# Process for crushing IC/CPU's



## ctgresale (Nov 9, 2011)

Hey everybody, been doing allot of reading on here for months on different techniques to process IC and CPU while I collected enough stuff to process. Found allot of good info, but think that I may have found something that can save allot of time and I have seen a few other member talk about it but never any results if they tried. It's the Blendtec Blender. I had seen the video's on YouTube and looked like it was just what I needed, but I was going to have to sell some scrap first to justify spending 550.00 on one of them. But last week I found a seller on Ebay that had some refurbished commercial version for 169.00 with free shipping, so I went ahead and ordered one. It came in today and it looks like it is all that we will need to grind up IC's and CPU's. This spins at something like 1500 rpm's and is a IC crushing machine. I put a handful of 32pin eproms in there to test out and within 30 sec there was nothing but a fine dust. Also another good part of this being a commercial version, it has an external hard plastic housing that closes over the blender part and when it is closed it has another part that keeps pressure so the lid does not fly open for any reason. I just went back to Ebay and it looks like the 169.00 black ones are sold out, but he still has some olive ones at 199.00. I'll try to post some pictures tomorrow of stuff that I've run so everyone can see how it really works Also here is the item # that I'm talking about--- Item number: 390356091247 

Thanks
Steve


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## pinman (Nov 10, 2011)

How long will it last?


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## samuel-a (Nov 10, 2011)

pinman said:


> How long will it last?



With ceramics... no blade will last for too long...


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## ctgresale (Nov 10, 2011)

not sure but will let you know if it turn out not to be long, also NEW replacement 36qt blender jar for 59.00 from mfg, btw there is allot of sparking that goes on durning a crush


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## Harold_V (Nov 10, 2011)

ctgresale said:


> btw there is allot of sparking that goes on durning a crush


Ayup!

That's the blades being destroyed. That's to say nothing of the bearing below the blades, which is now loaded with abrasive compounds that will shorten what little lifespan the blender may have enjoyed. 

I don't recommend a blender for crushing ceramics for that reason. A ball mill is a much wiser choice. 

Harold


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## Geo (Nov 10, 2011)

go to youtube and look for "will it blend?" there is some funny stuff about those blenders.they were made tough but repeated use in that manner cant be good at any rate.


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## patnor1011 (Nov 10, 2011)

Well I can confirm that it will not last long. After few batches it will start smelling like burning plastic and rubber and you notice output is more and more coarse. Engine noise will change too. That is time to stop what you do as accident is waiting behind corner. I did the same thing but I have used it for grinding black plastic chips from motherboards and cards. It lasted about 5-6 batches. 
Ball mill as Harold pointed out is right choice for ceramics. Plastic chips can be processed as I did - pyrolysis/burning in high temperature and then grinding in ball mill or hand held sort of mortar&pestle device.


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## Barren Realms 007 (Nov 10, 2011)

Your material needs to be processed to the consistancy of baby powder to process it.


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## ctgresale (Nov 12, 2011)

Thanks for the feedback, guess I go easy on it with the ceramic ones and only use it for the plastic ones, or maybe make some other kind of blade for it, something stronger


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## patnor1011 (Nov 12, 2011)

Well I destroyed mine on plastic chips to be precise. If you want that blade and engine last longer incinerate/pyrolyse them first, pre-crush them in some (pipe&cap) mortar and (rod) pestle and then try to crush to fine powder in your mixer.


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## Harold_V (Nov 12, 2011)

Please examine your blender to see if the lower bearing (often just an Oilite bushing) is exposed to the contents of the blending cup. Lesser blenders are built that way, and are _not intended _to be used for such material. Yours may not be built the same way, but I have my doubts. 

Unless you can isolate the material in the blender from the lower bearing, the life will be exceedingly short. The powdered material is very abrasive--so it destroys the bearing and shaft. They "self destruct". 

