Group 12 element by mass, and even the leanest concentrated deposits are at least 0.1% mercury (12,000 times average crustal abundance). It is found either as a native metal (rare) or in cinnabar (HgS), corderoite, livingstonite and other minerals, with cinnabar being the most common ore. While mercury and zinc minerals are found in large enough quantities to be mined, cadmium is too similar to zinc and therefore is always present in small quantities in zinc ores from where it is recovered. Identified world zinc resources total about 1.9 billion tonnes. Large deposits are in Australia, Canada and the United States with the
Type metal details because molten lead shrinks and sags when it cools to a solid. After much experimentation it was found that adding pewterer's tin, obtained from cassiterite, improved the ability of the cast type to withstand the wear and tear of the printing process, making it tougher but not more brittle. Despite patiently trying different proportions of both metals, solving the second part of the type metal problem proved very difficult without the addition of yet a third metal, antimony. Alchemists had shown that when stibnite, an antimony sulfide ore, was heated with scrap iron, metallic antimony was produced. The typefounder