I use a gold test kit purchased from the same company I buy gold and silver wafers from. The bottles of acid test for 9, 14, 18, 20 and 22 karat gold content, and one more bottle to test silver. It came with a black streak plate which is way better for seeing gold and silver streaks than my home-made white ceramic streak plate. Attached is a pic of the streak from some lumps of metal I found last year while stomping around an old volcano. That was a joyous moment!
As you are in the USA, the gold test kits over there usually come with 10 karat test acid instead of 9 karat. I'm an infidel living in a muslim-majority country, and they have to pay a religious tax on owning any gold above 9 karat (hence that formulation in my test kit). You'll find plenty of sellers in your country in Ebay or other online sites.
Just follow the instructions which come along with whichever test kit you purchase. Take necessary precautions as you are dealing with acid. This video in youtube can explain things better than I can:
You are not allowed to view links.
Please Register or Login
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmbuwKiieyM
. There's plenty of other similar videos out there, so take your pick!
I keep the bottles of test acid in a covered glass jar in my fridge, which should hopefully extend the usable life of those fluids. Japanese kobans can be very pretty works of metallurgical art, and may be worth more if undamaged . If you wish to test them without performing a destructive test, consider X-ray fluorescence (XRF) testing. Companies which perform gold assays would usually have those expensive machines that will shoot x-rays onto the object and give you a very detailed printout of the metal/metals. The downside to XRF is it will not be as accurate and definitive as a fire-assay test. Wish I could stumble across a koban or three some day. Good luck!
Linkback: You are not allowed to view links.
Please Register or Login
http://www.thunting.com/smf/index.php/topic,46420.msg253850.html#msg253850
There are 1 attachment(s) in this post which you can not view or downloadPlease register for viewing them. P1000946-001.JPG
|
|
Logged
|
"Gold rides an iron horse." (Old prospector Homefire)
|