Gold Over Silver vs SOLID Gold | Can You Spot the Difference?

What up, it's your boy Gus from GusVillaJewelry.com, and in this video, I'm going to be answering the age-old question: Can I tell the difference between gold over silver and solid 10K or 14K gold? I have two handmade Miami Cuban link chains, and I have no idea which one of these is which. But we're going to go through them together, see the differences between the two, and see if I can guess it correctly.

Now, first, let me start off this video by letting you guys know what gold over silver is. We handmake these chains out of silver and then dip them in gold afterward. We sell them for much less than if someone wants to buy something that's solid. Now, we brought two chains over. They're two big boy chains, so that the difference in weight, which is usually how you could tell the difference, isn't so noticeable. We're going to go over them together to see exactly which one is the solid one and which one is the gold over silver and if I can even tell the difference at all. So, Ben, hit me with one.

Okay, cool. So, I haven't seen any of these. I don't know. I just told them to send me two that they had. So, this here is a big boy piece. Okay, cool. Let me take it off the wax paper. This is, of course, how people are going to receive it. It's our beautiful file, of course. Come on, the GVJ file. It's everywhere. I'm going to look just strictly on the aesthetics because if I begin to look at things like the lock, which, of course, we handmake on our solid gold ones, I'm going to be able to tell relatively quickly. So, I'm not looking at the locks. I'm purposely kind of covering them with my hand. But if I'm looking at just the file of it, again, it's flat, so it's really, really hard to tell. Maybe between the links, which is where the plating is usually the first place to rub off even though when it's brand new, it's probably not going to. The weight of it seems really heavy as well.

The process, and this is the interesting part, between this and the silver ones is nothing. There is no difference between the two. I still have to stretch the metal, melt it down. It's essentially the same virtually identical way of making it except one of them uses silver, which, of course, is a metal that doesn't cost so much, and the other one just costs gold. So, there's no difference between the two. Now, without looking at the solder mark from behind a loop or something like that, I could tell number one it's a beautifully made link. Not to toot my own horn here, but the weight does seem heavy. But, of course, it could be. This is probably anywhere from 300 - 400 grams.

A lot of myths that I get is that it clinks, and, of course, that's not true. You can only tell when it clinks like that when it's brass or hollow or stainless steel. If it's silver or gold, you're not going to hear a difference between the two. So, that's a common myth we could bust right here. The spacing again is very hard to tell, but from what I think this one is, I'm not going to reveal it now. I want to see the other one before I make my final decision. But it's heavy. The lock looks fine. Let me just click the lock in here real quick. Yeah, but that would click the same exact way if it were gold over silver one. So, really kind of hard to tell. Okay, I got an idea of what the weight is, so maybe the weight is going to be the dead giveaway even on this big piece. So, that's number one.

Number two, hand me the other one. So, this is the second piece, again, handmade by us. People ask me what this wax paper is. It's just paper that we wrap right before we ship it out so that you don't scratch it up in the process of shipping it out. So, this looks about to be a little even heavier. It's actually a lot heavier, but it's also a bigger millimeter as well. So, there's a difference between the two.

Looking at the links, this all looks pretty solid as well. Let me explain to you guys how the process of gold over silver works. The reason why it's so hard to tell the difference between gold over silver and solid gold is because of the construction. I melt down the bar of silver. Once the bar of silver is stretched out, I roll it through these rolling mills and make this long kind of a square tube looking thing, and then we roll it and make wire, what's called pre-wire. Run them through these stretch benches. Each time we're running them through these draw plates that make them narrower and narrower until we get to the right fit that we want. Then we roll up the links, solder them, and turn the chain. So, the process of one is exactly the other, just like I mentioned before. So, it's really hard to tell.

The biggest giveaway when you get these fake chains that you see from China or that they're Italian made or whatever it is, is the spacing is really big. You could parallel park a Hummer through these things. They're so ugly. The color is usually a little bit off. The locks are very generic. They all look the same. They rarely come with a box lock like this one here. So, it's a dead giveaway. The reason why this one is so hard is because it's handmade. So, it is an actual Miami Cuban link. It's just made in silver and, of course, dipped in gold.

