page_title: Amalgam (chemistry)
section_title: Gold extraction (ore processing)
hierarchical_section_title: Amalgam (chemistry) / Use in mining / Gold amalgam / Gold extraction (ore processing)
caption_attribution_description: Original title The Interior. "Clean Up" day at the Deadwood Terra Gold Stamp Mill, one of the Homestake Mills, Terraville, Dakota Interior of the Deadwood Terra Gold Stamp mill. Crushed ore is washed over mercury coated copper sheets, whence fine gold particles form an almagam with the mercury. The amalgam was scraped off and the gold then separated from the amalgam by heating and evaporating the mercury which was then recovered by a condenser for reapplication to the plates
context_page_description: An amalgam is an alloy of mercury with another metal. It may be a liquid, a soft paste or a solid, depending upon the proportion of mercury. These alloys are formed through metallic bonding, with the electrostatic attractive force of the conduction electrons working to bind all the positively charged metal ions together into a crystal lattice structure. Almost all metals can form amalgams with mercury, the notable exceptions being iron, platinum, tungsten, and tantalum. Silver-mercury amalgams are important in dentistry, and gold-mercury amalgam is used in the extraction of gold from ore. Dentistry has used alloys of mercury with metals such as silver, copper, indium, tin and zinc.
context_section_description: Where stamp mills were used to crush gold-bearing ore to fines, a part of the extraction process involved the use of mercury-wetted copper plates, over which the crushed fines were washed. A periodic scraping and re-mercurizing of the plate resulted in amalgam for further processing.
caption: Interior of the Deadwood Terra Gold Stamp Mill. Crushed ore is washed over mercury-coated copper sheets, and fine gold particles form an amalgam with the mercury. The amalgam was scraped off and the gold then separated from the amalgam by heating and evaporating the mercury, which was then recovered by a condenser for reapplication to the plates.
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