Benefits and uses of silver. What is the difference between technical silver and jewelry?

Silver, like gold, occurs in nature in the form of nuggets and has good malleability. Thanks to these properties, it has played a vital role in the cultural, economic and even religious life of society since ancient times.

The age of the first ones found in the Middle East is more than 6 thousand years. This metal was a symbol of the moon for the inhabitants of Babylon and Assyria. The material for the world's first coins was an alloy of the two most popular precious metals today - silver and gold. And in the Middle Ages, “argentum” (Latin) and its compounds excited the minds of alchemists.

Today, this metal opens up endless possibilities for the imagination of jewelers who create unique jewelry.

Silver in nature

Appearing before the admiring gaze of man in its native form, silver reached truly enormous sizes. Thus, the German Schneeberg deposit (Ore Mountains) gave the world a silver nugget weighing 20 tons back in 1477. Perhaps, in the entire history of the development of this noble metal, only Canadians managed to break the record, who already in the twentieth century found a nugget in the province of Ontario, called the “silver pavement.” The giant, which was 30 m long and 18 m deep into the ground, also yielded 20 tons when melted - but this time it was pure silver.

Unfortunately, greater chemical activity than gold allows a person to encounter silver more often in the form of various compounds. It is concentrated in more than 50 known minerals containing selenium, sulfur, tellurium or halogens. And 75% of currently known silver reserves come from complex silver-bearing deposits, where silver is only an associated component in other ores.

Today, silver reserves in the world are estimated at 570,000 tons. The undisputed leader in the production of this metal is Peru, followed closely by Mexico, China, Chile and Australia.

Properties of “lunar metal”

Silver in pure form- a metal of silver-white color, which has the highest heat and (at room temperature) electrical conductivity. This metal is relatively refractory (melts at 962 °C), but is incredibly ductile. The thinnest wire 2 km long can be obtained from just 1 g of silver. An important criterion for silver is its property of not oxidizing under the influence of oxygen, which allows it to be classified as a noble metal. However, exposure to iodine and hydrogen sulfide in a humid environment leads to darkening silver products or the formation of a “rainbow” sulfide film on their surface.

Silver lends itself perfectly to processing: polishing, cutting, twisting, drawing and rolling into the thinnest plates. These properties make it indispensable for the manufacture of jewelry masterpieces, but at the same time they limit the shelf life of soft and delicate products from pure metal. Therefore in jewelry To achieve strength, silver is used in the form of an alloy with the addition of copper.

Sterling silver

The most reliable, immaculately white and durable material For making jewelry, 925 silver is used, also called sterling silver. This is pure silver with a small amount Copper has long been considered ideal for making tableware and most jewelry. Despite all attempts to improve the characteristics of this alloy with the help of zinc, silicon, germanium and even platinum, 925 silver does not give up its leadership position.

New century - new style

The unique style of 925 silver is given by special processing methods. For example, brilliant brightness, unusual pure silver, creates a thin coating of precious white rhodium. Rhodium plated silver not only looks attractive, but is also particularly resistant to corrosion and mechanical damage. Rhodium's platinum shine and durability have been appreciated by fashion trendsetters such as Gucci, Tiffany and Christian Dior, choosing it to cover his silver products.

Also, a thin layer of oxidized silver gives special decorative and protective properties to 925 silver jewelry. Having passed special treatment grey, silver acquires a special charm and “aged”, vintage charm. Thanks to special polishing, the convex parts of the product retain their natural silver color, standing out in relief against the background of darker concave elements.

Another way to give silver an original color is the age-old secret of blackening silver that never goes out of fashion. Having a certain external resemblance to oxidized metal, blackened silver is the result of a very special art. During the processing of the product, the coating of sulphide oxide of silver, lead and copper (niello) is fused at high temperature with an engraved silver surface, creating exquisite patterns.

And products made from so-called matte silver, on the surface of which microroughness appears due to the use of a special emulsion, have a special nobility and sophistication.

