Information on Pins
- Thread starter Rhiakath
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If I remember correctly, I got 5'ish grams per Kilo (2.2 Lbs) the last time I ran pins similar to those in a stripping cell. If your going to run them in a cell you'll have to remove that stainless steel sleeve on that bottom pin. Or if they are non-magnetic, you can leave it on.... strip off what you can, then throw them in your stock pot to get the rest later.
It's a little tricky and time consuming to remove the sleeves, I'm sure someone here probably has an easier way to remove them then how I did it.
It's a little tricky and time consuming to remove the sleeves, I'm sure someone here probably has an easier way to remove them then how I did it.
I wasn't planning on running them in a cell, unfortunately.
Thoughts on a fair price to buy?
What was your plan with these pins?
Was thinking I could strip them for the gold. HCL and Nitric
Ask for a sample and analyze it. Otherwise, it is just guessing... Pins can look decent and have very low gold content. Similar USSR mil spec pins can run 20g/kg, but new chinese knock-offs around 1,5g/kg. If I placed these two in front of you, you will probably cannot see the difference.
Only gamblers buy unknown pins and mixed lots of pins. If you like to gamble, go for it.
Light soak in nitric can show how thick the plating is - you can visually guess the thickness of plating from floating foils and speed of the reaction. But this is only guessing, just a bit better guessing. Melt and quick XRF assay is the way to go. This is how we done it for quite some time. You pull homogenous sample, weigh it, melt it, clean and weigh it, sand the bead and shot with XRF, calculate the yield adjusted to melting loss.
cejohnsonsr1
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That’s the wrong process. First you need to separate the gold from the base metals. Probably HCl and Hydrogen Peroxide and a bubbler. Then you can go to AR to refine the gold. If you dump these straight into AR (HCl and Nitric) all you’re going to do is make a big mess that you’re not equipped to deal with. I recommend you pass on these until you understand what you’re doing and are prepared to dedicate the time and money necessary to process them.
Misunderstood his question. Thought he was asking what I would use the pins for, not the process of stripping then.
But noted and thanks
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If you cannot check the gold content, go for the lowest you have been given that of 1,5g / lb. If it runs more you have an extra income, if it runs for the same, you have ,minimal loss (labor and materials)
Simple, 2lb = 3g x60USD => 180 USD, Offer 150 so you have a small margin.
Pete
Edited for mistakes.
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Perfect! I was thinking right around there. I did request a small sample to include, if any, other pins that were not pictured.
Try to think like this...
You are in for at least to break even, and not lose money, otherwise it would be more economical to just buy bullion.
Pete
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Strangely enough - taking the "refining experience" to one side people are very often better off trading their boards to someone like boardsort and using the money to buy gold. Concentrate on the high yield stuff that you can buy for less than 75% of its value and trade the rest.
kurtak
Well-known member
This is absolutely correct - the same "type" pins (pins that look the same) can vary by a lot
That is because it depends on if the pins are made for run of the mill consumer grade electronic - or made for something like military, aerospace, telecom, medical electronics --- &/or for that matter when they were made
The exact same type pins made in the 80s & 90s will likely have heavier plating then the same type pins made after 2000/2010
I have done batches of pins in the picture that paid as low as 1.5 g/pound & other batches as high as 3g/pound
The best pins I ever saw (different type pins) paid 5g/pound - those came out of some OLD telecom microwave equipment
The key word(s) here are NEW & China - it does not surprise me one bit that pins coming out of China since around 2020 for consumer grade electronics have less then a gram per pound even though they are the same type pin made in the 80s or 90s
Kurt
kurtak
Well-known member
Yap - I totally agree --- I learned "very early on" that you are FAR better served selling run of the mill consumer grade CBs to the bigger board buyer that ship boards to the smelters
Process ONLY the VERY HIGHEST grade stuff & sell the rest
That is if you actually want to make money & not create a BUNCH of TOXIC waste the does not pay
Kurt
Yeah, I bought a batch of chips for practice, but that was about it. I think I posted it in one of these threads. I am just looking around now for anything "free" from friends and family. Mostly would be newer chips anyway.
Reading so much in general about all this refining is definitely making my head spin, lol. I miss out on some good items just because I second guess, take too long to find the information, or whatever, lol
Unfortunately regarding the pins in question, the seller doesn't have enough information for where the pins came from. As I mentioned in an earlier response, I was originally thinking around the $150 mark for the two pounds. But if its a lower concentration, 1g/lb, even the $150 seems to be a bit too high. I may be stressing over nothing, though, and could just offer $100 and call it a day, regardless of what the seller does.
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The main problem you face Rhia is they simply vary so so much. It's quite literally impossible to judge visibly. I don't ever buy pins for this very reason without having a sample to assay first, and if the batch is small then for most people the ability to assay is limited.
Look, it's all about the value, one approach I have, when buying stuff is....buy the junk to get the good stuff...see picture.
I often buy by the box and average out the good stuff, the processors from the image averages 1usd per piece...everything else that came with it was aleeady resold to recover expenses...
By the way, that is my first pentium pro i managed to purchase and was very excited about it, i have a lot of other 286,386,486 i bought but this was my first pro...
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Just as a question, did you know the real gold is in the fibre versions of these? That's where the 1g per chip myth came from.By the way, that is my first pentium pro i managed to purchase and was very excited about it, i have a lot of other 286,386,486 i bought but this was my first pro...
