Being able to quickly and easily determine whether or not the materials you are working with are actually precious metals or just decent fakes can be a valuable asset to any home jeweler. Sometimes it is enough to simply know whether or not the metal is gold, other situations require knowing the quality of the metal you are working with. Home testing, or DIY methods, can let you know whether or not the metal is in fact gold. There are kits available online that allows you to determine the quality of the gold you’re dealing with.
There are simple, home methods that can be used to distinguish between something made of gold and something made of a less precious metal. The easiest test is to hold a magnet next to the piece of metal you are examining, if the item is attracted to a magnet then it isn’t pure gold. Another simple test is to wear the item in question; if it leaves behind the telltale green mark then it is not pure gold.
Other tests include rubbing the item on an unglazed porcelain tile, if the streak left behind is yellow then it is gold, if the streak is black then it is not pure gold. There are plenty of other DIY tests that can be done with simple items that can be found in your home. As mentioned before, these tests only let you know whether or not the item in question has some gold in it. To more accurately determine the amount of gold, or karat, that a piece of jewelry has you should purchase an acid testing kit.
Generally acid testing kits contain multiple vials of different strength acids to determine the karat of a certain piece of gold. Karat refers to the purity of the substance; for instance, 24K gold is greater than 99% pure gold where as 14K gold is only 58% pure. The basic premise of the testing kits is to scrape off a piece of the metal in question and attempt to dissolve it in the acid, depending on the amount that dissolves or the acid used you can tell how pure the gold sample is.
Most kits require you take a sample of the gold you are trying to examine. This can be done by scratching the piece with a sharp needle or razor blade and obtaining a small sample of the item that way. Other products come with stones that you are required to rub the item on to leave small specs of the piece. Be sure to be careful not to excessively damage the item you are testing during this process. Depending on the kit you are using, the next step is to use the acid, according to the instructions in the kit, to test the sample. Starting with the weakest acid, probably a 10K gold acid test formula, and moving to the strongest you drip small amounts onto the samples you have taken. Take note of which acid makes the sample dissolve, this will give you an approximate estimate of the density of the gold you are working with.
Source by Ryan L.
How to Use a Gold Testing Kit
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