We buy this by individual quote. No published grid: call or note it on your label request. We contact you with a written quote before processing, and nothing in this category is processed until you approve. Decline the quote and those items come back by tracked courier at your shipping cost, quoted in writing before they ship.

Dental gold: quoted on all the precious metals, not just the gold

Dental alloys are more than gold. They routinely contain palladium and platinum, metals many buyers quietly keep for themselves. We test every piece by XRF, itemize every metal in your written quote, and process nothing until you approve.

What dental work is actually made of

Crowns, bridges, inlays, onlays and partial-denture frameworks were made from a wide range of alloys over the decades:

  • Yellow "gold" crowns are typically 10k to 22k equivalent, most often around the 16k range (roughly 60 to 70% gold), alloyed with silver, copper, palladium and sometimes platinum for hardness.
  • White or silver-coloured crowns can be the valuable kind or the worthless kind, and you cannot tell by looking. Palladium-based white alloys are genuinely valuable; nickel-chromium and cobalt-chromium alloys contain no precious metal at all.
  • Porcelain-fused-to-metal (PFM) crowns hide the alloy under a ceramic shell. The metal underneath is often a precious or semi-precious alloy. Send them as they are; we account for the porcelain weight honestly.
  • Partial-denture frameworks are usually cobalt-chromium (no value), but older ones can be gold alloy. Testing settles it.

This mix is exactly why "we pay for the gold" is not good enough. A crown that is 60% gold and 25% palladium holds a large share of its value in the palladium. Our XRF analyzer reads the full alloy, and your written quote lists each metal, its percentage, and its value. The quote covers all of it, and nothing is processed until you approve.

Common questions, answered plainly

  • The tooth is still attached. That is fine and completely normal. Send it as it is; we handle removal professionally and hygienically.
  • It looks dirty or old. Irrelevant to value. Do not clean or boil dental work; just wrap it.
  • It might be nothing. Email a photo to contact@silverplatecanada.ca first and we will tell you honestly whether it is worth sending. Roughly speaking, if a magnet grabs it firmly it is probably a non-precious alloy, but the XRF has the final word, not the fridge magnet.
  • Is this legal to sell? Yes. Dental work you or a family member paid for is yours to sell, and it is one of the most commonly recycled forms of gold.

Small parcels welcome. A few crowns weigh only grams but can still clear the $250 free-processing line at today's metal prices. If your settlement lands under $250, remember the $25 processing fee published on the what we pay page: sending the whole drawer in one shipment usually clears the line comfortably.