2 proven ways to mine gold at home: step-by-step instructions + is it legal

What can you get Au from?

Telephones, radio tubes, diodes, computers, microcircuits, connectors—devices containing radio components—are excellent starting materials. The main requirement for them is that these products have a long production period, that is, they must be old. In Soviet times, a large volume of precious metal was used to create radio components; accordingly, the older the device, the more gold can be extracted from it.

Modern devices containing radio components include SIM cards and laptops, although they contain much less precious metal compared to devices from the times of the USSR.

I also use gold-plated items as a source material - cutlery, jewelry, watches. But you shouldn’t expect a large amount of Au in such things: the sputtering on the bodies of such products is applied in a very thin layer, and in order to get a decent amount of gold, you will need to collect more than a dozen pieces of jewelry.

Mining process at home step by step

Gold mining at home can be organized in several ways. They are based on the following principles:

1. Dissolving the base . To obtain the precious metal, it is enough to expose products with surface gold (watches, dishes) to a powerful solvent. This technique is based on the unique inertness of gold, which is not affected even by concentrated acid. To implement the method, it is enough to place the coated product in a glass container and fill it with concentrated nitric acid. All metal parts will dissolve in 3-4 days, and the gold will precipitate.
2. Etching . This principle is based on the complete dissolution of details. In order to dissolve gold, you will need a “hellish mixture” in the form of a combination of hydrochloric and nitric acid - “aqua regia”. In such a liquid, gold only dissolves, and all other ingredients do not simply dissolve, but chemically react with the acid, forming the corresponding compounds. Under these conditions, the introduction of the necessary reagents allows gold to be precipitated from solution. You can use hydroquinone, hydrazine, hydrogen peroxide, sodium sulfite, and ferrous sulfate. Etching technology is most suitable for extracting gold from small parts of electronic devices.
3. Electrolysis. High purity gold can be obtained by electrolysis. The gold-containing radio component serves as the anode, and 2 lead or iron plates are installed as the cathode, connected at the top by a conductor. The electrolyte is hydrochloric acid. When a direct electric current is passed (with a density of 0.6-0.7 A/sq.dm of anode area), gold gradually transfers to the cathode plates and settles on their surface.

Gold etching techniques

When implementing these methods for obtaining gold from various parts, it is necessary to follow a certain procedure. The first production option involves the following work:

1. Accumulation of sufficient quantities of raw materials. Removing all elements that have no value. Only gold-plated elements with a minimum content of other materials are prepared for processing.
2. Place the raw material in a glass container and fill it with concentrated nitric acid.
3. After 3-4 days (provided the base is completely dissolved), the solution is filtered through gauze layers.
4. The resulting sediment is placed in a glass container and filled with ethyl alcohol or vodka. Exposure is 22-25 hours.
5. The brown precipitate is washed and filtered, after which it is sent for melting. To obtain a purer metal, it is recommended to add soda to the melt.

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Most often, gold is extracted from radio components by etching. This technology is implemented in the following sequence:

1. Accumulation of sufficient quantities of raw materials for processing.
2. Preparation of “royal vodka”. Hydrochloric (3 parts) and nitric (1 part) acid are mixed in a glass container with utmost care.
3. The raw materials are cleaned of dirt and loaded into “royal vodka”.
4. The liquid is heated to accelerate dissolution. The process is considered complete when the parts are completely dissolved and the solution turns bright green.
5. Gold precipitation. For these purposes, you can use a solution of hydroquinone, prepared by adding 50 g to 1 liter of water. This composition is carefully poured into a vessel with aqua regia, maintaining a concentration of 10 ml of hydroquinone per 1 liter of solvent. Next, the container is left for 3.5-4 hours.
6. The solution is carefully filtered, and then the gold deposited at the bottom of the container is evaporated and dried. The sediment looks like thin pieces of yellow foil.

How to Store Etched Finished Metal

Home gold mining is characterized by tiny portions of the precious metal, and therefore it is necessary to minimize its losses. Thus, at the final stage of gold evaporation, it is recommended to add borax and soda to the resulting sediment, which will reduce waste and simplify further processing. It is better to immediately pour the resulting metal into specially prepared molds (crucibles).

Small burners or muffle furnaces are used to melt gold. The molds are made of cast iron or alloy steel and have a collapsible design. Most often, gold is stored in the form of small bars. Depending on the quantity of the final product obtained, it is sometimes shaped into rods or wires.

Features of working with reagents

When mining gold at home, you will have to deal with very aggressive and harmful chemicals. It must be remembered that acid vapors (especially when heated) are extremely dangerous for the human body.

During the work, nitrogen oxide is released, which can damage the respiratory system, even leading to death. Frequent and prolonged inhalation of harmful substances can cause chronic diseases. Concentrated acids can cause severe chemical burns to both the skin and mucous membranes.

Important. When carrying out work at home, precautions must be strictly observed. Good ventilation of the room must be ensured at all stages. You can only work with rubber gloves, safety glasses, a respirator and a protective apron.

