Thermal City gold?

[RandallSC]

Been going through some cons from thermal city and finding gold flakes with silver color to it. Is this mercury that was being used upstream to separate the gold. A guy had some nuggets he got from dredging while I was there with some silver color to it. He said it was because of mercury. New to this so any input is helpful. Thanks.

 

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[Fullpan]

Kevin - do you know the details of the private lab poisoning? just curious, and what her treatment was?

 

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[KevinInColorado]

Kevin - do you know the details of the private lab poisoning? just curious, and what her treatment was?

She was in the hospital for several weeks and lost all her hair but that's all I recall from 35 years ago. The exposure was due to an always-open container of mercury used to calculate the volume of machined auto parts...and, by today's standards, insufficient ventilation I suppose.

 

[gold tramp]

As someone who has actually worked with HG for years in a lab charging, running a 16 inch plate amalgamator 25 lb charge and merc press, and nitric to gold from hg. we practically lived in the lab only a fan to vent, none of us ever got sick . Yes HG is a hazard but you all are freakin out its not that bad. As for evaporation even the smallest globules take forever to evap it won't happen overnight. And when water is used you need to be carefully the organics in the water will breakdown HG making it very toxic , just my take on the HG issue , don't want tick anyone off .

 

[Kruzman]

If the gold from thermal was from the river, it may be residual merc from old miners or 100% natural. if its from the panning area, that material is from a ancient riverbed and picked up the mercury naturally from the environment. I find mercury on a LOT of my NC gold and often its from places where it would NOT be from old miners. we just have a lot of natural mercury.

 

[Sackett]

The short anwser to the orginal question, is YES there is gold coated in murcury from Thermal City, in fact they still sale it there in the store 1oz $20.00==1/2 oz is $10.00!

 

[Goodyguy]

I've witnessed miners using mercury at the panning trough at Thermal City to recover the fines from their pan.
Must be common practice there.

GG~

 

[wingmaster]

I wouldn't say the mercury coming from a pit they dug is natural mercury as I seen a very old pit dug on that property from the old mining days.

 

[russau]

when all that mercury evaporates(vapor) and rises in the open air, when it cools and condenses(resolidifys),what do you think happens to the mercury? it drops back down to the ground. now is that ground now mercury contaminated? if so, what would happen if that mercury vapor was blown by a gust of wind towards your camp or picnic table with your food on it for lunch/dinner or your children playing? do you think it would be worth the risk playing with it?

 

[Kruzman]

What will happen if you actually got a wiff of vapor off a flake of gold is a dose smaller than what you get from a can of tuna. just saying...

 

[RandallSC]

An ounce of gold for 20 bucks just cause it has some mercury on it! What a bummer cause that means what I am finding isn't worth much huh?? And I liked thermal city too.

 

[H-2 CHARLIE]

is there Danger MD in a 99 yr old cyanide sand pit not knowing what the pit has in it ? does it evaporate 99 yrs latter ?

 

[KevinInColorado]

An ounce of gold for 20 bucks just cause it has some mercury on it! What a bummer cause that means what I am finding isn't worth much huh?? And I liked thermal city too.

No silly...an ounce of mercury for $20
An ounce of merc coated gold is still gold and still worth the usual gold price!

 

[davidb]

That's true and if that's price you better buy as much as you can it would be worth burning mercury off lol

 

[RandallSC]

Much obliged for all the info. I am gonna try to keep them (mercury coated and not) separate but kinda hard with the finer pieces.

 

[KevinInColorado]

That's true and if that's price you better buy as much as you can it would be worth burning mercury off lol

I'd say buy a couple oz and a simple retort...then just reuse what you have and save $$!

 

[Sackett]

An ounce of gold for 20 bucks just cause it has some mercury on it! What a bummer cause that means what I am finding isn't worth much huh?? And I liked thermal city too.

No it's not an oz of gold coated with mercury for $20.00, but an oz of pure mercury for $20.00 to be used to get gold!

 

[Kruzman]

there is no good reason to put merc in your pan to get ultra fine gold, just learn how to pan well, and don't throw away your black sands as they will contain gold too small to see with the naked eye, and also fine gold/merc amalgam that you skipped right over when cleaning up. once in a while, cook your black sands outside, then classify and reprocess.