Gold Ore

southfork

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A little sample that was found with a metal detector. Crushed by hand then panned to wash away some of the dirt and clay? The photo is macro so real small particles, but the quartz shows and what looks like iron and free gold. I think we need a small smelter to retrieve the values trying to speed up the recovery what's your thoughts ?
 

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Tesorodeoro

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We have free milling gold and sulphides and micro gold from grinding and cleaning. all the smalls/pickers and micro gold will be smelted and poured into buttons .
I see. So it’s not really a recovery process in so much as it is a way to get your fine gold converted into something that can be cast at a later date. All this talk of activated carbon, and polymeric matrix is really not very relevant to your situation. Next thing you know, you will be getting instruction on how to set up a refinery.
 

Tesorodeoro

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The iron sulphides are being ground and roasted and ground again. I not trying to convert the sulphides just release the free gold and it's working just fine.
Have you experimented to see that roasting the sulfides is actually contributing to the release of free gold enough to justify doing it?
 

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southfork

southfork

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Have you experimented to see that roasting the sulfides is actually contributing to the release of free gold enough to justify doing it?
Well, I started with a rusty rock about 4 grams or so and now have a lot of micro gold and pickers. I plan on smelting this sample or maybe I should call it melting gold because it's so rich I'm just playing with gold. I'm not an expert mad scientist like the other guy that has never found a grain of gold lol. Just a little note my son found enough gold on the last day out to pay for all the new equipment.
 

Tesorodeoro

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Well, I started with a rusty rock about 4 grams or so and now have a lot of micro gold and pickers. I plan on smelting this sample or maybe I should call it melting gold because it's so rich I'm just playing with gold. I'm not an expert mad scientist like the other guy that has never found a grain of gold lol. Just a little note my son found enough gold on the last day out to pay for all the new equipment.
Thats great. You really need to get someone to investigate the mine workings. There is no telling why they stopped working the mine or what is left. There could be a rich stope between tunnels..who knows.
 

alloy_II

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Well, I started with a rusty rock about 4 grams or so and now have a lot of micro gold and pickers. I plan on smelting this sample or maybe I should call it melting gold because it's so rich I'm just playing with gold. I'm not an expert mad scientist like the other guy that has never found a grain of gold lol. Just a little note my son found enough gold on the last day out to pay for all the new equipment.
Ah, you've finally figured the difference between melting and smelting.
 

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southfork

southfork

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I`m confused.
Me too this what I'm crushing it's not magnetic at least what's left still looks like tiny specks of gold in some of the particles of black sand. I wish i had a wheelbarrow full of this. Maybe a little silver or platinum ?
 

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gold tramp

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Me too this what I'm crushing it's not magnetic at least what's left still looks like tiny specks of gold in some of the particles of black sand. I wish i had a wheelbarrow full of this. Maybe a little silver or platinum ?
Use you Mercury see if it grabs it, quick test..
That what I do with ore I work with has alot of pyrite that looks like gold...
Gt...
 

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southfork

southfork

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Use you Mercury see if it grabs it, quick test..
That what I do with ore I work with has alot of pyrite that looks like gold...
Gt...
I want to keep it clean I already know it's Gold no reaction to muriatic or nitric acid.
 

alloy_II

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Me too this what I'm crushing it's not magnetic at least what's left still looks like tiny specks of gold in some of the particles of black sand. I wish i had a wheelbarrow full of this. Maybe a little silver or platinum ?
Screenshot from 2022-05-01 14-12-41.png

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alloy_II

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What is he converting sulfides into I didn't see any sulfides in his pic,
Sulfides are trash anyways...
What southfork said, by giving your seal of approval I assumed you had read and fully understood the content of the post.

Screenshot from 2022-05-01 10-36-33.png
 

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alloy_II

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so, what type of ore do I have? https://www.ftmmachinery.com/blog/8-types-of-gold-ore.html alloy_II the question is for you.
You answered your own question, your material obviously in the 70% / 75%

I'm working in the 5% / 10% invisible gold range, recovery planned via smelting.

Source.

The remaining 5% to 10% is in the form of "invisible" gold, which has been replaced by the crystal structure of various minerals or in the form of tiny particles.


Screenshot from 2022-05-01 19-08-59.png
 

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Tesorodeoro

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I'm interested here, what experiment would one do to determine if a sulfide was contributing to you gold content..
Also isn't rusty stuff an oxide ?
Gt....
Well I’m no expert, but it sounded like there was a sulfide material being roasted and ground up to liberate free gold? I suppose my experiment would be to split a sample and roast one and not the other and see if there is any measurable difference in recoverable gold? I don’t want to get into the weeds here, but I was wondering if it had been proven that the gold that was being recovered was actually the result of roasting sulphides and not just a by product of additional efforts beaking down the fines. Does that make sense? No need roasting sulfides if you are not getting a decent recovery from the roasting process. I met a miner once that later died from roasting sulfides.
 

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alloy_II

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Well I’m no expert, but it sounded like there was a sulfide material being roasted and ground up to liberate free gold? I suppose my experiment would be to split a sample and roast one and not the other and see if there is any measurable difference in recoverable gold? I don’t want to get into the weeds here, but I was wondering if it had been proven that the gold that was being recovered was actually the result of roasting sulphides and not just a by product of additional efforts beaking down the fines. Does that make sense? No need roasting sulfides if you are not getting a decent recovery from the roasting process. I met a miner once that later died from roasting sulfides.
Sorry for the loss of your friend, roasting sulfides can be dangerous.

The big boys use flotation cells to recover sulfides, we artisanal miners rely of roasting.

If I'm unaware of an ore samples make up, I'll have a full elemental ICP analysis done.

Most of the elements listed below are toxic.

Source. Opens as pdf file.

Sulfide-Associated Gold

Gold is often associated with many sulfide minerals including arsenopyrite, pyrite, chalcopyrite and galena. Often a portion of the sulfide-associated gold can be considered free milling while the remainder is occluded or very finely disseminated within the sulfide matrix.

While the free-milling portion can be recovered by traditional gravity or cyanidation processes discussed above, the sulfide-associated gold can cause issues with these processes.

Some sulfide minerals consume large amounts of cyanide or dissolved oxygen (critical to the cyanidation process) and make
whole ore leaching impractical or uneconomic.

The ultra-fine gold particles associated with sulfide minerals are often too small to recover by gravity and very expensive liberate by grinding.
 

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