Facts About Platinum – Most Precious Metal

Did you know that it is estimated that almost every fifth product contains platinum or that platinum is needed for its production…

Many believe that platinum is the same as white gold and due to the lack of information about it, are not able to understand, and therefore did not explain what platinum really is.

Platinum represents a completely independent type of noble metal that can be found in nature and as such, it does not even have touch points with a white gold which is actually a gold alloy and a certain type of white metal

Since the discovery to the present value of platinum is constantly growing. In addition to being used for the manufacture of expensive jewelery and ornamental items, the use of platinum is very widespread in various industrial branches, even in medicine…

Fact: Platinum is grayish-white. It is harder than copper, and is stretchy almost like gold.

Fact: Platinum is a very heavy metal. One cube of platinum, whose side would be 30 centimeters long, would have a weight of 500 kilograms! Platinum is almost twice as heavy as lead.

Fact: Platinum is usually found in mines, often mixed with rare metals such as palladium, rhodium, iridium and osmosis, which are called “platinum metals”. It is sometimes mixed with gold, copper, silver, iron, chrome and nickel. It appears in the form of grains, scallops and bulbouss.

Fact: Platinum deposits were first discovered in South America in the 18th century. The old peoples of South America used platinum to make jewelery and body decorations, but evidence of its use was probably destroyed by the arrival of Spaniards and Portuguese in those areas.

Fact: Just a few hundred years ago platinum was neither industrial nor strategic or noble metal. During the 17th century in South America, the Spanish conquerors considered the platinum to be a problem because it was mixed with the found gold. In the Ural mountain range in Russia there was a lot of unnecessary metal “platinum”, so the Russian government decided to change currency from gold to platinum. In the following years it was made nearly half a million ounces of platinum in Russian rubles and so they changed it from a cheap metal a noble metal.

Fact: Platinum is more precious than gold. It is estimated that platinum found in entire history can be placed in a cube less than 10 cubic meters. The vast majority of platinum found today comes from two sides of the world, South Africa and Siberia in Russia. The largest platinum site, Merensky Reef in South Africa, was discovered in 1924.

Fact: More than 50% of the annual platinum production is used by the automobile industry. Platinum as a relatively precious metal has incredible investment potential. It is more expensive than gold, and therefore is considered an attractive investment instrument.

Fact: The earliest item that testifies to the use of platinum dates back to the 7th century BC and is kept in the Louvre Museum in Paris. The Egyptian jewelery box is decorated with hieroglyphs, made of gold and platinum alloys.

Fact: It is considered that the first description of platinum in Europe was recorded by the Italian humanist and poet J. C. Scaliger (1557), who writes about white, heavy, invulnerable and nonflammable metal. For chemists of the 18th century, platinum was a new and insufficiently researched metal, and was first described in professional literature in 1748.

Fact: The alloy of platinum (90%) and iridium (10%) has been chosen to create a standard meter and the standard kilogram. The prototype of the kilogram has a roller shape of 39 mm high and 39 mm in diameter, and the international prameter, which was used from 1889 to 1960, has a rod shape. Since 1983, the meter is defined by the speed of light

Fact: In July 2015, an asteroid, which allegedly contained about 90 tons of platinum and other precious metals, flew near the Earth. Scientists are examining the possibilities of using natural resources on asteroids by sending space telescopes that should gather enough information to start “asteroid mining” one day…