Hi from Joe: I used to do some mining & noted the old timers would use mercury on a copper sheet to attract gold [& silver when available], works great on a shaker table, most all knew to not try it panning; stuff's pretty toxic. When the amalgam got mushy they'd capture it in a chamois, wring out all the Hg they could squeeze, put the lump in a still & boil off the Hg + recover it. result was a small loss of Hg from leaks & spills, gold ready for the smelter or get it assayed & sell privately. After extended use, the copper would go away - react w the Hg to form another alloy in the Hg. The Hg could be restored by distilling.
Nothing was ever mentioned about sacrificial loss of Ag or Au; wasn't enough to miss. Bye. > Hi Roger, > > On Wed, 23 May 2001 13:22:46 EDT, [email protected] wrote: > > >Ken: Except for your idea about zinc and copper having germicidal > >properties, > >from what you mentioned above, I don't see a mechanism to dissolve silver. I > >don't believe that acidic or basic rainwater is going to dissolve silver. An > >oxidizing acid (or a non-oxidizing acid together with an oxidizing agent) > >such as boiling nitric acid would be needed to dissolve silver. Silver is a > >noble metal, fairly non-reactive (except with a few things like sulfur and > >proteins), and not easily oxidized even when thermodynamics says it should > >form an oxide. > > I think Ken was implying there might be an electrolytic (battery) > action between the zinc or copper kettle/barrel and a silver coin when > the liquid was slightly acidic. > > -- Dean -- from (almost) Des Moines -- KB0ZDF > > > -- > The silver-list is a moderated forum for discussion of colloidal silver. > > To join or quit silver-list or silver-digest send an e-mail message to: > [email protected] -or- [email protected] > with the word subscribe or unsubscribe in the SUBJECT line. > > To post, address your message to: [email protected] > Silver-list archive: http://escribe.com/health/thesilverlist/index.html > List maintainer: Mike Devour <[email protected]> >