When talking about silver processing, one cannot fail to mention gilding. Gilding (gold plating) is the electroplating of silver with a layer of gold ranging in thickness from fractions to tens of microns. This coating has great chemical resistance, that is, it good remedy protecting metal from corrosion. Electroplating increases surface hardness and improves aesthetic appearance, giving jewelry a noble and expensive look. Gold plating also imparts greater thermal and electrical conductivity, which is used in watchmaking and fine electronics.

Silver in jewelry fashion

Due to its availability, silver is one of the most popular materials for making jewelry today. It is also valued by jewelers as well as metal for making decorative items that create a sophisticated aristocratic atmosphere in the house.

Silver jewelry surprise their lovers with variety decorative solutions and design finds. Elegant and laconic classic models in shop windows jewelry stores juxtaposed with bright, voluminous decorations inspired by leading fashion trends. The versatility of silver is also manifested in its “friendship” with the most different inserts. Both colorless cubic zirconia and colored cubic zirconia look equally good in its frame. semiprecious stones. Silver reveals the full play of light on the edges of the inserts.

One of the popular techniques for decorating jewelry made from this precious metal is jewelry enamel. With its help, a variety of jewelry is created that have their own individuality - after all, each product is painted exclusively by hand experienced craftsman. They bear the imprint of the soul of enamellers who put all their creativity into jewelry.

Being universal material, silver is suitable for men and women of any age and social status. It is combined with gold, enamel, any semi-precious and precious stones, pearls and enamel, corals and ivory. Silver jewelry is suitable for any occasion and among the variety of silver jewelry you can choose the right one for the most different occasions. In addition, according to ancient beliefs, silver calms and heals, so in the crazy age of speed, you shouldn’t deny yourself a little silver joy.

Silver is noble metal, which is widely used in various industries. The silver mining industry cannot keep up with the growing demand for this precious metal. Demand is increasing all the time, and its natural reserves are irrevocably depleted. Some silver experts believe that in the near future, silver will become more expensive. made from recycled materials, playing today big role in meeting growing human needs. The price of silver is rising all the time. Today, investing in is great way preserve and increase your savings. Despite the fact that silver is cheaper than gold, they still try to extract it from old radio components. Silver-containing scrap from obsolete radio components is melted down. The silver contained in radio components has a name - “”.

Technical silver, used in electrical engineering, is obtained mainly without impurities. However, it can be presented in the form of various silver alloys, where the main metal is silver. Technical silver is a relative concept. There is no clear definition of what it is technical silver? In terms of its chemical composition, technical silver is not much different from jewelry silver. Technical silver can be defined as products used in the technical field and mainly made of high-grade silver.

Technical silver is basically always containing an insignificant amount of impurities, where they chemical composition strictly defined. Electrical silver, unlike jewelry silver, performs not an aesthetic, but a technical function. For technical silver, much higher value has: electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity and light reflection, but for jewelry silver these properties do not matter.

In plates intended for soldering and tinning.

Silver solders in the form of wire are used for soldering and tinning of various products.

Silver is used to make batteries.

PDA capacitors are silver-plated plates and a ceramic insulator, which can be found in any radios, receivers and television modulators.

The main precious metal in variable resistors is silver.

Photo of a connector made of beryllium-copper alloy coated with silver.

Cable with a central silver-plated monocore, double braided: copper outside, silver plated inside.

Silver ink, which is a transparent solution of silver acetate in ammonia, is applied by the printer to the surface of the dielectric, where the ink dries, losing the liquid component of the solution, leaving metallic silver on the surface of the track. New silver ink is applied to flexible materials (plastic, paper, fabric) and is intended for printing electronic microcircuits.

Played important role in the development of capitalism and the formation of its economic mechanism. The position of gold, historically a monetary metal, changed with the development of capitalist relations. Each stage of capitalist production more or less fully corresponded to a specific monetary system with a general tendency to reduce the volume of monetary functions of gold. Currently, it has been legally removed from monetary circulation and has formally lost all connection with the monetary system. Nevertheless, as a former monetary metal, it continues to retain a number of important properties that distinguish it from the rest of the commodity mass.

