ALL SOLD [REDUCED 5%].99 Silver Below Spot (Seriously) INVEST !

[johnniewalker]

I am reducing the price of each of these by 5%. I need X-Mas money!
Up for sale are four .99 Silver ingots that I smelted. I melt scrap jewelry (925) and add the appropriate amount of silver shot to achieve .99 purity. Though these bars may not look like one straight from the mint, SILVER IS SILVER. The precious metal value is the same. And here you have an opportunity to buy BELOW spot. Any officially minted piece of bullion is never offered at spot-it is spot plus a surcharge or a percentage.
Spot today is $33.67/oz, and its surpassed $34/oz a few days recently. Here are my prices (consider 12.5/BTC) including shipping anywhere in the US:
1) 0.87 oz ingot: $26.27 = 2.1016 BTC
2) 0.97 ingot: $29.1 = 2.328 BTC
3) 1 oz ingot: $29.50 = 2.36 BTC
4) 1.1 oz ingot: $31.90 = 2.552 BTC







Now, 12.5 is a fair BTC rate. Also, as you can see in the pictures, some of my bars are slightly overweight. I knew I would learn some silver in the melting process, so I compensated with extra shot-thats the reason for that. Silversmithing is truly an art.

Please message me if interested. I am willing to deal if you buy more than one ingot.

[SgtSpike]

I might be interested, but one question I have is that of resale value.  Is there an easy way to test a silver ingot like this for purity and legitimacy?  In other words, if I wanted to sell it to someone else, how could they be assured that it is legitimately .99 purity silver?

[johnniewalker]

I might be interested, but one question I have is that of resale value.  Is there an easy way to test a silver ingot like this for purity and legitimacy?  In other words, if I wanted to sell it to someone else, how could they be assured that it is legitimately .99 purity silver?

yeah-you can buy test kits on ebay, amazon, whatever
to add: There are tests you can do without any equipment (check ehow or something). They obviously won't tell you spot-on what silver content is, but they can easily let you know that what you have is solid silver. Like I have a friend who bought one of those fake Chinese Nazi Silver Bars (idiot) and w/simple tests it was SO easy to prove the thing was fake. It was coated in the thinnest layer of silver and made of iron or something.

[Binford 6100]

could  you, please, elaborate on that part where you melt .925 silver jewelry add silver shot and it turns into .99 silver?

Up for sale are four .99 Silver ingots that I smelted. I melt scrap jewelry (925) and add the appropriate amount of silver shot to achieve .99 purity. Though these bars may not look like one straight from the mint, SILVER IS SILVER. The precious metal value is the same. And here you have an opportunity to buy BELOW spot. Any officially minted piece of bullion is never offered at spot-it is spot plus a surcharge or a percentage.

how much magic is needed to outweigh the 7.5% copper or what other impurities are in sterling silver?

[johnniewalker]

Sure. I guess you've never melted metals before or are framiliar with your melting points. Sterling silver is 92.5% silver and 7.5% an alloy, usually of copper and zinc. The melting temperature of silver is relatively low-compared to the copper alloy anyway. And no magic here-just something called borax. Find it in your detergent aisle. It lowers the melting temperature of the silver AND removes impurities so they never even make it into the mold!
Also, there's something called math that comes into play. I'll simplify things for you. Say you have .9 grams of 90% silver. So, to make it more pure you add .1+ grams of silver shot (basically pure silver).
Have you ever wondered why you've never seen something that is 100% pure silver? Kind of funny all you see is .99, huh? IMPURITIES EXIST AND ARE INEVEITABLE. Come talk to me when you make that 100% silver ingot, Albert Einstein.

[johnniewalker]

Even simpler for you, cause I think you might need it: IT'S CALLED TURNING THE 7.5% INTO THE .1%

[J-Norm]

A bottle of "silver testing acid" will turn a scratch of silver on a stone bright red, a bottle of "14k gold testing acid" will turn silver a blueish tint when directly applied.

Because silver is an incredibly efficient conductor of heat. Touch room temperature silver to an ice cube and watch the ice melt like it is in contact with a hot knife.

Because silver is diamagnetic get a very strong rare-earth magnet and touch it to the silver, it is not attracted to the magnet. Now wave the magnet back and forth near the silver and feel the strange resisitence as though you are pushing it through a liquid. This is because silver creates its own magnetic field when it comes into contact with another moving magnetic field.

Trippy stuff.

[gade202]

I can vouch for johnniewalker as I just completed a purchase from him.  Great communication to boot. 

[odolvlobo]

could  you, please, elaborate on that part where you melt .925 silver jewelry add silver shot and it turns into .99 silver?

how much magic is needed to outweigh the 7.5% copper or what other impurities are in sterling silver?

Both 1 ounce of 92.5% silver and 7.5 ounces of 99% silver have 0.075 ounce of impurities. So, you need to add 6.5 ounces of 100% silver to every 1 ounce of 92.5% silver to make it 99% silver, according to the math. You don't need as much (or perhaps any) 100% silver if you refine the 92.5% silver further.

