# 5,000 WiFi boards



## MCToon (Feb 25, 2016)

I have about 5,000 WiFi boards and over 2,000 WAP motherboards. These are from environmentally hardened external 2.4GHz BelAir 100 Radios. These are being decommissioned and I am recycling them. The aluminum case, wires, plastic, circuit boards and everything is getting recycled. We have been getting $1.50 per pound for the circuit boards. I would like to investigate if I am able to get a better price if I do the PM extraction myself.

I'm doing this with my son, he does the majority of the labor and gets the money (I get a little dad-tax). I assist with process and providing a garage and yard to store pallets of radios. We home school so I'm also the science teacher. This is a perfect opportunity for some chemistry. He's in 9th grade, that's good timing.

I have an electrical engineering background which included plenty of chemistry, but mostly theory and it's been enough years that nothing is fresh. No lab knowledge remains. I am almost finished with Hoke and have read many threads here including this excellent one: http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=85&t=23285 I've watched hours of YouTube and become quite a Geo fan (the person, not the car).

This forum has a great source of information so I would like to give back and post details of this project here.

I'll start with pictures of the wifi radio boards. There are gold colored traces all around the board, I don't know if this is copper, brass, gold, or whatever. Nothing needs to contact these traces. In one of the pictures you will see I manually ripped off a piece of the trace. There are two antenna ports that are similar in color, these do contact the wire going to the antenna. I have also posted a close up of the wires that plug into the motherboard.


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## MCToon (Feb 25, 2016)

These boards are all RoHS 6/6 so they are claiming to contain zero Pb (Lead). They are also designed for low temperature so a solder made of high tin content is not likely as tin does not do well in low temperature.

I have put some boards into regular HCl and some into AP - HCl/H2O2 with a small amount of copper wire, but no air bubbler yet. These are outside and I live in Minnesota. It's been above freezing during the day but a bit under freezing at night for the few days since I put them in, the liquid has not frozen, but the reaction has certainly been slowed down.

I know the AP is not typically the first step, I am experimenting and trying to develop a process. There are 5,000 boards so I have to see if I can do something that scales to that level and nets better than selling the boards.

The AP boards have turned the solution deep green, not at all translucent. The pins have all fallen off but none of the chips have yet. I don't see anything through the solution, it's too dark This solution probably has solder dissolved in it, I suspect it will not be good for regular AP in the future. Fortunately, it's a small test amount.

The HCl boards have turned the solution light translucent green and the pins have also fallen off.

I will filter these and see what shows up. Next I will test some of the HCl boards in Lye and some in AP directly. I don't see an obvious solder mask, but I could be wrong.

(Edit: I had written Pd instead of Pb in the first sentence, big difference.)


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## MCToon (Feb 25, 2016)

You may notice in the pictures there are 6 stainless steel nuts pressed in the board to hold the plastic shield. These are a significant challenge to be removed. I hope to find something that doesn't require removing them. Alternatively, something that makes the easier to remove. Currently, they are attached well enough that it's not possible to simply pry them off with a screwdriver or chisel. Maybe after a HCl wash they will be weakened and prying becomes possible.

I've also thought about creating a rig where a lever could be pulled down and a wide chisel scrapes the board and pop off the cover along with all the other components. This is not desirable since it dramatically increases the amount of time per board.


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## solar_plasma (Feb 25, 2016)

Do not reinvent the wheel. Look for how to process cell phone boards - this is the same kind.

You want to depopulate first and sort the parts before anything goes to CuCl2 etching or whatever process.


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## Grelko (Feb 25, 2016)

There are quite a few threads on processing boards.

You should be able to get a better price if you process them yourself. It really depends on what your time is worth.

If those were mine for example, I would remove the plastic shields, scrape the entire boards and separate everything. The yellow boxes should be tantalum, the bigger chips with the green fiber/gold corner are "north bridge", and all of the pins are gold plated. Plus the MLCCs, other chips and everything else.

Yellow boxes would be sold as is, pins would be processed in A/P "HCl+H2O2" or in a cell (I use A/P since I don't worry about the time it'll take) Pyrolize/incinerate the chips "and north bridges", crush, pan, etc. 

Put the scraped boards into HCl only to remove any tin first, then process with HCl/H2O2. Scratch the boards to check if it's plated under the green mask also, If there is gold plating under the green, use Lye to remove the green mask, then process in HCl+H2O2.


