"Bugs" wrote in message
oups.com...
Gold content is 9/24 of the gross weight, depending on the alloy.
Bugs


It is, in theory, always 9/24, regardless of the alloy. Where variations
come into play is in the honesty of the person doing the alloying, and laws
that regulate. Soldered items used to be permitted a half karat plus or
minus, plus an additional variation of plus or minus one half karat for
alloying. Thus, it wasn't unusual to find items marked ten karat that
assayed nine karat. I offer you class rings as an example, proven time and
again when refined in volume. They were consistently just better than nine
karat. The savings to the large corporations that make such rings must
have been staggering.

Harold