What do you do now that all the gold toner has gone missing

ColinRH · Aug 14, 2020

I guess that due to the current world problem with Covid, and therefore to the price of gold, gold toner is not being manufactured. There does not seem to be any gold chloride available in small quantities I would normally buy and the only commercially available is Moersch Toner. (No problem but I would prefer mixing myself)

How are all you gold toner's dealing with this situation? I am wanting to tone a series of Salt and Vandyke Brown prints.

ludwighagelstein · Aug 14, 2020

There is still Tetenal Gold Toner as far as I´m aware...

AgX · Aug 14, 2020

Make Goldchloride yourself.

Andrew O'Neill · Aug 14, 2020

I love running my Kallitype prints in gold chloride. I've got a small bottle of stock. When that goes, I'll figure something out. In the meantime, I'll not stress, and make carbon transfer prints. No toner required LoL.

removedacct1 · Aug 14, 2020

Bostick and Sullivan still has gold chloride available. Art craft still lists it too.

DREW WILEY · Aug 14, 2020

Photographer's Formulary is just shut down for summer remodeling, since they can't hold workshops there this year. I always keep a reserve bottle of gold chloride on hand, just in case.

mshchem · Aug 14, 2020

I wouldn't know in the UK. It's super easy to make, but requires a real lab, acids, and a bunch of other stuff. There's US sources but can't be mailed so they don't send outside the United States. Look for a refiner, they often offer better prices. An example of a US refinery pricing.

https://saltlakemetals.com/product/gold-chloride/

ColinRH · Aug 15, 2020

Thanks for your replies.
The problem is that US suppliers will not/cannot post to UK.
It would appear Tetenal is in administration and unlikely to make any more.
My preference is to mix my own and the usual supplies have also dried up. I have found ,what to me, appears to be a supplier but not being a chemist I don't know what I am looking at! Unless it is sold by a photographic supplier as 'gold chloride' I have no idea what to buy.
If there are any knowledgeable chemists looking on perhaps you might have a look at the site below and tell me if that is what is required. I would be very pleased.

https://www.scientificlabs.co.uk/search/DEFAULT/1/gold chloride

Thanks in hopefulness!

AgX · Aug 15, 2020

ColinRH said:
It would appear Tetenal is in administration and unlikely to make any more.

Out of the remnants of gone under Tetenal Europe a new firm called Tetenal 1874 has been established. Their website contains a lot of blah blah, but hardly any products they produce.

AgX · Aug 15, 2020

ColinRH said:
Unless it is sold by a photographic supplier as 'gold chloride' I have no idea what to buy.
https://www.scientificlabs.co.uk/search/DEFAULT/1/gold chloride

You need Goldchloride. However the crystals you get are Goldchloride-Hydrate, which does not matter chemically. It just means that water is encapsuled in the crystal, which should be calculated in only in case of weighing for high precision.

The toner formula I got at hand even starts with a 2%-Goldchloride solution, that is the same as that one solution offered in the listing you linked to.

eli griggs · Aug 15, 2020

You can always approach a college chemistry professor and offer to supply a few grams of gold for a demonstration, with you taking the results home or sharing a a bit with the school.

No?

ColinRH · Aug 15, 2020

Hello Agx,
Thanks for your reply and information. Is the item below suitable? It doesn't say whether it is dry or in a solution - or does it?? This is my problem. If it is not in solution how would I make it up?
Gold(III) chloride , >=99.99% trace metals basis

The item in the list below it is slightly cheaper bur says that it is in deionised water rather than distilled water which I would think is not suitable.

Thanks for your interest - eli griggs too.

ColinRH · Aug 15, 2020

OK - so I have just found on Wynn White's notes that gold chloride appears to be a dry product - I guess rather like silver nitrate. If that is the case, mixing dry I see as no problem, would I be right?? I seem to think so..

Lachlan Young · Aug 15, 2020

ColinRH said:
Thanks for your replies.
The problem is that US suppliers will not/cannot post to UK.
It would appear Tetenal is in administration and unlikely to make any more.
My preference is to mix my own and the usual supplies have also dried up. I have found ,what to me, appears to be a supplier but not being a chemist I don't know what I am looking at! Unless it is sold by a photographic supplier as 'gold chloride' I have no idea what to buy.
If there are any knowledgeable chemists looking on perhaps you might have a look at the site below and tell me if that is what is required. I would be very pleased.

https://www.scientificlabs.co.uk/search/DEFAULT/1/gold chloride

Thanks in hopefulness!

Moersch sells both a standard gold toner and other variants including Nelson's Gold Toner. Buy from Process Supplies or direct from Moersch if Process don't stock it. Various people can supply Gold Chloride if you need it.

Tetenal's product is essentially similar to Moersch MT10.

guangong · Aug 15, 2020

Follow Agx’s advice...make it yourself. Gold chloride must still be available from laboratory chemical supply houses. Formula is readily available in many photographic lab handbooks.

AgX · Aug 15, 2020

My advice was on making Goldchloride himself, not just the toner. As the OP in his first post already referred to mixing the toner himself.
But seen his lack of chemical insight, I strongly warn against the former.