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## patnor1011 (Feb 25, 2016)

Dont be afraid of that 6k screws. One electric screwdriver and couple hours say 2-3 afternoons will do it. You will become so efficient you will be able to do them while watching TV. Your material is nothing compared to dismantling hundred of laptops with similar amount of screws but a lot of different types and sizes.


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## Barren Realms 007 (Feb 25, 2016)

Give it enough time and you will be doing them in your sleep.


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## Grelko (Feb 25, 2016)

patnor1011 said:


> Dont be afraid of that 6k screws. One electric screwdriver and couple hours say 2-3 afternoons will do it.



This is what I do when I get a load of flatscreen TVs, except my electric screwdriver doesn't hold a charge for long. I'll sit there a couple hours with a regular "or ratchet" screwdriver while watching movies.


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## UncleBenBen (Feb 25, 2016)

Barren Realms 007 said:


> Give it enough time and you will be doing them in your sleep.




I think I may have actually done that!

I sleep walk. Woke up in the basement standing at my work table about a month ago!


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## Findm-Keepm (Feb 25, 2016)

MCToon said:


> These boards are all RoHS 6/6 so they are claiming to contain zero Pd



Don't you mean Pb? MLCCs used in RF applications typically have Palladium/silver terminations.

http://www.mouser.com/catalog/supplier/library/pdf/MurataAppSpecific.pdf

Cheers,

Brian


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## Anonymous (Feb 25, 2016)

Findm-Keepm said:


> MCToon said:
> 
> 
> > These boards are all RoHS 6/6 so they are claiming to contain zero Pd
> ...



Brian you are quite correct Sir.

Jon


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## MCToon (Feb 25, 2016)

spaceships said:


> Findm-Keepm said:
> 
> 
> > MCToon said:
> ...




Yes, Lead == Pb. No "Lead" in the solder. There may well be Palladium in the solder. Now everybody knows I'm dyslexic, including myself.


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## Anonymous (Feb 25, 2016)

Don't sweat it Mctoon, we're all human mate. 8) 8) 

It just gets a little more relevant when it's the difference between one element or another 8) 

Jon


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## Lou (Feb 25, 2016)

Especially when they're elements you don't want to see as refiner. I thought he meant Cd, which is worse yet.

In my opinion, Pd's role in modern electronics is established. Moreover, it's an ethical person's job to recover it. Secondary recycling like this is very positive to the environment and can be quite profitable. In any event, there is a lot of good contribution in this thread.


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## MCToon (Feb 26, 2016)

I removed the 10 boards from the HCl today. Many of the components fell off the boards. The plastic shield over the board was completely dissolved. Not sure what it was made of but there is no trace of it. Some of the PowerPC CPUs were off, but not all. All of the gold plated contact pins were loose.

The first picture is the parts that fell off the boards. I filtered these out of the HCl and rinsed with clean water several times.

The other 2 pictures are the front and back of a sample board. It is pretty clean, I suspect with warmer temperature and some agitation there would be more complete removal of the components.

This is Method #9 from http://goldrefiningforum.com/~goldrefi/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=831.

The list of cons says "The spent acid is very toxic." Is this because of Pb - Lead? If the solder does not contain lead is this a concern? If the board were depopulated mechanically, wouldn't there still be tin solder on the board that the AP process would pick up anyway? Thus fouling the AP solution.

I also manually depopulated the boards with a reciprocating saw and chisel blade. Look for results in a future post.


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## etack (Feb 26, 2016)

I think you will want to do some presorting to save you some time in the end.

Remove the pins and large gold connectors first. The HCl will make them corrode and limit your options for processing later.

The *red *is scrap for shred(mixed iron)

The *Blue* sort and save to sell or process later Ta caps and crystal oscillators

http://www.murata.com/en-sg/products/timingdevice/crystalo

All the rest can be sorted or all burnt, melted, and processed together.

And lastly save your filters any place that is now black had gold on it that was dissolved in the solder. This is now small floating black specs in your acid.

Eric


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## macfixer01 (Feb 27, 2016)

MCToon said:


> You may notice in the pictures there are 6 stainless steel nuts pressed in the board to hold the plastic shield. These are a significant challenge to be removed. I hope to find something that doesn't require removing them. Alternatively, something that makes the easier to remove. Currently, they are attached well enough that it's not possible to simply pry them off with a screwdriver or chisel. Maybe after a HCl wash they will be weakened and prying becomes possible.
> 
> I've also thought about creating a rig where a lever could be pulled down and a wide chisel scrapes the board and pop off the cover along with all the other components. This is not desirable since it dramatically increases the amount of time per board.




