]

I buy six 2.5 liter bottles for two fifty. Was three hundred with the fifty dollar shipping charge. But last time I ordered, it was still two fifty, but the shipping charge went up to one fifty!

[@UncalBertExcretes]

@@sreetips I can see why you only really do karat scrap, anything else is a complete waste of nitric and it appears that refining gold consumes far less nitric than silver.

[@mhcraft4335]

Welcome back sreetips! I have been waiting for new video... Also looking forward to see new videos in future. Especially platinum refining.

[@sreetips]

Coming very soon, thank you

[@peterbulford2750]

Thank you for this. I am looking at silver recovery and now know on cost yield ratio

[@thevalleyofdisappointment]

37:32 I assume this is Copper chloride solution with some trace silver chloride some trace copper nitrate and unconverted silver nitrate in that white bucket. Can this be mixed in with your silver waste bucket with the pour offs from regular silver cementation?

[@tylervanorman492]

Did you say $5 for the plate also. So an even lower return?

[@joeibrahim73]

You might want to look into the value of that cookware you're using. Those old floral decorated Corning dishes are going for a bit of money.

[@peterdidonato1590]

That was pretty interesting street. I recycle off and on and I have about 5 lb of silver plated copper wire. I would like to melt it down and retrieve the silver and copper to recycle the copper as copper 2 and take the silver to a jewelry store and get paid for the silver. Anyway of just melting it down on the store or with a propane torch? I'm not much into using chemicals.

[@sreetips]

If you melt the wire then the metals will alloy together.

[@dzezvick26]

HI! I have a problem about silver recovery from silverplated silverware. The basic metal is zinc, then a thin layer of copper and then silverplating on. First i try to disolve whole spoon in nitric acid, but it starts to boil over the floor. I repead the proces with less concetrated nitric acid, the spoon is disolved, but i have a lot of powder on bottom, the liquid is blueish. So im guesing that zinc is on the bottom like powder, silver is in liquid? or did zinc something else to my silver? Now I will first melt the zinc away and scrap the upper layer down, and i will procced with that nugget forward

[@sreetips]

Zinc is soluble in nitric acid it will turn your solution green. Get a small sample of the blue liquid and test it with a few drops of hydrochloric acid like I did in the video. What ever is on the bottom, it shouldn't be zinc. It might be your silver.

[@dzezvick26]

@@sreetips Hi again. I finished disolving silverplated silverware in nitric acid, filtered it and put Hcl and nothing happened. Like no silver inside. No cloudiness... ;( Should I try put copper inside to cement silver? But now I have second problem with recovering gold from cpu...I disolved 15cpu and few ram sticks in Hcl + hidrogen perokside (little), put those goldplating leaves in aqua regia, they disolved, filtered the liquid and today I got my smb by mail, (in Slovenia hard to buy), and surprise...nothing happened with liquid..like no mud at the bottom, still green yelowish colour...I put it so much that smb sit on the bottom...no reaction. Do you know what could go wrong? Should I put a little bit of urea inside?

[@blueberryfreddy2432]

Great video!!! When does adding borax make sense in process like this?

[@sreetips]

I add borax to the melt dish to keep the silver from sticking to the dish

[@robertwoods4281]

wow, that was very interesting. thank you for that. now I don't know much about everything you were doing, but I was following u. to my lay understanding. all metals of the periodic table are soluable? is that true or then my spelling.😁

[@sreetips]

Robert, nitric will dissolve silver, copper, brass, zinc. But nitric won't dissolve gold, platinum, aluminum or stainless steel. Some metals are soluble in certain acids but insoluble in others. We can use this knowledge to selectively separate metals from each other.

[@rkb6783]

Experiment was not for the production of... Or the extraction of silver. This was just a good experiment. Had this been an ACTUAL ATTEMPT at recovering sliver... A lot more. A LOT MORE plated or any particular products you want to place in the beaker. In order to recover higher amounts of silver concentrate. Would have been added !

[@universebecomingltd]

EDIT!!! EDIT!! EDIT!! HAHAHA! I see you DID mention it at the beginning of the video. Disregard my aforementioned statement. :D You forgot to mention the nitrogen dioxide danger this time. :D I've watched other videos you've made where you did mention the danger so that's how I know you forgot. Love your videos. You are so meticulous I thought for certain you had a background in chemistry. I was surprised to learn that you're a hobbyist! Nice job at being so efficient. I'm a jeweler so that's why I have an interest in precious metals recovery. :)

[@jaeshikchung6269]

Very impressive. btw, how sugar can transfer silver oxide into pure silver?? is it a reduction reaction?

[@sreetips]

I'm not a chemist. I just know that adding the sugar converts the silver oxide to pure silver. Something to do with the carbon in the sugar, I think.

[@susanholiday7347]

You didn't filter the test tube contents before pouring into the filtered solution. So it could be slightl impurities in the melted chunk...

[@corvairvert]

The stock pot end was sadder then the last scene of "Old Yeller", I am putting together a small plating shop to do as a hobby, zinc, copper, nickel etc mainly automotive and motorcycle parts and came across one of your videos, needless to say i have been binge watching since. What is the possibility of making gold plating solution for electroplating emblems on cars ect. I see the are getting 180.00 per quart shipped containing 1 DWT, pennyweight of 24k fine gold in one of the listings on ebay. I have seen that there is a process using potassium ferricyanide and gold chloride. Thank you for your videos and you have a new fan.