First of all, gold remains a material stored in government reserves and private accumulation, which is due to its high mobility and liquidity, i.e. ability to serve as an absolute means of purchase and payment. For capitalist states, gold is an insurance and reserve fund, allowing, in case of emergency, to receive means of payment in any national currency. And, although the same funds can be obtained from the sale of other foreign currency goods, for example, oil, timber, grain, etc., gold has a number of advantages in comparison with them: high specific value, compactness, and transportability.

Gold has a unique complex of physical and chemical properties, which no other metal has. It is highly resistant to aggressive environments and is second only to silver and copper in electrical and thermal conductivity. Gold is very technologically advanced, it is easy to make ultra-thin foil and micron wire from it, it is easily soldered and welded under pressure, and gold coatings are easily applied to ceramics. Gold almost completely reflects infrared rays and has catalytic activity in alloys. Such a set beneficial properties gold is the reason for its widespread use in critical industries modern technology: electronics, communications technology, space and aviation technology, nuclear energy, etc.

Gold and it are widely used for making contacts in low-current technology ( modern systems communication and control, computer). The good electrical conductivity and non-oxidation of gold ensures reliable operation of such contacts over a long service life.

In the form of thin coatings on glass, ceramics, and quartz, gold is widely used in electronic devices, semiconductor elements, and microcircuits for transmitting electric current. Such films: are characterized by high electrical conductivity and corrosion resistance.

Gold-based solders have valuable properties. They can wet the most various materials, have high corrosion resistance, manufacturability, provide greater strength and heat resistance of soldered joints. The low vapor pressure of these solders allows them to be used for soldering vacuum-tight seams. The main consumer of gold solders is the electronics industry, where they are used for soldering parts and assemblies of waveguides, electronic tubes and lamps, radar equipment, vacuum devices, when installing semiconductor integrated circuits. Solders; Gold-based materials are also used for soldering the most critical components of nuclear power plants, aircraft and rocket engines, space equipment, etc.

Gold and it are used for the manufacture of precision potentiometers, thermocouples, and resistance thermometers.

Due to its high reflectivity with respect to infrared rays, gold coatings are used to protect spacecraft from solar radiation. Yes, some details spaceships Apollo and the astronauts' equipment were covered with a thin layer of gold.

In the chemical industry, gold-clad steel pipes are used to transport particularly aggressive liquids. Some gold is used as catalysts.

Dentistry consumes significant amounts of gold: crowns and dentures are made from alloys of gold with silver, copper, nickel, platinum, and zinc. Such alloys combine corrosion resistance with high mechanical properties.

Gold compounds are found in some medical supplies, used to treat a number of diseases (tuberculosis, rheumatoid arthritis, etc.). Radioactive gold is used in the treatment of malignant tumors.

The traditional and largest consumer of gold is the jewelry industry. Jewelry is made not from pure gold, but from its alloys with other metals, which are significantly superior to gold in mechanical strength and durability. Currently, Au-Ag-Cu alloys are used for this, which may contain additives of zinc, nickel, cobalt, and palladium. The corrosion resistance of such alloys is determined mainly by their gold content, and the color shades and mechanical properties- the ratio of silver and copper.

The most important characteristic of jewelry is its fineness, which characterizes the gold content in it (for silver or platinum products - silver or platinum, respectively). Our country has a metric standard system, in which the gold content is indicated by the number of parts by weight in 1000 parts of the alloy. The same system is adopted in most countries. In accordance with it, pure gold has a fineness of 1000. Until 1927, in Russia there was a spool system for designating samples, according to which the gold content was expressed by the number of spools in one pound of alloy. According to this system, pure gold corresponded to a fineness of 96. In a number of countries (USA, Great Britain, Switzerland) a carat system was adopted, according to which pure gold (fineness 1000) corresponds to 24 conventional units - carats. Fineness of alloys in various systems is given below.

