one of the tests we do here at QSB to the silver that we get when it comes in from unknown sources or unknown products as we run it through our annealing furnace and what it does is it lets us know the content of the silver that's in it right here we have a 90 percent silver dollar it's well worn but it's been buffed up so it will show up this is a sterling silver metal that was done in the 70s which was the standard then and then we have one of our silver rounds that's at least three nines fine so we're going to run through the furnace right now and then we're going to see what they look like when they come out the other side first the dollar then the sterling and now our three 9s fine silver these are three pieces of silver the furnace here runs at about 1600 degrees Fahrenheit takes about five minutes for the silver to go through and we want to get this over to be at least a thousand degrees Fahrenheit to be able to anneal it so first off here here's the Morgan dollar I guess you can see the color of that we'll set that right there there's the sterling silver and there's our three nines these are very very hot I touched that I would have a nice blister so you can see this is a great test if they're plated it'll even burn through the plating so it's a one of the first tests that we use when we receive silver from a dealer or from the public to check on its purity okay this is another test that we perform when we have metals come in it's the Sigma Mehta lytx tester it's become a great tool that we use here it's a precious metals verifier so I've set it up here it's set right now for three nine silver so I'm going to push the button that I can run it tells me it's ready for me to put the silver on there for three nines I put our silver on there it's within the range it's a little actually above the center so I'm actually going to push it up a notch let's take it up to four nines our silvers right in the middle of the four nine so we actually have contemplated putting three 9s plus on our silver but our silver is at least three nines and usually better this was what the Canadians found too and they decided to put four nines on there so now let's go back here to the three nines let's run our sterling on there you see it's below the range and then here's the Morgan Silver Dollar that's also below the range so now let's take it to sterling we'll start it put our sterling on there it's right in the range let's see what happens with the Morgan dollar it's within that range but you can see it's below there's not a lot of difference there between nine to five and ninety percent so if we move it over to a Morgan Silver Dollar and put it on there it's actually a little high so actually probably what has happened here is more than most of the silver and the silver dollar is in the center and as the outer layers have worn it's gotten rid of the copper but the Chinese counter fits a lot of them it's very easy to find out if they're counterfeit well here's a blank that say we we know that it's plated we segregate everything but if you had something that came in there there was no markings and no way to really know we can put it on the tester and it shows us with the arrow that there isn't any silver in it other than what's on the outside so this is a plated blank half ounce within our range now the great thing with this little instrument is that it can do gold but it can do different types of gold there's sterling gold let me run back here to pure gold here's a bar here's a credit Swiss bar that we have so we'll run it shows that it is pure okay so the first test of these two tests that we do one is non-destructive and one is destructive now we didn't destroy the items that we tested today but we did turn two of them black in a way that destroyed the value of those pieces so when we do get items that we have questions about this is the first test that we do because it's not going to destroy something that could potentially still be valuable even though it's sterling silver so if you if you've purchased a piece of Chinese panda that you're not sure about you've done a magnet test on it you can't tell the weight seems right tungsten is the same density almost as gold so if it's been made out of tungsten it's going to be the same thickness same diameter same characteristics as a real one this is a great test to use without having to cut the piece in half and see in what color the metal is inside that's a destructive test you probably won't get your money back but what if you accidentally cut it in half and find out oh you know what it really was a Chinese panda and it really is gold then you've just lost a lot of money so this is a great way to have peace of mind and knowing what you've done for the amount of money that this machine costs you pay for itself in in weeks or months what a great asset it is to have this and it's very portable something that you can put in there's a little backpack it comes in you throw it in there take it to a coin show with you take it to the office pull some items out and you can do a quick test on them and we'll verify any suspicions that you might have good baseball is the part where the skyline