Report of 1 Kilo Gold Bar Filled with Tungsten Found in UK

Coinweek.com ^ | Mar 26, 2012

[Eye of Unk]

About two weeks ago the market was hit with someone selling one million ounces of gold, it was speculated as a war time tactic to buy fuel and munitions, but that was just a speculation and why gold dropped from its high perch by nearly $100 and ounce.

[Randy Larsen]

Save...

[Calvin Locke]

I saw this in some 1970s tv show/movie shortly after gold became legal to own in the US again.

The team “borrows” a colleague’s newly purchased gold investment bar to push as the randomly selected bar from the gold-coated tungsten stash they’re selling to some criminal.

The pushed bar is sawed in half, they get the money, swap the real cut bar for a faked cut tungsten bar, and skedaddle.

The criminals use a power saw on other samples, revealing the white tungsten.

Obviously, the ending scene is where the colleague gets his bar back in pieces and filings.

[The Duke]

Or, (if you don't have a Greek handy)...

• Put a tupperware container on a scale and record the weight.
• Put the gold into the tupperware and record the weight
• Pour water into the container until it reaches a known level (that covers the gold completely - precision required here!)

Enter the three numbers into a spreadsheet that calculates the density of the gold and compare to the expected density.

The density of tungsten is just 1.45% greater than that of gold, so the difference will be very small. So, make sure your scales are accurate and that the result is within 0.5% of what is expected.

[DuncanWaring]

He didn’t have to measure the volumes accurately.

All he had to do was put a bucket on each end of a balance, level the balance, and then put the overflow water from the crown in one bucket and the overflow from the reference mass in the other bucket, and see if they were the same weight.

[M1903A1]

There aren't even any metals, AFAIK, that would crack or crumble just by laying on a shelf.

Cheaply-cast industrial "white metal" will do some interesting things as it ages. Vintage model train collectors have horror stories of their precious pieces becoming almost too fragile to move lest they crumble.

That said, it'd be pretty hard to mistake that stuff for gold.

[Deaf Smith]

"We have decided to cut him"

He fired the employee who discovered the fake gold bar...the "old Fox".

[Chances Are]

“Open wide for Chunky!”

CA....

[Noumenon]

“Open wide for Chunky!”

I liked the dark chocolate ones with raisins.

As for the gold fraudsters, I expect that they’ll be opening wide for something.