Carats are the way of measuring the quality of gold jewellery. You must have all heard of 9 carat, 18 carat and 24 carat gold? Well what exactly is a carat?
To explain this I will have to give you a brief explanation about gold.
24 carat gold is pure gold. This means that the gold is not mixed with any other base metals to form an alloy (a mixture of metals). As precious as it may be, 24 carat gold is rather soft for a metal and doesn’t make particularly strong jewellery. So, it is mixed in a recipe (more about this later) with other metals and ‘diluted’ down to make it stronger.
The optimum level and the one that makes the best gold jewellery is 18 carat gold.
This simply means that 18 parts to six parts are gold (out of 24 parts and equal to around about 75%). So to clarify; If 24 carats (24 parts) is pure, unadulterated gold. Then 18 carats (18 parts) is around 75% pure gold and 25% other metal for hardness.
So with this in mind we can easily work out that one single carat is 1/24th of the metal.
So if alloys make gold harder and longer lasting whys is 18 carat better than say 9 or 14 carat?
Answered simply; the durability of 18 carat gold is greater than that of 9 carat gold.
To explain what I mean by durability imagine holding up two spheres, one made of glass which is harder than the other made of rubber.
Dropped from a height, the rubber sphere will bounce but the hard glass sphere will shatter. 18 carat gold is more durable than 9 carat gold and doesn’t break as easily.
Another good reason for choosing 18 carat gold over 9 carat gold is that 18 carat is almost completely resistant to attack from normal chemicals. 9 carat gold however, will go dull in colour and even turn black when it is exposed to chemicals in the atmosphere. This can also happen with contact to perspiration and household cleaning products.
The ‘recipe’ alloy that gold is mixed with is a combination of different metals to form an alloy. Different metals have different properties that can be altered by rolling and stretching to become harder (but more brittle) and heating (annealing) to different temperatures then cooled in certain ways to soften the metal to just the right durability. This process is individual to master jewellers and can make the difference in the quality of the jewellery that they produce.
The method for measuring the way that an alloy (pure gold is a metal too, and when mixed with other metals it is classed as an alloy) is by using the Vickers scale.
This is explained more HERE.
I hope this helps you when you go to choose new jewellery or you are trying to sell scrap jewellery. Try HERE for that - best prices we've found.
I enclose a video by new band Johnossi call 18 Karat Gold. This is really quite good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnju3KTRh5A
Wednesday, 9 September 2009
Wednesday, 2 September 2009
How to Keep an eye on the price of gold to sell scrap gold
Scrap gold has become valuable due to the steadily rising price of gold on the gold markets. So it makes sense to sell any unwanted scrap gold now while the going is good.
After topping $1,000 an ounce in mid-February the price of gold levelled off and ran at a yearly average of $1030. Historically, these prices are very high. Yet, we face the threat of more serious substantial global inflation mainly, as a result of fighting the global recession so will gold prices remain as high?
If you check with the City anylists you get a mixed bag of response but the underlying feeling is that Gold prices won’t rise much more than they are now and even may fall a little. It would take an interesting mix of global market shifts to increase the price of gold.
The Weak rate dollar is actually helping sustain the high price of gold as Western investors love put their money into gold. Yet the Asian markets shy away from buying gold when the price is strong?
I think we could be in for a great run of high price per ounce, said Mark Arbeter, who is the chief technical strategist for Standard & Poor's. Who are the world's foremost provider of independent credit ratings, indices, risk evaluation, investment research and data.
"Of course, some of this has to do with the action of the stock market," he added. "The weaker the stock market is, then the better that gold will perform."
Gold prices really have soared recently to high levels that have not been seen since the mid 1980s. From $430 per ounce in April 2005 to $555 an ounce towards 2005 years’ end, then up to $750 per ounce near the end of 2007, and to the very much anticipated $1,000 per ounce in the spring of 2008.
This is great news for people who want to get rid of their scrap gold. The prices are high - lets hope they stay that way!
Some of the highest prices paid for Scrap Gold can be found here ate Ashleys.
http://www.scrapgoldwebuy.co.uk Call them on 01303 248584
You can also keep an I on the International gold prices with a home page RSS feed.
If you have any scrap gold. Now is the time to sell it.
After topping $1,000 an ounce in mid-February the price of gold levelled off and ran at a yearly average of $1030. Historically, these prices are very high. Yet, we face the threat of more serious substantial global inflation mainly, as a result of fighting the global recession so will gold prices remain as high?
If you check with the City anylists you get a mixed bag of response but the underlying feeling is that Gold prices won’t rise much more than they are now and even may fall a little. It would take an interesting mix of global market shifts to increase the price of gold.
The Weak rate dollar is actually helping sustain the high price of gold as Western investors love put their money into gold. Yet the Asian markets shy away from buying gold when the price is strong?
I think we could be in for a great run of high price per ounce, said Mark Arbeter, who is the chief technical strategist for Standard & Poor's. Who are the world's foremost provider of independent credit ratings, indices, risk evaluation, investment research and data.
"Of course, some of this has to do with the action of the stock market," he added. "The weaker the stock market is, then the better that gold will perform."
Gold prices really have soared recently to high levels that have not been seen since the mid 1980s. From $430 per ounce in April 2005 to $555 an ounce towards 2005 years’ end, then up to $750 per ounce near the end of 2007, and to the very much anticipated $1,000 per ounce in the spring of 2008.
This is great news for people who want to get rid of their scrap gold. The prices are high - lets hope they stay that way!
Some of the highest prices paid for Scrap Gold can be found here ate Ashleys.
http://www.scrapgoldwebuy.co.uk Call them on 01303 248584
You can also keep an I on the International gold prices with a home page RSS feed.
If you have any scrap gold. Now is the time to sell it.
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