How to Determine Pure or Solid Gold
Most jewelry is not pure gold, even if it is advertised as 24 karats. That's not a deceptive practice, but a practical one. Gold is very soft and malleable, so constructing jewelry using pure gold just won't work well. Therefore, alloys are added to the gold to give it some rigidity. However, if you purchased or found a nugget of gold or a gold coin, then it may or may not be pure. Although there are some simple tests, such as biting to see if you leave a dent and checking that magnets are not attracted to it, these tests can't measure absolute purity. For that, you would need to perform a density test, since pure gold, and only pure gold, has a very specific density. Any impurities would alter the density measurement away from the density of gold.
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Instructions
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Calibrate the digital mass scale to read zero without any object on the scale. Since all scales operate slightly differently, you will have to consult your scale's manual for precise instructions, but generally there is a dial you turn until the measurement is zero.
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Place the gold by itself on the mass scale and record the measurement in grams.
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Fill a graduated cylinder half-full of water and record the volume. The water level may appear curved up or down, i.e., like a bowl shape. If so, read the measurement at the center of the curve. This measurement should be in cubic centimeters. If the cylinder measures milliliters, don't worry: they have the same values, i.e., 1 cubic centimeters equals 1 milliliter.
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Carefully drop the gold nugget into the graduated cylinder, and record the new volume.
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Subtract the old volume measurement from the new one to calculate the volume of the gold nugget. As an example, if the water-only volume was 50 cubic centimeters, and the water-plus-gold volume was 60 cubic centimeters, then you have 10 cubic centimeters of gold.
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Divide the mass by the volume to calculate density. In the example, if the mass of gold was 193.2 grams, then you would divide this measurement by 10 cubic centimeters to calculate the density of 19.32 grams per cubic centimeters, which is the actual density of gold. If your gold nugget weighed something different, then it is not pure.
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Tips & Warnings
If you discovered your gold nugget or coin is not pure, that does not mean it is not valuable, because it may still have significant gold content. So don't throw it away!
References
- Photo Credit Gold image by Sergii Mogyla from Fotolia.com