Metric….. 1000 958 750 583 375

Zolotnikovaya…. 96 92 72 56 36

Carat…… 24 23 18 4 9

In the CIS, the bulk of jewelry is produced from alloys of samples 750, 583 and 375. Abroad, 18- and 14-karat alloys are widely used, and 10- and 12-karat alloys are also used for cladding base metals.

Quite a significant amount of gold is used to mint coins and medals, decorative coverings and so on.

It should be noted that although in the total volume of industrial consumption, including the jewelry industry and dentistry, the share of gold spent for purely industrial purposes (electronics, communications technology, nuclear energy, space technology, etc.) is only 10-15%, the value The share of gold in the development of the latest branches of technology is growing very significantly and steadily despite the high cost of this metal.

Like gold, it has remarkable technical properties, thanks to which it is widely used in industry. It is distinguished by the highest electrical and thermal conductivity among metals, combined with low chemical activity, plasticity and high reflectivity. Very valuable properties possess some silver compounds. Unlike gold, the bulk of which is used in jewelry and related industries, silver is mainly spent on purely technical purposes.

The most important area of ​​silver consumption is the production of photosensitive materials for the film and photographic industries. The consumption of silver for the production of film and photographic materials is steadily increasing, however, despite all the efforts of scientists, full-fledged silver substitutes for these purposes have not yet been found.

A major area of ​​application of silver is electrical engineering and electronics, where the high electrical conductivity of silver, combined with chemical resistance, has predetermined its widespread use in the manufacture of contacts and conductors.

A significant amount of silver is spent on the manufacture of solders for soldering various metals and alloys. Silver solders produce strong and ductile solders that resist shock and vibration. Oxidation resistance has led to the widespread use of silver solders in aviation and space technology, and good electrical conductivity - in electrical engineering.

Silver-zinc and silver-cadmium batteries used in rocketry, submarines, etc. have high discharge characteristics. Miniature batteries containing

Silver and gold are similar in many ways. Both are precious metals. But silver has some advantages over gold, due to which silver can have important in future.

The enemy of gold is gold itself. Gold mined from the depths is not widely used. It is mainly used for jewelry production and is also used in investment. But if the price of gold rises, it can be easily returned to the market from these areas.

With silver the situation is completely different. Most of the silver mined each year is used in industry, primarily in electronics. Thus, a large number of silver is forever lost and cannot be returned to the market if necessary.

Most gold is stored in central bank vaults, but you won't find silver in them. This is due to the long-term shortage of silver in the 1980s, which was caused by inefficient mining. Therefore, states had to systematically cover this deficit from their reserves, and today these reserves are depleted.

Where is silver used?

Silver is a special metal due to its physical properties. Silver is the best conductor of all metals electricity and warmth. Therefore, silver is used in many areas. Many people don't even realize how many items around us use silver. Computers, television, Cell phones, cars, refrigerators - almost all electrical appliances contain silver to a greater or lesser extent. Silver is also used in medicine, chemistry, jewelry making, and so on. A lot of silver is used in the military industry: in missiles, torpedoes, and submarines.

Silver has great potential for use in future technologies: solar cell manufacturing, nanotechnology, and in new zinc-silver batteries to replace lithium-ion batteries. New silver batteries will last twice as long, there will be no danger of explosion, no toxicity. In the future, laptops based on these batteries will appear.

A new area of ​​silver use is the textile industry. An incredible 1,200 tons of silver are used annually in the production of polystyrene clothing with microscopic silver inserts.

Silver is a disinfectant because it has antibacterial properties. The cause of sweat odor is bacteria that grow on the surface of the skin. If you kill these bacteria with silver, the smell will disappear and there will no longer be a need for deodorant.

Silver's role as an investment asset has grown over the past few years. Forward-thinking investors have long realized the prospects of silver and are slowly accumulating it while the price is still low.

Where does silver come from?