I'm looking through the links here. Since the construction is the same, there isn't really much to look at. I'm thinking because of the actual weight on this is probably, I'm not going to say it now, let me just hit it with the gun. But what you're looking at here is about a 22-inch length. Just from the aspect of it, you're probably looking at around maybe 600 or 700 grams, something like that, as you're probably looking at here. Just the construction of this thing is beautiful. I purposely don't do a hang straight test, but I'm going to do it just for the sake of this video. If you could see, we add a curve to that, and the reason we do that is so that when you put it on yourself, you could actually see that it lays completely flat. So, this is what it looks like on. You see it? It's flat on my chest. It hangs perfectly beautiful on it.

I think I can make my decision based on just the weight of it. I think that's going to be the dead giveaway if I'm being 100% transparent. So, I brought my handy-dandy PMI gun, and the PMI gun is going to tell us exactly which one is which. But before I do that, I'm going to make my final guess just based off this. I'm still not 100% sure. They're so identical in both color and weight. Silver and 10K don't have much of a difference as far as the weight goes. I'm probably going to guess it right. I'm not even going to lie to you because I deal with these all day, every day, and I know what one is supposed to weigh. 99.99% of you are not going to be able to tell the difference. There is no visual difference between the two. Of course, one fades, one is solid. One of them is parking your money, the other one you're just paying for the look. Just keeping it a buck.

But I'm going to say this is the 10K one. It just, I know what this is supposed to feel like, and it weighs in my hand since I grab them all the time. This weighs about what 10K is supposed to, but we got the handy-dandy PMI gun. We're going to hit it with the gun right now and let's turn this bad boy on and hit it and see exactly what we're... Option number one. This is the one that I think is the solid gold one. Let's hit it with the thermo gun and find out. Bingo, bingo, bingo! This is now hitting about 11K. This was the solid gold one. And again, I know this because, at the end of the day, I deal with these constantly. But you guys are seeing it with your very own eyes. There is no visual difference from one to the other.

Moving on to the gold over silver one, of course, just to be 100% sure, we're going to hit it with the thermo gun. Bam! And it does show that it is 3 to 4 carat, which shows that it is plated. Just to give you guys the visual representation, you guys are seeing it right here with your own eyes. Now, of course, there's going to be a bunch of haters out there saying, "Oh, you should wear the real thing." Okay, cool, that's great. This isn't for you. There's a market for everyone. Now, I'm going to show you guys some shots of these pieces being worn on in some daylight so you guys can see the difference and you let me know if you can spot it.

So, there you have it. The proof is in the pudding. I like to show you guys, be 100% transparent, peel this curtain back from what most jewelers are trying to tell you guys. I like to make these videos so that you guys can see for yourself if you could tell the difference between the two. Now, plated is not a replacement for solid gold. It's just simply not. You have to understand that a plated piece of jewelry is never going to look 100% like the solid gold one in the aspects of the plating itself. These things are electroplated, which means that they're always going to have slight little imperfections, usually anywhere that the metal touches the metal, so between the links around the lockbox, things like that.

So, if you get one of our gold over silver pieces and you think that it's going to be identical 100%, it won't. There always will be some little piece that maybe the plating comes off after maybe a week or two or whatever it is. You have to understand that you're buying a plated piece of jewelry. I want to be 100% transparent with that. In addition to that, of course, it fades. It depends on how long you have it, how long you wear it, the acidity in your sweat, what you're doing with it. So, keep these things in mind. You are paying a lot of labor for something that is not solid gold that just looks like it but obviously saving thousands of dollars in the process.

So, I had to just give you guys that disclaimer because it wouldn't be right for me to try to tell you guys that something is identical. If you want the real thing, save up and buy it. If you guys have any other questions that are burning on your mind that you'd like for me to make a video on, please drop it down in the comment below and I'll catch you guys in the next one. Holla.