Harold


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## patnor1011 (Nov 12, 2011)

I have used it for whole chips. Blades pretty much disappeared. Then I got aluminium one - coffee grinder and I use that on incinerated, crushed plastic chips - it reduce them to baby powder like consistency. I take out most of pins and inside metallic parts prior grinding. Works fine for me.


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## grim (Nov 29, 2011)

hey guy's just a quick question has anybody tried the crazy crusher made for rock sampling only it claims to take rock down to sand grain size and i would like to hear from anyone who has used one before i goahead and buy one 
thanks guys
ps. its at crazycrusher.com


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## glondor (Nov 29, 2011)

Hey Grim. If this is spam, at least it is usefull spam. That looks like a winner of a tool. Price seems ok as well.


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## grim (Nov 29, 2011)

hi glondor 
no its not spam well it wasnt meant to be just i saw a video on youtube and thought this could be just what i need and wanted to know if anyone had used it and what they thought of it as i have aprox 40 kilo's of chips from memory sticks that i have been avoiding doing anything with as breaking them down for leaching looked to be a real pain


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## rasanders22 (Dec 24, 2011)

That ore crusher looks promising. In the FAQ it says it has been used for CPU's. $300 dollars isnt a bad price either if you ask me.


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 24, 2011)

Why do people want to pulverize CPUs?


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## glondor (Dec 24, 2011)

Word is there is gold in the ceramic matrix. I cannot verify this. Yet.


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## Anonymous (Dec 24, 2011)

goldsilverpro said:


> Why do people want to pulverize CPUs?


I sure could use some help with this.
I built my own ball mill.A 22 inch beauty.I have only used it about 20 times on ceramic.On some batches that I process,I do quite well,and on others I recovery nothing.Can anyone try to explain what may be going on? I ran a batch 2 weeks ago,using a leach,and got almost a gram of gold from less than 10 lbs of powder.Next day,same process,very different result,almost nothing.Any ideas?


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## patnor1011 (Dec 24, 2011)

Any chance that it was actually left over gold from previous procedure? (like dissolving pins)
I understand that you processed already processed cpus. Am I right?


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## Anonymous (Dec 24, 2011)

patnor1011 said:


> Any chance that it was actually left over gold from previous procedure? (like dissolving pins)
> I understand that you processed already processed cpus. Am I right?


You are right,and that is certainly a possibility.Although I doubt I would have missed that much gold the first time around,but anything is possible.


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## patnor1011 (Dec 24, 2011)

You once said you bought some processed cpu so maybe that was from somebody else's hurried process who knows... Or just some small gold precipitated on some dissolved base metals from pins... Just thinking.


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## glondor (Dec 24, 2011)

It is the leaching process I cannot get my head around. Unless you can get a 100% leach that is verifiable, then 100 % recovery of the leach from the powder, some, maybe a lot of A/u may be left behind. 

Arthur discovered his process was leaving a lot behind. $20 grand worth on the volume of material he had processed. I don't know if he has figured out yet if the leach was fail or the leach recovery from the powder was fail. 

If you have a good leach but cannot recover all the metals bearing liquor, you have fail. Obversly if you get good liquid recovery but a weak or incomplete leach....fail.

The only thing that would help is a testing regimen to validate each step of the process before moving on to the next step. 

I have much material of the right sort to process following the leach system but I have not figured out how to qualify each step properly with the resources available to me. The biggest road block for me has always been how to "squeeze the powder dry" of metals bearing leach. To my mind if it is still wet it still contains values. There are too many minor details in the process that I do not have an answer to yet to proceed with the material. 

I am of the opinion that those of us who have cracked the mystery are playing their cards close to their chest. (Rightly so)
Prices these materials go for can not all be blue sky, someone ,somewhere has solved the puzzle.

To add to the dilemma there will be variations in the same type of ceramics as well as variations in the various types of ceramics and variations in those sub groups. It would take a lot of processing of 1 type just to quantify the variations in a particular type, let alone for each other type and so on. 

