METHOD TO CONVERT SILVER SULPHIDE INTO METALICSILVER
This work is dedicated to Mr. Chris Owen,better known as GSP.Chris hasprovided,to all members of the Forum, many valuable knowledge.Also hehas shared,with all of us,his huge experience in precious metalrecovering.THANKS,GSP.
Silver sulphide is an important raw material for silver.The most importantsilver ore is silver sulphide (argentite).Due to its great insolubility anysilver compound can be converted to silver sulphide.When silver is in solution it can be easily precipitate to silver sulphide justadding some alkali sulphide ,i.e. sodium or potassium sulphide.Thisreaction forms a black mud of silver sulphide.There is a lack of information about how to refine the black mud of silversulphide.Nitric acid or chloridizing process(aqua regia or ferric chloride)can be used but both processes present drawbacks.Nitric acid processreleases toxic fumes and needs many reprocessing steps;chloridizingprocess converts silver sulphide into silver chloride which needs furthertreatment.The purpose of this invention is to provide,step by step, a method toconvert directly silver sulphide into metalic silver,without using any acidand in a very short time.
Silver sulphidePotassium nitrateBoraxCrucibleMetalic rodGas/oxygen torch1 Bottle of Whisky (Chivas,Crown Royal,Jack Daniel´s,Jim Beam,J&B orany Whisky you like )