Found my First Silver WirePatch Specimen nugget

[jewelerdave]

Well I finally was able to get one, small, only a half gram but I managed to get my first nugget/rock of wire silver!!!

Was not very impressive when I found it, I just saw one little wire on what I thought was a hot rock.
washed it off a little and it looked kind of like wire patch (a very rare form)

Exited I bagged it up. Took it home and cleaned it at home, a combination of Ultrasonic cleaning and a light acid bath brought out the silver color very nicely, as well as got rid of the dirt.

I wish I could take a better picture, Under the microscope the specimen is AMAZING! jam packed filled with small wires going in and out of the rock.

Not worth a fortune but more rare than gold specimens.
I am amazed my detector found such a tiny specimen. Its an old goldmaster v/sat I got about 15 years ago, Still finding pin head sized metal and up!

Anyway, glad to have found my first Colorado Silver!

 

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[Old Dog]

Nice find Buddy,

Thanks for sharing.
Congrats,
Thom

 

[kuger]

Man thats awesome!!I dont know if I would have known what that was in the field!

 

[jewelerdave]

well of course I did not use nitric, I didnt want to dissolve the specimen.

Lets do a proper run down of cleaning.

First, water, this exposed some of the silver.

Next was a bath in an ultrasonic cleaner in a plastic bag with water and ammonia. this broke up a lot of the dirt and took off some sulfides and exposed the silver better. a brown cloud of dirt exploded off the specimen at this point.
At this point they were black, you could not tell what the wires were. with the exception of one that was white on the outside.

Next step was a bath in hot pickling acid, this is a jewelers mild acid that eats oxides of metals, It will slowly eat copper and oxides. leaving silver and gold nice and bright, normally used on castings.
this did a nice job. It ate off the oxides turning the black wires white.
Some of the wires are still yellow in color, it could be an alloy of gold, I would not be surprised. But I am not about to destroy it for an assay.

The rock is a dark grainy massive crystalline structure, most likely a very dirty or silver impregnated quartz, The wires dip in and out all over the rock. no fizzing in acid. But does not clean up, I may try some HCL and see if that helps.
There could be some limonite in there as well, I found a lot of limonite and sulfide ores all over the place, I just took home what beeped. I found a fist sized chunk of galena silver lead ore, that set the detector off as well, I think I am going to smelt it for fun when I have the time.

 

[Jim Hemmingway]

Hi Jewelerdave,

The black you see on silver is a sulphide, a result of silver's natural chemical reduction.
Natural silver can occur in just about any degree of purity, because it's frequently found in close association with other metallic elements and their sulphides; when higher grade silver (as with your native silver wire) is exposed to an HCL bath, and that may include many other non-oxidizing acids (can't speculate on other acid types), the silver frequently displays a "brassy" look that is only micron thin, and on slightly buffing larger specimens is readily removed to expose the colour and lustre we normally associate with refined and polished silver jewellery. BTW, I do not recommend this procedure for this type of specimen.

Limonite is nature's rust, chemically a hydrated iron oxide, the stuff that stains weathered rocks a rusty colour and makes dirt brown. More serious collectors, to remove such limonite stains from silicates like feldspars and quartz, generally use oxalic acid (poisonous, comes in a water soluble powder). Prior to using it, if you're not familiar with it's potential effect on your wire silver, consult around a bit with those having experience. I haven't used it on my silver specimens, never needed it. That's about all I can say to you on this subject. Maybe someone else can chime in here. Good luck with your prospecting. Jim.

 

[Eu_citzen]

Jim I see you know your stuff! Very good reading lads!
Dave nice specimen.

Got some pics of the cleaned specimen? I'd love to see it.

 

[nuggetshooter323]

Great find! Specimens like that are my favorite.