Dissolving trivalent gold / gold fulminate into ammonium sulfite is a common task when developing gold electrolyte bath for gold electro forming. According to patents ive read it happens readily and at room temperature, usually adding 3x as much ammonium sulfite as there is to precipitate. However, in practicality, I keep failing at this step. The gold wants to stay in the precipitate instead of getting reduced to monovalent gold ammonium sulfite. I have been doing a lot of research on this and thus far, most of the people involved in the original patents are deceased or retired. One tidbit I picked up today is that my starting gold concentration in the precipitate approx 14 grams may not have been enough to dissolve into the ammonium sulfite solution. I am wondering if anyone may have any insight as to why Im not getting the expected result?
Thank you in advance