copper and silver extraction from concentrate

[lilorphanannie]

i am looking for suggestions as how to proceed with the extraction of copper and silver from concentrate. its a concentrate leached via flotation from a sulfide ore. im thinking that the values are high enough where it could be profitable. ore is running 25 to 30% cu and 60 to 80 opt ag. and a little gold. im looking to do a garage setup in my free time, small scale. not worried about volume at the moment ,only to learn the process. i also have access to cemented copper concentrate , averages @ 50% cu. dont know which i want to start with. i do have some limited knowledge of chemistry, working with acids, electrowinning and smelting, and ive reduced gold to chlorides(but was never able to turn it back into metal). but i dont know what the next step should be with these concentrates .i would like to take them from the concentrates to pour nearly pure metal. im looking for detailed information,from anyone that knows and would like to offer help.thanks

[Sam Burgin]

You have a couple of options with your secondary ore.

A flow through vat leaching with Nitric Acid maintained at a Ph of 1 or less (very hot), and electrowinning at 30 amps or so. The residue is directly smeltable.

A slurry leaching with low Ph Nitric for the smaller particles and vat waste, then use a metal scavenger like, V-111, to drop everything out, it will miss a few metals, but not enough to matter that much. The precipitate is directly smeltable.

You sure you want to do this in a garage? This is some pretty nasty stuff.

How much ore do you have and where are you?

If you are close, maybe we can work out something, we do this everyday.

Sam

[lilorphanannie]

hi sam, thanks for the reply. i sent you a personal email.please let me know if you recieved it of not.