Donald Qualls · Aug 16, 2020

Making gold chloride isn't a home project (at least for normal people). At the least, it will require making aqua regia -- combining two hazardous acids (concentrated nitric and concentrated hydrochloric) -- in order to react with gold (because neither nitric acid nor hydrochloric acid will react with gold at a useful rate, even if heated, but aqua regia will). You'll also need to have "fine" gold, purer than even 24k -- for which you'll probably have to pay bullion price (and a premium to get it in gram quantities -- last I saw, gold was headed for $4000 per Troy ounce, which is around $130+ per gram, plus the premium for handling and packaging those tiny gram-range flakes).

Once you have the gold dissolved in the aqua regia, you have to ensure that it precipitates as the chloride, not the nitrate (I'm not a chemist, so I don't know if that's a problem or not), and dispose of leftover acid.

I expect Nile Red or Cody's Lab on YouTube likely has a video about this process (Cody or a close relative owns a closed-down gold mine and Cody has a slightly impaired sense of self-preservation, and Nile Red is a real chemist); might be worth searching and viewing before making the decision to attempt to get the chemicals to make your own gold chloride.

fgorga · Aug 16, 2020

Retired chemistry professor here.

If I was going to make gold toner using a product from the supplier you suggest, I would purchase this product: https://www.scientificlabs.co.uk/product/G4022-1G. For photographic purposes one does not need to spend the extra money on the highest purity material available.

If your recipe calls for anhydrous gold chloride you should use 1.17 times more of the trihydrate to take into account the mass of the water.

The molar mass of gold(III) chloride is 303.33. The molar mass of waters is 18. Thus the molar mass of the trihydrate is 357.33 (i.e. 303.33 + 18 + 18 + 18). Thus you need 357.33/303.33 = 1.17 times more of the trihydrate than of the anhydrous to get the same amount of gold.

AgX · Aug 16, 2020

Donald Qualls said:
Making gold chloride isn't a home project (at least for normal people). At the least, it will require making aqua regia -- combining two hazardous acids (concentrated nitric and concentrated hydrochloric) -- in order to react with gold (because neither nitric acid nor hydrochloric acid will react with gold at a useful rate, even if heated, but aqua regia will).
Once you have the gold dissolved in the aqua regia, you have to ensure that it precipitates as the chloride, not the nitrate (I'm not a chemist, so I don't know if that's a problem or not), and dispose of leftover acid.

To make it worse, what I overlooked, the reaction with Aqua Regia will not even deliver Goldchloride, but instead Chloroauric Acid... Thus one better keeps off the file from the Gold jewellery...

Donald Qualls · Aug 17, 2020

AgX said:
To make it worse, what I overlooked, the reaction with Aqua Regia will not even deliver Goldchloride, but instead Chloroauric Acid... Thus one better keeps off the file from the Gold jewellery...

And as I noted, you need gold purer than anything used for jewelry; otherwise, you'll get a lot of alloying agents and little gold in the final result. Silver and copper are both more reactive than gold (though platinum and iridium, used in "white gold", are not). Coin gold might work well enough, but coins that were intended for circulation (like American Eagles and Double Eagles -- $10 and $20 respectively, back when the dollar was fixed to gold at under a dollar a gram) were still alloyed for durability (not the same as "debased" -- this was done openly, and the coin's value was based on the actual gold content).

Bottom line: gold chloride is best purchased, and not that hard to obtain. Expensive, of course -- just like platinum chloride and palladium chloride for platinum/palladium printing, only less so.

RalphLambrecht · Aug 17, 2020

AgX said:
Make Goldchloride yourself.

How;golg und Königswasser?

AgX · Aug 17, 2020

Yes Ralph, but as indicated that reaction will go into a different direction.

Donald, over here when talking of Gold coins we mean those of 24 carat, and actually I first wrote coins, but found jewellery give a better image, though knowing that 24carat jewellery is on the rarer side.
(It exists, and when a higher strenght is needed the object is cold formed, without resorting to any alloy.)

Donald Qualls · Aug 18, 2020

@AgX even 24k isn't pure the way bullion coin is pure. Bullion coin is generally at least .995 fine (no more than 0.5% impurities), often .999, while 24k (as I recall, I could have the figure wrong but not the concept) can be up to around 2% alloying material (often a mix of copper and silver to preserve color), which would be about .980 fine and generally isn't even referred to with the "fine" designation. Even 24k jewelry needs that little bit of alloy because genuinely pure gold is so soft it wears quickly -- won't hold a polish, setting prongs won't stay tight, etc.

AgX · Aug 18, 2020

Donald Qualls said:
while 24k (as I recall, I could have the figure wrong but not the concept) can be up to around 2% alloying material

To my sources 24carat Gold may only have 0.01% alloys.

Could there be internationally different regulations on jewellery gold?

Donald Qualls · Aug 18, 2020

AgX said:
Could there be internationally different regulations on jewellery gold?

Highly probable. What i recall is probably the definition from the jewelry trade, not something based on laws in a particular country. Your version would be .9999 fine. I prefer to quote the "fine" rating, since it's less prone to interpretation.

What do you do now that all the gold toner has gone missing

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