Neusilber vs silver

[Albert]

Hi Dietrich,

I see you got nothing to do today This is what I was talking about in a little bit less scientific terms However, may I add something as I said above that following this path would be nothing more than an academic exercise that could not yield any results for practical application:

You say: "But in general, one can say that a Neusilber frame cross will weigh about 3-4% less than a silver frame one."

My comment: Not in general, but in lab conditions with 100% control of material input and assembly under a 0% tolerance assumption!

You say: "And this is not an opinion, this is facts."

My comment: Yes, but how is Tom, or you, or I going to apply that fact looking at a mint EK and trying to figure out if its frame is made of Neusilber or silber?

Here is the dilemma that started all this (Tom I hope you don't mind): if I go to take a look at a minty unmarked RK tomorrow. What do I have to do to tell if its frame is made of silver or Neusilber? Can it be told in the field rather than in a lab?

I have heard from collectors of Soviet medals that one can use some kind of a mild acid to check precious metals. If the speciman is made of gold or silver it will not react in any way. If not the test will stain the speciman. Well, might work on a Gold Star but I doubt anybody would allow me to apply some acid to their RK So is there a fool proof, not so scientific, method?

Albert

[Dietrich Maerz]

Hi Albert,

you are right, I'm a little bored today and make comments left and right....
And you must be bored too since you found that out


And you are also right about the comments about the calculation and that those are only correct if done in a labratory. What I wanted to show is only that a Neusilber frame cross will weight less (3-4%) than a silver frame cross.
If the calculation would have shown lets say 10% it would have been a lot more usefull. But I like doing things like that, anyway.

Is the error of marging in other areas bigger than thoses 3-4% in the field? Most likely! I would not trust it 100% but I would use it as a benchmark.

But a fool proof method will always be a scientific one. So back to chemistry.

Dietrich

[Darrell]

Tom,

here is what mathematics has to say about this. And it will be boring...

Sounds like Engineer talk to me