E-scrap recovery

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ebjackson30

Member
Joined
Mar 1, 2016
Messages
20
Hello all,

New to the site here. Literally have just been reading over the past few days about e-scrap recovery. I've been wanting to do this as a hobby as I have access to loads of scrap PCB. I wanted to attach a couple of pictures and see if anyone had any ideas as to what type of PMs I could possibly receive from the boards I have an overabundance of. I know this is probably vague and you probably can't tell just from pictures but I figured I would give it a go anyways.

Thanks!

Eric
 

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Low grade boards, not much there. Those would be best saved up and sent out to a refinery.
 
I'm far from an e scrap expert, but I think shipping would cost as much or more than they're worth. There's just not much on there. I see one medium size IC that may or may not have gold bond wires and maybe a few MLCCs. My advice would be to shop them around to local scrap yards and take the highest bid.

I could be wrong.

Dave
 
Thanks for the replies. I inspected them a little further and noticed that the little white plug piece seems to have gold plating on the prongs. I might just take some sheet metal shears and cut the plugs off and scrap the rest.
 
I would take a nice sharp flat chisel and tap all those chips and the pins off for later processing and low grade scrap the rest...

I have a 2x4 with screws at the bottom so the boards rest against them while tapping the chisel with a hammer n they go pop and fly into the plastic bin surrounding them. Quick and easy way to go through boards and catch all the little things...Well, 90% of them I'd say.

B.S.
 
FrugalRefiner said:
I'm far from an e scrap expert, but I think shipping would cost as much or more than they're worth. There's just not much on there. I see one medium size IC that may or may not have gold bond wires and maybe a few MLCCs. My advice would be to shop them around to local scrap yards and take the highest bid.

I could be wrong.

Dave

If those are LEDs in picture 1 on the right, they might have a gold bonding wire in each 1. Also, It's hard to tell, but in picture 3 on the far left, a couple of those look like black tantalum boxes with the grey line on one end. I could be wrong though and those would be resistors. If you break one open, tantalum will be in layers, if it's the certain type of resistor, it'll be 2 folded copper wires.
 
Grelko said:
FrugalRefiner said:
I'm far from an e scrap expert, but I think shipping would cost as much or more than they're worth. There's just not much on there. I see one medium size IC that may or may not have gold bond wires and maybe a few MLCCs. My advice would be to shop them around to local scrap yards and take the highest bid.

I could be wrong.

Dave

If those are LEDs in picture 1 on the right, they might have a gold bonding wire in each 1. Also, It's hard to tell, but in picture 3 on the far left, a couple of those look like black tantalum boxes with the grey line on one end. I could be wrong though and those would be resistors. If you break one open, tantalum will be in layers, if it's the certain type of resistor, it'll be 2 folded copper wires.

The LEDs do have a gold bonding wire. Those black boxes...I crushed one open and it had one small piece of metal in the middle that is silver in color. What could that be?
 
Also, I attempted to deconstruct one of the LEDs (the parts that looks like all 8s) and there appears to be gold connectors throughout. I have searched, unsuccessfully, to find a method to extract this. When I split the indicator, it actually splintered some of the gold. I want to prevent this from happening again.
 
Your best option for now is to do some reading, there's a lot of info here on the forum about e-scrap and the value of various types of components. Of course, read Hoke (see the Library).

If you do some scraping/component removal, all you really have to worry about is not throwing anything out until you're sure it's of no value to you.

For the bonding wires, broken doesn't matter--at some point you'll either dissolve it all and precipitate it back out, or melt it together. Many processes involve incineration and/or pulverizing your material (as I suspect your bonding wires in the LEDs will see). I highly suggest not melting anything until you know your full process and how it works. If you spend some time reading the forums, you'll see quite a few people come in with "I made this yellow ball of metal after melting some e-scrap. Is it gold? Is some of it? How do I get it out?" ;)

Consider value as you learn, too. Yes, many forum members are "only hobbyists" or refining on the side. But even if you're only doing it to learn, you should still know the costs involved. Will you be spending 8 hours and $50 on acid to recover $3 in gold from a certain type & amount of component? You might want to know before you start.
 
On that grade of cheap consumer equipment that sells for pennies each? I doubt it but I am more than willing to be proved wrong.
 
Possible yes, probable no. Electronic scrap is not the place to be looking for Pt. I'm sure you will find light emitting diodes behind the plastic of that display and they will either have an aluminum or gold bonding wire, most likely gold.
 
Still investigating this...appears that scraping the top layer reveals copper underneath.
 

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ebjackson30 said:
Still investigating this...appears that scraping the top layer reveals copper underneath.

That will be the case with at least 95% of boards that most people come across.

The great thing about all this is that the learning curve is sooooo long that you will have plenty of time to research all the countless devices found on circuit boards, while you spend countless hours studying over what to do with them.

Just takes time, dedication, and ton of love for it!
 
So I've been doing reading. Lots and lots of it. Here on the forums and the books that are recommended to read. On to my interrogatives...

I cut one of the LED displays open from the first picture I posted. I can't really observe anything that may be of value in the middle. The reason I'm making this post is that I'm thinking of just taking the small LED lights for processing and just low grade scrapping the rest. I know there isn't much value in these guys but still I'd like to do as much as I can with them.

Any thoughts on this?
 
OP- - you still haven't answered the question as to how many you have? So how much do you have>?

I'd use these to learn how to process if I were you.
 
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