- Jun 26, 2008
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- Primary Interest:
- Metal Detecting
Here is the way you can figure the amount of gold in a gold/quartz specimen without destroying the specimen. It is not exact but close enough to be the industry standard (close enough for us recreational miners). Your scale needs to have an accuracy of at least .1 gram, have a "hook" for hanging your specimen in air, and the capacity to handle your specimen's weight. If your scale does not have the ability to hang your specimen in air, you can easily make a "rig" to do so. Weigh the rock on the scale (dry). We will call this the "air weight" A. Record your answer! Now prepare your rock to weigh it wet. Set up a very thin piece of copper wire with a 1/4 inch loop at one end. Leave the other end straight for now. The wire must be long enough to be able to suspend your rock from the hook into a container that has enough water in it to completely cover the rock while suspended. "Zero" your scale with the wire included. Remove the wire from the hook and, using the straight end, wrap the rock once to securely hold the rock. Cut off any excess wire. Put the wire/rock back on the scale hook, suspending it in the water just enough to submerge the rock in the water. The water container is not being weighed. It must be physically seperate from the weighing platform and rock.Weigh the rock wet and call the results W. Record this answer. Now it is time to use a calculator. Multiply "W" by 3.1. Multiply "A" by 1.9 . Subtract A from W. The answer is the weight of gold in the rock in grams. Now go back to the weights you first recorded. Subtract the gold weight from the original dry weight. The answer is the weight of quartz in the rock in grams. I am not sure this method is good on gold/any-mineral rocks. Now go out there and get busy! TTC
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