Gold or fools gold

[liljack]

I'm confused

 

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[vpnavy]

I moved this request from HELP! over to Gold Prospecting for more exposure.

 

[Kenmitch]

Looks like fools gold but then again it's too hard to tell from the photos. Gold will be gold under all lighting conditions and wont change when your lighting is moved around, other than being more visible at least.

 

[Duckshot]

Put a price of placer known to be gold in a pan along with some equally sized pieces of your sample. Give it a swirl and you will imeadiately see the differences between gold and fools gold. The gold will pretty much stay put while the less dense fools gold moves quite easily.

Also pyrite can be crushed with a pliers or smashed with a hamer. Gold and other metals will just flatten out instead of breaking up.

 

[Laz7777]

the blurry pic on the top right looks like it might.
unless my monitor or your pic is way off-color, the other 2 pics don't even look like pyrite to me. way too green, some gold will have a greenish cast to it, but not that far off the spectrum of yellow/red that they show.
you have some mineral, and without any further details of where you found it (not exact locale, just general), I don't know what it could be, but I strongly could say what it isn't: gold.

 

[placertogo]

Depending upon the deposit, there can be real gold as well as silver mixed in with pyrite or chalcopyrite. We have some iron sulfide and copper deposits along the Maine coast which yielded gold and silver as by products.

 

[FFFPatriot]

Try putting a gold magnet on it and see if it sticks to it. A brass magnet would work to. I just do the fingernail press. Pyrite always breaks apart with my fingernail. The gold flakes never do.

 

[winners58]

Where? what state? could be formed as porphyry or a Laterite
could be green stone or could be the green comes from arsenopyrite.
even if it isn't gold in some areas the green stone is a good indicator of gold close by.
knowing the geology of what type of minerals have been found locally will tell you what you have.

 

[Ragnor]

Looks like pyrite in some kind of sulfide matrix. crush it and pan it. Save the heavies and roast them if it's worth your time. You never know what you will find. But take your exposure saftey seriously if you are roasting. Some stuff takes just a taste of it to make yah real sick.

 

[enamel7]

Try putting a gold magnet on it and see if it sticks to it. A brass magnet would work to. I just do the fingernail press. Pyrite always breaks apart with my fingernail. The gold flakes never do.

I tend to use my rubber or wood magnet instead of my gold magnet!