- Weight
- Price
- Rarity- gold is usually found as tiny nuggets and most are even too small to see with the naked eye.
- It is too malleable – it can be shaped freely by hand, this isn’t suitable for jewellery.
Another useful property of pure gold is that it is non-toxic and non-irritating when ingested and may be eaten- it is a component of some alcoholic drinks.
Alloying
Alloying is the combination of two or more elements, at least one of which is a metal. Alloys are usually prepared to improve the properties of a metal of make it more efficient. The new metal retains properties of all the metals which were combined- allowing it to have all the desirable properties in one metal.
A solution to pure gold is alloying. It allows gold to become more exotic colours: white, rose, green and even purple. Gold becomes less malleable- this allows gold to endure time longer – how else can the most malleable metal have been discovered from over 3000 years ago?
What we buy is really gold with cheaper alloys. White gold, rose gold and most common gold sold by jewellers are all just alloyed metals. Most common of which is the cheap copper or nickel alloy.
Comparison Photos
- 18K yellow gold
- 18K white gold, rhodium plated
- 18K palladium white gold, not plated
Alloying increases durability and increases the quality of gold, as you can see in the above image. Alloying makes gold more beautiful and exotic: like white gold. But the real question is – do we (the public) really know what we get when we buy gold? Why are we not told that some sold is only 37.5% gold? Should we know that a cheap metal such as copper is also in our jewellery?
Carats
Carat is a measure of the purity of gold and other rare metals. As a measure of purity: one carat is 1/24 by mass. Another way of measuring “pureness” in gold is the millesimal fineness which is measured in parts per thousand of the pure metal in the alloy.
18K gold is the most recognised global standard and is marked as “750” in Europe and “18K” in the USA.
This table shows the equivalent of carats to millesimal fineness.
Each number of carats gives the gold entirely different characteristics, however 18K is generally the hardest and hardest wearing.
Durability
18K gold is usually the most resilient and durable. It is also extremely hard. Hardness doesn’t mean an object is more durable as there are many other variables that must be considered.
Tarnishing
Gold does not react to most chemical attacks, 18K gold will almost never be tarnished yet a lower quality 9K gold ring may discolour. This is what makes gold one of the noble metals: they are called the noble metals due to their corrosion and oxidation resistance and their chemical stability.
Metallurgy
Metals are divided into two main groups: "Ferrous" and "non-Ferrous." Ferrous metals contain Iron and Non-Ferrous metals are "Nobel" or "Precious Metals," Base Metals, and Light Metals.
Conclusion
I have learned a great deal about gold from this report- it can seem that gold alloys lets the public get the most out of their money.
This is because if we only sold 24K Pure Gold we wouldn’t be able to find gold in great condition from over 3000 years ago. Gold Jewellery would be too heavy thus making it unfavourable. This increases the life span of gold jewellery by a tremendous amount.
When I started this report I thought that white gold, yellow gold and so on were all just “normal” gold found as it is. I thought that rose gold was just a rarer type of gold found as it is with no help from humans but I was wrong. Rose gold is manufactured with gold and copper.
I never really understood what Karats were, but I believe there are still many people in the UK who blindly spend a load of money for low quality 9K gold which isn’t very durable and only have around 30% gold.
Jewellers should make it aware to their customers just how much gold is in their jewellery and how white gold is an alloy of gold, whereas before they conveniently forgot that fact.
Furthermore white gold is most commonly alloyed with nickel. One in eight people are allergic to it. A typical reaction is a minor skin rash but many people do not know they are allergic to the nickel but think it is the gold.
By Suresh Liyanarachchi
Candidate Number: 3086