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In a Pinch
In general, most refiners say they aren’t looking to act as a bank or credit institution. But with a good working history and relationship, customers can certainly ask for metal credit—which comes in handy if a batch of gold goes bad. “In one instance, I saw that an alloy had been mixed, white and yellow together, and it ruined four kilos of gold,” says Daniel Ballard of Precious Metals West in Ontario, California. “I got the metal poured into a bar, drilled it and assayed it to find out what they really ended up with, because with a mix-up like that there’s no telling what karat it is. We don’t usually front metal before we know what we’ve got, but this was a long-term customer who was also an alloy customer, so we gave them some 24k to work with. They grabbed the correct alloys from the shelf and were running that day.” Analyze This "We have special equipment that analyzes the rhodium plating thickness on white gold and uses that data to differentiate and more accurately determine the karat content of the piece being tested," says Vinny Guadagna. "Since fire assaying takes into account the weight of the whole piece (including plating material), the results often report lower gold content. This discrepancy is very prominent in cases where the jewelry piece has low weight and a thick rhodium plate. "There are instances when rhodium plated white gold jewelry on the market will assay under the legal limit for 14k gold," Guadagna adds. "By providing this service and reporting the effect of rhodium plating, we can help manufacturers ensure their white gold jewelry meets the legal standards for gold content." |
