Detecting Silver

[piZmo]

Hello... Im new to the site, but so far have found it very informative. I own a municipal waste company, hauling garbage...dumpster, etc. Ive been involved with scrap metals for years as a side job. Stripping old houses, siding...stuff like that. But recently i put a bid in for the municipal scrap metal recycling, and got the bid. My plan WAS just to have people drop off the applicances and such at our location and crush them into a dumpster. I was told there are some metals such as silver, and gold in some applicances. In fact, a guy i know who is retired actually does that on his spare time, came into my office with 2 silver bars weghing about 10lbs a piece and told me its just stuff hes stripped out of washers/dryers/stoves over the past few year and got them melted down. He got about $4000 for the bars when he sold them.

Pretty much what im asking is how can you detect silver? I just tore all these appliances apart and NOTHIGN LOOKs like silver. I know its there, but the pieces are just so dirty, i cant tell.... Is there an easy method to detect it? Like a magnet for example?? Anything??

 

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[Charlie P. (NY)]

Our detectors rely on conductivity. Silver is not magnetic, but it conducts electricity better than copper or gold, and all are more conductive than iron or steel, (or nickel).

Two pass a detector over an appliance and have it tell you where the silver is would be way beyond mine or any I'm familiar with. Almost all will ignore iron or steel if you set tham to do it, but not when surrounded by a whole frame and enclosure with motors and wiring all over the place. You may be able to rip the appliance apart and then scan the parts outside of the steel frame.

There's small amounts of gold in the contacts and chips in electronics, but silver I don't know much about. I think it is used in thermostats (they use two different pieces of metal like copper & silver strips that expand differently when heated), but I don't know for sure. It would take a LOT of stoves to get 10 lbs that way.

Copper is a biggie for sure.