Re: Silverado's abundant Antimony truly "The Forgotten Gem"
in response to
by
posted on
Oct 19, 2009 05:42AM
Some of the main uses of Antimony are as follows:
The most important use of antimony in the United States is in chemicals used to impregnate plastics, textiles, rubber, and other materials as a flame retardant – that is, a form of fireproofing. This is required by federal law for certain childrens' clothing. Over half the annual U.S. antimony consumption is for the manufacture of flame retardants. A portion of U.S. consumption is in antimony alloys. Antimony is mixed (that is, alloyed) with other metals, such as lead, to make the lead harder and stronger for use in lead-acid batteries. On the other hand, some alloys such as Babbitt Metal (an alloy of antimony, tin, copper, and sometimes lead) are useful as machine bearings because they are soft and slippery. Antimony is also alloyed with tin to make pewter items such as plates, pitchers and cups, used mostly for decoration. One use of antimony, which is declining, is to make type metal for printing newspapers and magazines. Antimony is one of very few substances (bismuth and water are two others) which expands when it cools and freezes. Antimony-bearing type metal thus fills every corner of a mold used to prepare sharp type for printing. With the advent of computer printing, this use has greatly decreased. Antimony is also used for pigments in plastics, paints, rubber, and for a wide variety of minor uses, including medicines, fireworks, and others. Antimony oxide is a brilliant yellow color, accounting for much of the pigment use. A tiny amount of highly purified antimony metal is used in the computer industry to make semiconductors. To be useful in this application, antimony has to be 99.999% pure!
Most people know little or nothing about Antimony & yet Silverado can & will in the near future be a very valuable source for this metal . The greatest advantage is that it is on safe U.S. soil & we do not need to be held hostage to the whims & control of China.