My Scrap Silver Adventure, 7# Bar

Finally got around to selling 2 partial sterling silver flatware sets that I bought long ago off ebay.  IIRC they were pretty much spot at the time and I paid roughly $1200 for one and $800 for the other.

Sterling flatware is really nice but you really only use it maybe twice a year and the kids don't want it so I figured might as well take advantage of better prices.  I calculated roughly 122 oz. at $48 silver would be in the $5000 area.  

Called 2 local sterling buyers, one a pretty big outfit that seems to buy a lot and they bid $1500.

On the phone with the smelter, the deal is $75 fee and then 95% of silver content.
Knives are $1 each extra charge.  They grab the blade, bash the handle with a chisel hammer until it is loose, shake out the glue/cement and add it to the crucible.  This place had a few different sized smelters to handle even larger bars.  They did wire brush the bar to make it look pretty.  While x-raying, he said sterling always says 925 but that has never happened with an assay.

Results:
Bar weight. 3636.90 gms
X-ray 90.02% Ag
3264.94 gms AgYou get 95% of this, so {(3264.94 x .95)/31.1] x 49 spot = $4886 - $91 = $4785

I traded the bar for this K and $710 cash.