The main source of silver is naturally obtained from mines. You might think that the recession industrial production due to the crisis will cause the demand for silver to fall, and this will lead to a fall in the price of silver? This is true. However, 2/3 of mined silver is a by-product from the extraction of the main metals: zinc, nickel, copper and lead. Due to the sharp drop in demand for base metals, many mines were closed. The reduction in the production of base metals logically caused the decline in silver production. The fall in silver production was much greater than the fall in demand for it in industry.

Another source of silver is recycling. But it is such a technologically complex process that its cost efficiency is very low.

Therefore, logically, we can expect that the economic crisis will affect not only the demand, but also the supply of silver. It is also important to understand that silver is not used in heavy industry, which was hit hardest by the crisis. Silver is mainly used in light industry and new technological areas that can best withstand the crisis. Therefore, from a long-term perspective, we can expect a significant increase in demand for silver.

As mentioned above, silver is used almost everywhere, but in very small quantities. Therefore, the price of silver does not greatly affect the cost of the final product that contains silver. Even if silver becomes more expensive many times over, manufacturers will still not try to find a substitute for it, since there is very little silver in the final product. If the price of silver begins to rise sharply, producers will even increase their silver inventories to ensure uninterrupted production.

The fact is that silver cannot be replaced in many products. Without it, these goods simply will not exist. If there is a silver shortage, new mines will not appear overnight. It takes ten years of preparation for a mine to start operating. There are not many mines in the world with sufficient concentrations of silver, and there are even fewer profitable mines.

About 30-40% of all silver produced is spent on the production of film and photographic materials. 20% silver in the form of alloys with gold, palladium, copper or zinc is used to make contacts, solders, and conductive layers in electrical engineering and electronics.

20-25% of the silver produced is used to produce silver-zinc batteries. Coins are made from a silver-based alloy jewelry, decorations and tableware.

An ancient use of silver was in making mirrors (nowadays inexpensive mirrors are coated with aluminum). Silver is used to make electrodes for powerful zinc-silver batteries. Thus, the batteries of the sunken American submarine Thrasher contained three tons of silver. The high thermal conductivity and chemical inertness of silver are used in electrical engineering: electrical contacts are made from silver and its alloys, and wires in critical devices are coated with silver. Dentures are made from silver-palladium alloy (75% Ag).

Huge amounts of silver used to be used to make coins. Nowadays, mainly commemorative and commemorative coins are made from silver. The heaviest modern silver coin, released in Russia in 1999, weighs 3000 grams and has a circulation of 150 pieces. It is dedicated to the 275th anniversary of the St. Petersburg Mint. With a high silver content, coins and other products are very stable in air. Low-grade silver often turns green. Green plaque contains basic copper carbonate (CuOH) 2 CO 3 . It is formed under the influence of carbon dioxide, water vapor and oxygen.

Silver compounds are often unstable to heat and light. The discovery of the photosensitivity of silver salts led to the advent of photography and a rapid increase in the demand for silver. Back in the mid-20s, about 10,000 tons of silver were mined annually around the world, and much more was spent (the deficit was covered by old reserves). Moreover, almost half of all silver was used for the production of film and photographic materials. Thus, ordinary black and white photographic film contains (before development) up to 5 g/m2 of silver. The displacement of black and white photographs and films by color has significantly reduced silver consumption.

Silver is also used in the chemical industry for the manufacture of catalysts for certain processes, and in Food Industry Non-corrosive devices are made from silver. Silver iodide has interesting, although limited, applications; it is used for local weather control by spraying from aircraft. In the presence of even minute amounts of AgI, large water droplets are formed in the clouds, which fall as rain. Even the smallest particles of silver iodide with a size of only 0.01 microns can “work”. Theoretically, from a cubic crystal of AgI just 1 cm in size, 10 21 of these tiny particles can be obtained. As American meteorologists have calculated, only 50 kg of silver iodide is enough to “seed” the entire atmosphere above the surface of the United States (which is 9 million square kilometers!). Therefore, despite the relatively high cost of silver salts, the use of AgI to induce artificial rain turns out to be practically profitable.