Melt Gold

Maybe you have gold jewelry that you want to melt. Or you’re an artist or jewelry designer who wants to create a new design by melting gold. There are several ways you can melt gold at home although you should always take great care to remain safe when melting gold because it requires extreme heat.

Steps

Getting the Right Equipment

1. Buy a crucible container to hold the gold as it melts. You need the right equipment to melt gold. A crucible is a container that is specifically designed to hold gold as it melts because it can withstand the extreme heat.
   • A crucible is usually made of graphite carbon or clay. Gold’s melting point is at about 1,943 degrees Fahrenheit, which means you will need temperatures that hot to melt it. Thus, it's very important that you don't just choose any container.
   • In addition to a crucible, you will need a pair of tongs to move the crucible and hold it. These need to be made out of heat-resistant material.
   • If you don't have a crucible, a homemade method uses a potato to melt gold instead of a crucible. To use this method, cut a hole into the potato, and place the gold in it.
2. Use flux to remove impurities from the gold. Flux is a substance that is mixed with the gold before melting it. It is often a mixture of borax and sodium carbonate.
   • You need more flux if the gold is impure. You can use many different formulas for flux mixtures. One method involves mixing borax and sodium carbonate. Add two pinches per ounce of clean jewelry scrap and more for dirty scrap. You can use regular baking soda or bicarbonate purchased from the store. When you heat it, it forms sodium carbonate.
   • Flux helps hold together the fine gold particles, and it also helps remove impure materials from the gold as it heats. When using the potato method, add a pinch of borax into the hole in the potato before melting the gold.
3. Be very careful of safety at all times. It can be dangerous to melt gold because of the extreme heat needed to do it.
   • Consult a professional if you have no training in melting gold at all. You also should find a place in your house to melt gold that is safe, such as in your garage or a spare room. You will need a work bench to put your materials on.
   • Make sure that you wear safety goggles and a face shield to protect your face. You should put heat-resistant gloves on your hands and wear a heavy apron too.
   • Never, ever melt down gold near something that is flammable. It can be very dangerous, and you don’t want to cause a fire.

Using a Heating Kit

1. Buy an electric furnace that is used for melting gold. These are small, high-powered kilns that are specifically designed to melt precious metals, including gold and silver. You can buy them online.
   • Some of these electric gold furnaces are pretty affordable. They also allow people to mix previous metals together (such as gold, silver, copper, aluminum, and so on) and melt them at home. To use them, you will need the same equipment, including a crucible and flux.
   • If the gold item also contains small percentages of silver, copper or zinc, the melting point will be lower.
2. Try melting down gold in a 1200-watt microwave. You want to use a microwave that does not have the magnetron on the top but rather has it on the side or back.
   • You can buy a microwave gold smelting kit or kiln. You place the kiln on a kiln shelf in the microwave. The crucible holds the gold while it is being heated and is placed in the kiln, with a lid on top.
   • Don’t use the microwave for cooking food again if you have used it to melt gold, though.

Finding Other Sources of Heat

1. Try using a propane torch to melt gold. As noted before, you must be extremely careful about safety concerns if you are going to use a torch. However, a torch will melt gold within a few minutes.
   • The gold should be placed into a crucible. Then, put the crucible on a fireproof surface, and direct a torch toward the gold within the crucible. If you add the chemical borax to the gold first, you can melt it at lower temperatures, which might be needed if you’re using a torch.
   • Be careful to bring the torch down slowly if you have fine powdered gold in the crucible because you could easily blow it around. Heating the crucible too fast also could crack it. You want to heat it thoroughly and slowly. An oxy-acetylene torch will melt the gold faster than propane.
   • With a torch, hold the flame well above the gold powder and slowly work in a circular motion. Once the powder begins to heat up and turn red, you can begin to work the torch in slowly until your powder is reduced to a nugget.
2. Shape your melted gold. You need to decide what you are going to do with the melted gold. Perhaps you want to sell it in a new form. You could try to make an ingot out of it or another shape, like a gold bar.
   • Pour the melted gold into the ingot mold or other mold before it hardens. Then, let the gold cool. The mold should be made from similar material as the crucible
   • Don’t forget to clean up your mess! You never want to leave heat sources unattended or in the reach of children.

Warnings

• 24 karat gold is very malleable. If you need to make it stronger, alloy it with another metal.
• Melting gold takes skill, so you could check with a professional before you try it.

Things You'll Need

• Gold
• oxy-Acetylene or oxy-propane torch
• crucible tongs
• crucible
• borax flux

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See also

• Melt Brass
• Melt Silver
• Build a Propane Blacksmith Forge
• Anneal Copper
• Melt Lead
• Build a Metal Melting Furnace for Casting
• Melt Aluminum
• Melt Copper
• Oxidize Copper

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