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Metal mining methods

There are several ways to obtain AU. Regardless of the chosen method, the raw materials must be prepared before starting work. I sort old and new items into two groups. Then, within each group, I classify devices according to the amount of expensive element it contains. Unnecessary parts in products or old devices are removed to save time and chemicals.

To read: Properties and features of 900 gold

Etching method

The basis of this method is the inability of the precious metal to participate in a chemical reaction with any substances other than aqua regia. Aqua regia is a mixture of hydrochloric acid and nitric acid in a ratio of 1:3.

The method involves making the mixture yourself. The substance has a pungent odor, is initially colorless, but after a short amount of time it becomes light yellow.

I recommend preparing the composition immediately before using it, so the oxidation function remains at its maximum level.

During the chemical reaction, gold does not oxidize, but remains on the surface of the liquid. He needs to be put down. To do this, you will need to add a reagent to the aqua regia. Hydrogen peroxide, oxalic acid, and sulfite are often used as it, but I recommend using iron sulfate. After adding it, the gold remains on the surface, resembling pieces of foil. I then filter the solution by passing it through a dense material.

Electrolysis mining technology

To mine gold in this way, I will need to fill a glass container with hydrochloric or sulfuric acid, then install 2 iron or lead plates into it. I connect them together with copper wire, then I place a microcircuit there and run an electric current. The microcircuit in this case is the positive electrode.

Under the influence of electric current, a reaction occurs and gold begins to settle on the plates. As soon as the process comes to an end, I turn off the current.

Which way is better

Each method has advantages and disadvantages. Compared to the etching method, the electrolysis method has a more complex technology, but it requires fewer reagents for extraction.

The etching method requires strict adherence to safety precautions, since the likelihood of getting a chemical burn is very high.

These methods are the most effective ways to mine gold at home.

Features of working with reagents

When mining gold on my own, I have to deal with very dangerous substances that have an aggressive effect on human health. For example, nitric oxide released when heated can threaten human life.

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I work in a room with very good ventilation. I use rubber gloves, eye protection and a respirator from start to finish. I recommend strictly following safety precautions, then the work will not pose a threat to health.

Properties of gold

Gold is a precious metal that is widely used in jewelry. However, in addition to its jewelry value, it should be noted that its unique electrical conductivity determines its use in electronics, where in critical parts it is necessary to ensure low resistance with minimal dimensions. It is these parts that become the main raw materials for home gold mining.

When organizing gold mining and processing, its basic properties should be taken into account:

1. High specific gravity. This characteristic is used when implementing technologies such as washing, when heavy weight causes gold grains to settle.
2. High ductility, facilitating forging of metal when making jewelry from it. Very thin threads can be made from gold.
3. Inertia. Gold does not react chemically with most known acids, alkalis and solvents. Only aqua regia and some solvents can affect it. This property is very important for organizing the extraction process.
4. Lower melting point compared to other metals and minerals, which makes it possible to smelt gold from products and make jewelry from the melt.

Attention. Being in a molten state, gold quickly evaporates, which must be taken into account when melting it.

Pros and cons of this business

If we put aside the legality of this process, then I highlight certain advantages:

• production does not require large expenses,
• the process is clear and uncomplicated,
• good payback
• does not require a lot of time.

However, I also found some disadvantages:

• the reaction is unsafe
• a large number of things are required to extract, which are not so easy to find,
• Obtaining a license to legalize a business is a rather labor-intensive and time-consuming procedure.

How is gold mined?

The extraction of a precious component from the bowels of the earth is a part of gold mining. The development of the deposit is preceded by:

• intelligence service;
• geological assessment confirming the feasibility of industrial development;
• financing of prospecting work and related costs.

Methods for extracting gold are determined depending on the form in which the precious metal occurs in nature. Gold is found in primary and secondary deposits. Primary veins are gold-bearing quartz veins located directly in the rock.

Secondary deposits are formed due to the destruction and transport over a distance of material containing chemical element No. 79.

How is gold mined from river beds?

At the very beginning of the gold rush, the precious metal was mined by hand by panning loose material deposited in river bed valleys. This method involved the use of trays. Currently, they are used at the first stage of exploration and assessment work for the presence of precious metal in sediments and for its artisanal mining.

The labor-intensive process of searching for gold in river waters.

Do-it-yourself gold mining is a labor-intensive process. As a rule, special equipment is used for this purpose, including metal detectors. Their use allows you to speed up search work.

How is gold extracted from ore deposits?

The low content of the valuable component in the ore requires the use of a combined technology for its extraction. To do this, the stone is crushed to a powder state, and then the following operations are used:

• gravity enrichment;
• amalgamation;
• distillation in retorts;
• fuse.

Gold mining in rocks.

Industrial waste is processed with cyanide to form compounds of the chemical element 79. The use of a mixed method makes it possible to extract jewelry from dumps practically without waste.

The resulting valuable product is purified from impurities of other metals (silver, zinc, copper, iron) by chlorination. To do this, the molten metal is treated with chlorine vapor.