[@sreetips]

I'll have to do some research on gold plating solution. Sounds like a good topic for a new video. Thank you.

[@jefferycrawford9194]

Quick qustion for you chief. If there was some gold also in this solution would adding the hcl cause the gold to come out of solution with the silver?

[@sreetips]

No

[@dennisgeroux4483]

Watching you talk at your desk you remind me of Clark Kent, mild mannered metal refiner. You could be Superman??

[@dnldhttnjr]

Would it be more economically feasible to reverse electroplate the plated material instead of dissolving everything? Say like you had a good amount of plated silver utensils?

[@sreetips]

I don’t know how to deplete silver.

[@muthukaruppan4979]

Glad to see and what is the name of your gloves what type that is

[@sreetips]

Nitrile

[@shaneyork300]

I wanted to watch this, to see silver recovery I have thousands and thousands of silver contacts. I want to someday process. It looks like it should be one of the easier pm to process, but I'm going to study and study until I'm very confident I can do it. Probably years in the future. Thanks for the GREAT VIDEO!!!

[@music-jn3wn]

Make sure there is no cadmium in those contacts.

[@CenterStarsChannel]

Do you have a video showing what you do with the blue copper mix? Do you chemically change it into copper???

[@toomuchdebt5669]

Yes it can be done. Check Nurdrage youtube channel.

[@sreetips]

I change it to copper in my waste treatment bucket. The copper comes out of the blue solution as metallic copper on pieces of angle iron.

[@painmt651]

Would it not be faster and less expensive to just dissolve the plating, and leave the base metal mostly untouched?

[@sreetips]

Possibly

[@jimt6953]

I wasn't interested at all in this topic but I watched it all from start to finish lol

[@MundusTransit]

Happy New Year to you too!

[@jamessawyer9882]

Could one get away with using a food grade sodium hydroxide or is there even much of a difference?

[@Addmaster1]

Got a question Mate - I tried following you, but to less sodium hydroxide in and than already put th3 sugar, than noticed that Nothing comes out, so I add more naoh after the sugar was added, than it reacted and got hot, but no silver participated out, so what doing now? Cheers and thanks for.sharing

[@sreetips]

That’s baffling, I’ve never encountered that.

[@swbyrd]

Thanks for the video. It was very informative and I enjoyed it. 👍🏻

[@youtubedestroyedmylife309]

To update, as of 4/9/2024, silver is 28 a troy ounce, so its much closer to breaking even. If it goes much higher, its going to be a profitable method.

[@ericswain4177]

Thanks for the breakdown at the end. What about the sodium hydroxide $ what is your time worth and what is the Map gas for melting it down cost $$ all is overhead. so to me, it looks like you might break even at best. Is it any cheaper to just smelt it down from the start ?

[@sreetips]

It’s my hobby. I don’t keep track of expenses for each batch.

[@ericswain4177]

Ya I got that, I just been looking at doing this sort of thing but don't want to do it and not at least come out a bit ahead. Thanks for the reply.@@sreetips

[@sreetips]

I see. The only reason I did this was because I seen how thick the silver coating was over the base metal. Most silver plated stuff is not that thick. This item was unusually thick, and that’s why I choose to do it.

[@ericswain4177]

I collect scrap Sterling and a bit of Silverplate, there are definitely different thicknesses of plated silver items, some even say triple plate on them not that that means much. On the profit side of things, I find that collecting and reselling sterling silver rings and things or even plated items as the item itself has a higher profit than smelting or chemical refining. So then I buy a high-quality 999. Silver rounds or bullion, it is a better bet. Well as long as you are having Fun that's what it is about.@@sreetips

[@jessefew8229]

I would like to see you do a refining of keyboard mylars & to know if you know how you could incenerate the mylars to recover the silver

[@shshgaming189]

Great video. Would this process be the same if I wanted to recover silver from the waste that I got from my initial gold recovery? To be more precise I recovered gold from CPUs but I know there's silver in the waste. Do I recover this silver like you've done in this video so basically adding distilled water and nitric acid to the waste solution and continuing like u did or is there another way? Would highly appreciate your reply. Thank you so much.

[@shshgaming189]

Or do I add copper to the waste solution to cement the silver out. I'm a little confused as to what the next step will be to recover the silver. Help pls. 😬

[@sreetips]

If you have silver in solution then you can add copper to "cement" the silver out. However, if your solution contains any hydrochloric acid then this won't work. Hydrochloric acid added to a silver nitrate solution will immediately precipitate silver chloride. The silver chloride can be recovered and converted to pure silver metal with lye and sugar. You can test your unknown solution by putting some in a test tube then add HCl. If silver is present then you'll immediately see a cloud is silver chloride form.

[@shshgaming189]

That makes sense now. Thank you so much 😀

[@ImThatGuy17]

Is there any way to strip the silver off without completely dissolving the base metals as well, or will the silver continue to cement out onto the base metal requiring that is be completely dissolved? I have a very large amount of silver plated items that I was hoping to strip, and am trying to figure out exactly how much nitric acid and total volume of liquids will be required throughout the process.

[@sreetips]

Yes, but I’ve not tried it yet.

[@arte47]

Hello, how you know that you didnt wet too far when you add the NaOH? is there any other way to change AgCl to silver? When i am doing this in large scale, i have some lump of AgCl which dont react with NaOH.

[@sreetips]

I use a Braun, hand held blender to mix to consistent black color - it’s perfect

[@almacli8360]

Thanks I was wondering that ✔️ I appreciate your work ‼️