Originally Posted by
eesakiwi
With my Silver contact collection, I found that the weight mounts up pretty quickly once you have enough to be 'of value'.
At that point its probably not worth refining it any more.
What you would loose in time, energy, chemicals/equipment and potential hazards is more than its worth to do. Ie, no real $ gain at all.
A proper refiner has a better % return, less costs, greater volume and will pay you instantly.
I separate my contacts into ~ Solid Silver ~ Magnetic contacts ~ Silver/Copper. ~ Gold/ Gold plated Silver ~ Industrial contacts/electrical breakers Silver.
The only thing I might do is melt the solid Silvers into a bar and sell it at the local Pawn shop as they can measure Silver % and pay for that.
So far I have 3 ounces of those contacts cleaned down. But a lot to be cleaned down(switch's/relays etc) yet.
The rest will go with the
escrap in one sale.
Don't melt these silver contacts they contain 12% Cadmium - it becomes a gas at 650 degrees Celcius. Wheres the melting point of silver is 950ish degrees Celcius.
Try not to handle them either, and definitely wash your hands afterwards.
The reason I will smelt, it I have other things to smelt.
I'm not really a proper scrapper, this is just a means have some raw materials to experiment with, and perfect my smelting/recovery techniques.
Then I will become a scrap buyer.
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