In this case, compounds with gas of minor components are formed, floating on the surface of the melt, which are easily removed. The remaining part of the impurities (about 0.5%) is removed electrolytically.

In laboratories, the method of pyrolysis is used to extract precious metal from residues. In this case, the residues are dissolved in aqua regia and the solution is precipitated with sodium sulfate.

Getting gold at home

Mining gold manually is also possible at home. In order to mine it, you don’t need to go to the mines and shake trays for hours. There are calmer and more civilized methods. There are a lot of objects around that contain gold. For example, old Soviet watches in their yellow cases contained real, pure precious metal without impurities.

In order to get it from there, you just need to buy such watches in very large quantities. Then you will need a plastic bucket and basin, an electric stove, razor blades, a heat-resistant glass pan, a brush and a cotton cloth for filtering, rubber gloves and a spray bottle. The chemicals needed are nitric and hydrochloric acids.

Recycling begins when you already have 300 cases on hand. The process will take only 4 hours, and you will use 4 liters of acid. From this number of cases you can get 75 grams of pure gold.

2015-03-26 Yes, gold can be created from other elements. But this process requires nuclear reactions, and is so expensive that at the current stage of technology development, you cannot make money by selling the gold you create. All matter consists of atoms. All atoms, according to modern concepts, consist of a small nucleus containing protons and neutrons bound together and a large cloud of electrons. Since most of the physical and chemical properties of an atom are determined by the number and shape of electrons, and the number and shape of electrons determine the number of protons in the nucleus, the atom is thus largely determined by the number of protons in the nucleus. All atoms that have the same number of protons in the nucleus are almost the same. For this reason, we call a group of atoms with the same number of protons a "chemical element", and associate different properties with specific elements.

Gold is a chemical element with 79 protons in each atomic nucleus. So, in principle, we could create gold simply by adding or removing protons to any chemical element (and enough neutrons to make the nucleus stable). More precisely, you can remove one proton from mercury or add one proton to platinum. The process is very simple in theory, but difficult in practice. The addition or removal of protons is a nuclear reaction. So there are no chemical reactions that can create gold. Chemical reactions change the number and shape of electrons in an atom, but leave the nucleus of the atom unchanged. Therefore, the ancient alchemical dream of creating gold is impossible.

The difficulty of nuclear reactions lies in the amount of energy used. To produce a nuclear reaction, we must shoot high energy particles. We can obtain such particles either from radioactive decay, from the acceleration of slow particles in a nuclear reactor, or from a mixture of these methods. For example, Sherr, Bainbridge, and Anderson created gold in 1941 by shooting neutrons into mercury. Neutrons were produced through a series of nuclear reactions at the Harvard Cyclotron.

Another difficulty is the fact that most gold created from other elements is radioactive. Radioactive gold is dangerous to people and should not be used. In addition, when radioactive gold is exposed to radioactive decay, it ceases to be gold after a few days. Thus, in order to create stable gold that you can sell to consumers you need:

1) Build a nuclear reactor as a source of neutrons. 2) Place the mercury in the reactor. After irradiation, some gold will be created. 3) Deactivate gold. This is more difficult than it sounds because you cannot separate non-radioactive gold from radioactive gold using purely chemical methods.

Thus, creating gold from other elements is currently an expensive laboratory experiment rather than a viable commercial project. Perhaps the technology will develop further, making it possible to create gold in nuclear reactors relatively cheaply.

Methods

Chemical

Jewelry workshops use the chemical method in their activities. Moreover, it can also be used at home. The essence of this method is to soak contaminated scrap yellow precious metal in special chemicals. Typically, ferrous sulfate or ferric sulfate is used for chemical refining. One of these substances is dissolved in water in the following proportions: 10–12 g of solution per 1 g of gold.

Precipitate consisting of all metals except silver

Jewelers often mix iron sulfate with aqua regia (one part gold chloride and three parts hydrochloric acid), in which scrap gold jewelry is first dissolved. However, this method is not always effective due to the fact that it is unlikely that it will be possible to completely extract the yellow precious metal.

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Evaporation of nitric acid in a porcelain container

As part of this method, it is necessary to alternately add ferrous sulfate and hydrochloric acid to the solution. As a result, a dark red powder will settle to the bottom of the vessel. This is gold. The resulting precious metal must be filtered and washed with water, and then collected on a paper filter. If all operations are carried out correctly, you will be able to obtain gold of the highest standard.

In order to ensure the absence of gold in spent reagents, a small amount of ferrous sulfate should be added to them. If a precipitate forms, then there is gold in the mining.

It is important! One of the simplest methods for refining gold, used at home, is the reaction of hydrochloric acid in the presence of clean nails if, as a result of quantitative analysis, the complete absence of gold is determined. The essence of this method lies mainly in the specific reaction of iron, which, gradually passing into solution, destroys the existing nitric acid compounds. Upon completion of the reaction, the nails remaining in the solution must be carefully removed, the gold powder collected and washed.