[johnniewalker]

Thanks fellas. I have an old elementary arithmetic book I think I should post on here. I know at least one person who could really use it.

[odolvlobo]

Thanks fellas. I have an old elementary arithmetic book I think I should post on here. I know at least one person who could really use it.

I'm not sure what your post means, or who it directed at, but my math is correct.

And no magic here-just something called borax.  It lowers the melting temperature of the silver AND removes impurities so they never even make it into the mold!

Also, there's something called math that comes into play. I'll simplify things for you. Say you have .9 grams of 90% silver. So, to make it more pure you add .1+ grams of silver shot (basically pure silver).

You can't simply add 0.1 oz. of pure silver to 0.9 oz of 90% silver to get 1 oz. of 99% silver because your silver still has 0.09 oz. of impurities. Adding 0.1 oz of pure silver to 0.9 oz. of 90% silver gives you 1 oz. of 91% silver. Like I wrote before, you have to add 6.5 oz of pure silver to 1 oz. of 92.5% silver in order to dilute the impurities enough to get 99% silver.

Anyway, I always wondered how refining works.

I don't know much about it but the information online only talks about using nitric acid to refine silver. It doesn't say anything about using borax to refine silver, only for use as a flux. How well does it work? You should end up with a pretty good chunk of alloy when you go from 92.5% to 99%.

[TTBit]

I am questioning the math myself:

100 grams of sterling silver is 92.5 grams of silver and 7.5 grams of copper.
To make it 99% pure without taking out the copper, you need 7.5/.01 = 750 grams of metal, or 742.5 grams of silver and 7.5 grams copper. You need to add 650 grams of pure silver. Correct?

[johnniewalker]

Yes, but obviously on a smaller scale. You guys have the math correct. The simplest way to put it is making the 7.5% the .1%. The example I discussed last night-you have .9 grams of 90% silver. When melting the silver (say its a coin), you add borax and heat only long enough for the silver to become molten (you already added .1 grams of shot which has purity of .99 to make a gram of pure silver), and then you pour into the mold. I have recently gotten into melting. Initially I just had a crucible and I'd melt everything in there to make a round. this was 92.5% silver. Now I have a graphite mold. The borax helps, but silver melts at 1761 degrees F and copper melts at 1981 degrees F. That discrepancy of 200 degrees means a significant amount of time in heating (all I use is a pencil torch with MAPP gas). If you watch any video on youtube of people melting silver, right when it is about to reach its melting point the melter picks it up (w/tongs of course) and shakes it around. It looks like a silver egg yolk. What's happening is they're capturing all the silver on the walls of the crucible before they pour into the mold. The copper stays in the crucible. You can see in this picture of my melting gear:

[johnniewalker]

Just ordered a bigger mold, going to melt all this (all the bullion I have) down. Ill give it tonight to see if anyone is interested.

[TTBit]

Yes, but obviously on a smaller scale. You guys have the math correct. The simplest way to put it is making the 7.5% the .1%. The example I discussed last night-you have .9 grams of 90% silver. When melting the silver (say its a coin), you add borax and heat only long enough for the silver to become molten (you already added .1 grams of shot which has purity of .99 to make a gram of pure silver), and then you pour into the mold. I have recently gotten into melting. Initially I just had a crucible and I'd melt everything in there to make a round. this was 92.5% silver. Now I have a graphite mold. The borax helps, but silver melts at 1761 degrees F and copper melts at 1981 degrees F. That discrepancy of 200 degrees means a significant amount of time in heating (all I use is a pencil torch with MAPP gas). If you watch any video on youtube of people melting silver, right when it is about to reach its melting point the melter picks it up (w/tongs of course) and shakes it around. It looks like a silver egg yolk. What's happening is they're capturing all the silver on the walls of the crucible before they pour into the mold. The copper stays in the crucible. You can see in this picture of my melting gear:

So if you are not careful casting in sterling silver, you wind up with a higher purity? That doesn't seem right.

[odolvlobo]

you have .9 grams of 90% silver.

When you write ".9 g of 90% silver", I assume then that you mean 0.9 g of silver plus 0.1 g of impurities.

[DeathAndTaxes]

So if you are not careful casting in sterling silver, you wind up with a higher purity? That doesn't seem right.

He is right.  Note I am not vouching for the quality of his wares but his explanation is correct.

Imagine 1 oz of sterling silver.  It is 0.925 oz of pure silver and 0.075 oz of impurities (mostly copper).  By controlling the temp so it is ABOVE silver melting temp and BELOW copper melting temp what is molten isn't 1 oz it is ~0.925 oz* and it isn't 92% silver it is 100% silver.*  The rest remains solid in the crucible and doesn't get poured into the new form.  Now in this example you only have 0.925 oz not 1 oz so if you wanted to make a oz form you would need to add some more "pure" (normally 99.9 fine) silver.

* Now in the real world you will never get the temp exactly right.  Some of the copper will heat up to melting point and join the molten silver.  So you won't be able to exclude all the copper.  Also silver has other impurities which have a lower melting point so they are going to come along for the ride.  Still the point is that a significant portion of anything with a higher melting point than silver gets "left behind" and thus what gets poured into the form is higher quality.