The nuts appear to be just press-fit into the boards. A pin punch and a hammer or arbor press should make quick work of removing them?


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## goldsilverpro (Feb 27, 2016)

In the last 20 years, I haven't seen a circuit board, less fingers and all gold CPUs , that was profitable to refine, unless by the semi-load. Remember that you have to count your labor. If you're not making $50/hour net, you should reevaluate your situation. Electronic scrap is nothing more than a carrot about 90% of the time.


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## Grelko (Feb 27, 2016)

goldsilverpro said:


> If you're not making $50/hour net, you should reevaluate your situation.



I don't mean to sound rude, but isn't this being a little vain? I understand time/money is worth alot to people, but shouldn't the experience be worth just as much or more? (Unless you already have the experience and you do this as your full time job)



MCToon said:


> I'm doing this with my son, he does the majority of the labor and gets the money (I get a little dad-tax). I assist with process and providing a garage and yard to store pallets of radios. We home school so I'm also the science teacher. This is a perfect opportunity for some chemistry. He's in 9th grade, that's good timing



He isn't running a multi-million dollar corporation, he's just teaching his son how it works (and making a couple dollars along the way).

It is true however, that most of the e-scrap within the last 20 years or so, is basically junk when compared to how it used to be made. So, to get anywhere close to that $50/hour mark, you'd need ALOT of material. (tons at a time)

Edit - added


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## Barren Realms 007 (Feb 28, 2016)

Grelko said:


> goldsilverpro said:
> 
> 
> > If you're not making $50/hour net, you should reevaluate your situation.
> ...



GSP is correct. If he is going to teach himself and his son to do this profession he owes to himself and his son to to learn the economics of it. There is material out there that can be run to make close to that amount and more if it is looked for. If it is done at a loss then it has the possibility of the user not seeing that doing this can be a worthwhile endevor and being worth the effort to put in the time to learn it correctly.


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## Grelko (Feb 28, 2016)

Barren Realms 007 said:


> GSP is correct. If he is going to teach himself and his son to do this profession he owes to himself and his son to to learn the economics of it. There is material out there that can be run to make close to that amount and more if it is looked for. If it is done at a loss then it has the possibility of the user not seeing that doing this can be a worthwhile endevor and being worth the effort to put in the time to learn it correctly.



That is true. If this is going to be run as a buisness, he definately needs to know the economics for it also, or it won't last very long. I must have mis-read it and thought this was going to be more of a "hobby" type recovery/refining.

For example, it'd be alot harder to make a decent profit from "regular" e-scrap when compared to karat scrap or even aviation/military. (Now, if I could just find better material myself :lol: )

E-scrap does however turn a much better profit than it normally would, if you can find somewhere that'll buy the left over plastic, copper, fiberglass, or even your waste.

You literally need to take everything into account when running a buisness. Just the price you get the material at, can make a huge difference.


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## etack (Feb 28, 2016)

Hobbies are hobbies and they cost money. My stargazing hobby I have 1000.00's in and it will never pay back anything. My building robotics with my son, well over $1000.00 in that and it my return something. My biking hobby dose nothing but cost me money. 

My point is if its a hobby its not meant to make you money. It's cool if it dose, but thinking it must will make it not fun for him and his son.

The nice thing with PM refining is that it CAN make you more than you put into it if you stay with it and learn how to do that in a way that's best for you.

Eric


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## Grelko (Feb 28, 2016)

etack said:


> The nice thing with PM refining is that it CAN make you more than you put into it if you stay with it and learn how to do that in a way that's best for you.
> 
> Eric



Especially when the prices finally go back up. 8)


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## Anonymous (Feb 29, 2016)

Everyone has made good points here. That's a good place to be.

The defining difference between peoples' point of view is whether someone is doing this as a hobby OR a way to make money. 

Neither is the wrong approach and both are correct. If someone asks me for advice and states they want to make money from processing my advice would be tailored to that perspective, and be correspondingly tougher than someone who wanted to learn how it is done and make some pretty metal.


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## nickvc (Feb 29, 2016)

My view is if you can master the required skills and knowledge to recover and refine and then learn what to look for and where it can be a hobby that can pay, not much perhaps allowing for your time, but that's what hobbies are about. If you can encourage youngsters to get an interest in chemistry, physics and maths from your efforts then that's a bonus.
We live in a throw away society and all we are doing is what governments have been trying to encourage in society for years, recycling resources that might well end up in landfill, I know of one housing estate built over early e scrap, it wasn't valued so was dumped!


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