Why is white gold a mixture and not a compound?

[Genecks]

I read reading a book, and it said white gold is a mixture and not a compound.

 

I don't understand how it's a mixture unless it's all melted. And when it's cooled down and formed into a ring, then isn't it a compound?

 

I don't understand how it's a mixture instead of a compound.

 

Is that because different amounts of gold and palladium are mixed, such as different percentages?

[the tree]

I don't understand how it's a mixture unless it's all melted. And when it's cooled down and formed into a ring, then isn't it a compound?

Because there are gold molecules and urm... white ones. They are all jumbled up, but not bound.

[Genecks]

Define "bound."

 

I figure something is allowing the atoms to stick to each other when they cool down from liquid form.

[insane_alien]

white gold is actually an alloy which is pretty much just a metallic mixture solidified. or it can be normal gold plated with rhodium and palladium which isn't an alloy or mixture.

[John Cuthber]

In a compound the constituents are generally present in fixed ratios, for example in salt NaCl there are exactly as many Na as ther are Cl. For a mixture like white gold the components can be present in (more or less) any proportions.

Also, in compounds (even those where the ratios are not constant- the so called nonstoichiometric materials) the components generally have defined places in the lattice or molecule.