Hello Arduino enthusiasts! I'm curious about the potential uses of precious metals like gold, silver, and platinum in our Arduino projects, particularly for their conductive properties. Have any of you incorporated these materials in your circuits or sensors? What challenges did you face, and what benefits did you observe? Let’s share experiences and tips on using these high-conductivity metals to enhance our projects!
HI, @johamsmith
How do you envisage these metals enhancing our projects?
At what cost?
Are you aware that a lot of electrical components already use precious metals in their construction, for physical and electrical reasons.
Conductivity advantages would only be of any reward if very high currents are involved, and I would envisage an Arduino project would not be suitable for that application.
Tom.. 
1 Like
Conductivity is rarely an issue and copper is one of the best conductors and very close to gold so you can just use a slightly-thicker copper copper wire to beat gold. (I don't know that much about other metals but most tend to be "similar".)
The resistances/resistors in MOST "Arduino circuits" is in the k-Ohm range or higher. Short copper wires have resistance of less than 1-Ohm so lowering it makes zero difference in performance.
Gold plated contacts are often used in connectors because it doesn't corrode. (That's not a problem with wires, just where two contacts come together.)
@johamsmith
In some countries, electronic devices are often dismantled in search of expensive metals.
Is your interest of the same kind? Do you want to know how much gold there is in Arduino?
I've seen silver plated wire used in high power radio transmitters.
At high frequencies the skin effect comes into play, and the current flows in the higher conductivity silver plating rather than the copper core.
I wouldn't consider platinum "high-conductivity metal"
No, because of the price. I'm certainly not going to use 24K gold in an Arduino project. Same with silver - still too expensive.
Aluminum, on the other hand may provide you with the best metal to use in place of copper in your application to run some tests, whatever tests you intend to run.
There may be instances as well where the best replacement for your application is using fiber optic cable, depending on what you're trying to accomplish.
I've fixed broken AA battery boxes in old toys with aluminum foil. Worked great.
I've used carbon to make circuit board traces on paper by coloring in heavy lines with #2 pencil and used steel(?) paperclips as battery terminals. Worked well enough to light up a couple of LEDs with my kids.
1 Like
Please tell us about your experience.
Silver is the most conductive metal at room temperature.
Gold is used for contacts because it doesn't tarnish like silver.
If you want a challenge, do what you can with more common materials.
Personal experience with silver.
My electronic assembly service had a customer that supplied printed circuit boards with silver plating on the copper traces. The boards/panels all came in vacuum sealed bags with enclosed desiccant.
Before use, so the solder paste would work, we had to scrub the boards with tarnish remover and Scotchbright abrasive pads. Then flush with water and thoroughly dry. Then to the pick and place machine.
After inspection the finished boards were again, sealed in vacuum bags with more desiccant and shipped to the customer.
Just a pain to work with!
1 Like
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I wonder whether johamsmith is going to come back and add spam to this topic.
He's a new member, that joined today at 1:27, posted at 1:29, and left at 1:35. Asked a slightly odd question.
That all looks suspicious to me.
He's certainly not interested in our replies.
I'm keeping my eye on him.
Edit:
My suspicion proved right by post #21, now deleted.
1 Like
Silver needing to be plated adds to costs. Thicker copper beats the crud out of that!
Is it possible that currently impossible or impractical carbon materials like graphene may change all of that and that carbon may becme the new steel? I imagine only that some day, burning coal will be viewed as insane waste!
I live in the Central Oregon desert. Once, years ago while out hiking somewhere, I found the remains of a high power radar transmitter. Being the scrounger that I am, I lugged the pieced back to the truck. They were all brass with silver plating, including a huge tube socket. There were lots flat plate pieces, so I was able to use them for something. I still have some of the pieces in the scrap brass bin.
I never found why the stuff was dumped out there.
1 Like
Brass is good for being machined into intricate shapes, but has poor conductivity relative to copper.
Radar frequencies are high enough for the skin effect to come into play.
The radar signals are conducted in the silver plating and not the brass.
1 Like
Aliens?
Typical locals!
There should have been a large magnet on the Klystron tube!
Nope. Socket was for a very large triode or pentode tube.
We used older tech (1952) in the late 70's to spot arty shells!
Newer units came out later but what we had worked well.