Does raw silver and platium look the same?

[LostinBolton]

I hit some items 5 years ago when I had an old detector. I just got a Dfx300 and found some of these old finds in the garage. I tested with the DFX and it is a strong 83 on vdi. This is the silver range but I don't have a platinum range. It is soft and breaks under 20lbs of pressure. I have located about 800 grams and I don't want to get ripped off. What would you do?

Thanks for any advice. When I found them people were telling me it was slag but I had a geoligest look at last night with bench test with DFX and pocket knife and magnet. It is silver white in color.

I want to bing a piece to a jeweler to test.

I can't figure out how to upload pics yet I as I am new here.

 

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[Terry Soloman]

NO. Platinum and silver nuggets do not look the same. Just take your sample to a trusted jeweler and have them test it for you. Good Luck!

 

[dustytrails123]

Or go to ebay and order a testing kit for 6 dollars and test it youself...

 

[LostinBolton]

Thanks I like both ideas and I did go to a jewler. They did an acid test and it past for a least silver but the guy didn't have a platinum test. So I went back out for 5 hours and found another 101 grams and a bunch of other random stuff and a nickel. Now I am going on eBay.

Does anyone know on the DFX VDI that platinum would show, I don't have any known platinum.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Does anyone know on the DFX VDI that platinum would show, I don't have any known platinum.

It will depend on the size of the item and trace alloys, etc... For example, that question is like asking: "where does aluminum read"? Notice that the tab or beaver tail reads low, right? But notice that if you wave an entire aluminum can in front of your detector, it reads penny or quarter or whatever, right? But notice in each case, the composition is exactly the same: ALUMINUM. So what changed? The size. So you can't really ask "where does platinum read", as the question is size dependant.

By the way, I sincerely doubt you have "platinum nuggets". If ever we md'rs find molten nugget type stuff while detecting, it is as your friend says: slag. Sure it may shine up if you pick at it. But that's just because the outside of whatetever it is, is oxidized, dirty, etc... For example: take a cruddy memorial copper penny after you find it. It's deep dark brownish green black, right? How take a scratch-awl and pick at it, and you reveal gold color (from the copper underneath the corrosion), right? So have you got "gold"? No, you have coppper. Same for all other forms of slag. If you pick at it, you reveal a shinier color underneath the dirty corroded item.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Post script:

You say they tested for being "silver"? I find even that doubtful. I mean.... there'd have had to have been some hefty silver coins or jewelry that burned to super hot degrees, to litter an area with "silver nuggets". To my knowledge, silver is refined out of ore, and does not appear in "nugget form"? So you might want to get the silver test results double checked from somewhere else too.

 

[wingmaster]

From what I've seen of raw silver its a grey color in vain form, not sure about the platinum but a search show platinum nuggets.

 

[Terry Soloman]

Silver nuggets are quite common in the Bradshaw Mountains of Arizona. Silver nugget - Google Search

I once saw a very large platinum nugget from Colorado, out at Stanton at the base of Rich Hill. It belonged to a Minelab dealer, Dave Lester. Looks nothing like silver.

 

[LostinBolton]

I guess I misspoke when I used the term raw form. Most of the pieces are plate like. On of the pieces I pulled out yesterday was a small triangle. It is about 1.5 x1.5 x1.5 and 3/8 thick and weight 59 grams. After I cleaned it up it seems to have some circle scaring marks like it was minded or shaved out. It was found where a tunnel was bored out about 1850 from some research on the area. I will try to clean up some other of the plates and see if the same mark exist.