[johnniewalker]

So if you are not careful casting in sterling silver, you wind up with a higher purity? That doesn't seem right.

He is right.  Note I am not vouching for the quality of his wares but his explanation is correct.

Imagine 1 oz of sterling silver.  It is 0.925 oz of pure silver and 0.075 oz of impurities (mostly copper).  By controlling the temp so it is ABOVE silver melting temp and BELOW copper melting temp what is molten isn't 1 oz it is ~0.925 oz* and it isn't 92% silver it is 100% silver.*  The rest remains solid in the crucible and doesn't get poured into the new form.  Now in this example you only have 0.925 oz not 1 oz so if you wanted to make a oz form you would need to add some more "pure" (normally 99.9 fine) silver.

* Now in the real world you will never get the temp exactly right.  Some of the copper will heat up to melting point and join the molten silver.  So you won't be able to exclude all the copper.  Also silver has other impurities which have a lower melting point so they are going to come along for the ride.  Still the point is that a significant portion of anything with a higher melting point than silver gets "left behind" and thus what gets poured into the form is higher quality.

Thank you. I used the example of 90% (a pre-1964 coin even though I don't melt coins) because the numbers are easier to work with. And I did mean 90% silver 10% impurities. I suppose I think in units. I would be thinking "ok, I have .9 of one unit (coin)-I need to add shot to make up for the .1 unit I don't have". And yes, melting to a temperature where just the silver melts and the copper completely doesn't is hard. When I get to the point where the silver is beginning to get molten I turn the gas down. When all the SILVER is melted I don't waste any time pouring it into the mold, so as to not melt any copper on accident. I literally have OCD, so I add extra silver shot every time, and I almost always end up above desired weight. And desired weight to me is the original pre-melt weight of (in this case) the coin. I suppose that is another component of my OCD. When I do something I do it right-to a painstaking point.

[johnniewalker]

Yes, but obviously on a smaller scale. You guys have the math correct. The simplest way to put it is making the 7.5% the .1%. The example I discussed last night-you have .9 grams of 90% silver. When melting the silver (say its a coin), you add borax and heat only long enough for the silver to become molten (you already added .1 grams of shot which has purity of .99 to make a gram of pure silver), and then you pour into the mold. I have recently gotten into melting. Initially I just had a crucible and I'd melt everything in there to make a round. this was 92.5% silver. Now I have a graphite mold. The borax helps, but silver melts at 1761 degrees F and copper melts at 1981 degrees F. That discrepancy of 200 degrees means a significant amount of time in heating (all I use is a pencil torch with MAPP gas). If you watch any video on youtube of people melting silver, right when it is about to reach its melting point the melter picks it up (w/tongs of course) and shakes it around. It looks like a silver egg yolk. What's happening is they're capturing all the silver on the walls of the crucible before they pour into the mold. The copper stays in the crucible. You can see in this picture of my melting gear:

So if you are not careful casting in sterling silver, you wind up with a higher purity? That doesn't seem right.

No, exactly the opposite. There is about a 200 degree difference between where silver melts and where copper does. If you heat the mixture longer you end up with lower purity, because you have melted the copper along with the silver. When you reach silver's melting temperature you must maintain the threshold between its melting temperature and copper's melting temperature, so when you pour you are only pouring molten silver, not copper. The copper is supposed to stay in the crucible. It's quite simple. You see that picture? Thanks to borax (which works like PAM), you can gather the molten silver even if it rests on near-molten copper. The empty spot you see in the crucible is where I collected and poured the silver. The rest is copper. Occasionally I have to heat my crucible up hot enough to get the copper molten so I can pour it and thus clean it out. I actually have a nice little piece of copper bullion going too : )

[Fjordbit]

I'm a hobby silversmith and this is correct. Another impurity is carbon from the torch, but the borax acts as flux. it makes sense to me.

Even if his technique is bad and he does carry impurities in, it seems that his process still guarantees you the right amount of silver. He is taking 1 oz of 92.5% and adding in .075oz of 99% shot. This guarantees .99oz of silver. If the weight is over, then the extra weight is from impurities but it doesn't matter as you have the same amount of silver.

[mameise]

I ordered one of these while you still talking about math....
It arrived. Its not the best looking silver oz i ever had but it seems to be silver. And its "nice" to see first tries of melting.

Thanks johnnie !
+1 for you

[johnniewalker]

I'm a hobby silversmith and this is correct. Another impurity is carbon from the torch, but the borax acts as flux. it makes sense to me.

Even if his technique is bad and he does carry impurities in, it seems that his process still guarantees you the right amount of silver. He is taking 1 oz of 92.5% and adding in .075oz of 99% shot. This guarantees .99oz of silver. If the weight is over, then the extra weight is from impurities but it doesn't matter as you have the same amount of silver.

Thanks. The weight is over primarily because I overcompensated on the shot, to ensure purity best I could. I got an inquiry about these ingots-they are SOLD, sorry. I check the marketplace everyday for someone offering scrap silver, I have some new molds and want to get back to melting!