Arthur did have success with a SSN leach to recover considerable value from previously processed material. All his waste tested barren before the SSN leach. Although the likelihood that his material IS now barren, how can he (WE) be sure. 

I guess you could have an assay of each lot, properly sampled, then keep hammering at the material with processes and chemicals until you reach the assay expectations. I guess that would get you close to full recovery, At least you would know what to expect and keep at it till you got it all. 

There are a few mysteries to solve here and I am sure the answers are all to be found right here on the board.

I plan on working this out in the new year. 8) Just a few thoughts. If I get any answers I will share


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## Anonymous (Dec 24, 2011)

glondor said:


> I guess you could have an assay of each lot,


I have assayed leached,and pre-leached powder,and recovered gold on the pre-leached,and nothing on the leached.But do understand that when I grind my ceramics,I am doing about 20 pounds of various types at once.So there is no way to differentiate between one kind and another kind.I guess I could run 10 pounds of just one kind,and assay before,then leach,then test the post leached powder.But I would not have time to deal with that for some time.
GoldSilverPro, 
I have heard you say before,that you do not believe there is gold contained within the substrate.Have you checked any with an XRF?If not I know of a place locally that owns a gun and I could have them shoot a few for me.Actually I may just set aside some time on thursday to do that.


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## Anonymous (Dec 24, 2011)

Here is what GoldSilverPro had to say about it.Very interesting reading for sure.
http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=6713&hilit=ceramic+substrate#p59905


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## Anonymous (Dec 24, 2011)

1997 
http://www.ltcc.de/en/whatis.php


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## glondor (Dec 24, 2011)

Hey Mic, does this term mean any thing to you >>>>>>>>>> doped
(gold traces) tellurium.


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## Barren Realms 007 (Dec 25, 2011)

I use a mill that will hold about 60-80 lbs of material plus around 45-50lbs of hardend steel bolts to crush the media at a rate of about 1.5 to 2 lbs per hour of running time of fine crushed powder the consistency of talcum powder produced. This material is sifted thru a screen and the larger pieces are rerun thru the mill.

I use a large electic griddle that I put a stainless steel pot on big enough to put a 5 gal plastic bucket in. I put a couple of bricks in the bottom of the metal pot and set the plastic bucket on top of the bricks. I put 2-3 lbs of sodium nitrate in the bucket and then add 1 gal of HCL and 1/2 gal of hot tap water. I fill to metal pot with hot water and turn the griddle on 400F (this keeps the water temperature just under boiling temp) and heat the solution to dissolve the sodium nitrate.

Once everything is dissolved into the solution I use an 8oz plastic cup and put 2-4 cups of powder into the solution and let it work on the powder till very little NOX gas action exists. Sprinkle to powder over the top of the liquid as you add it, the bubbles produced will help suspend the powder on top and as the bubbles bust the powder will drop down tru the solution and get a better reaction with the solution. If you just dump the cup of powder into the solution at one time you can cause a violent reaction with the possability of a boil over. Do not stir this till the NOX gas has subsided at that point you can stir the solution, after the NOX fumes subside add another charge of powder and repeat the process. Your solution will turn a bright orange or reddish color as the process progresses. After your 4-5 set of charges of powder into your solution slowly add your powder to check for NOX emissions if they are subsiding with the addition of the powder your solution is almost used up. If a white precipitate starts to float and is hard to settle it is also time to stop addition of powder. If you go too far with the addition of powder you will see your solution turn black and every thing in solution will cement out and test negative for PM's and you will need to reprocess the powder in new solution.

After you have done this process on 4 loads siphon off your solution's into one bucket and cement out everything in the solution with the addition of a copper pipe or sheet. When your soltion test negative for PM's remove the copper and let everything settle and then siphon off the solution. Wash the sediment in water till your water is clear, allowing sediment to settle between washes. After your sediment is clean process the material in your favorite fassion.

Always try to remove any of the copper tungsten heat sinks from your chips before processing them thru your mill.


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## arthur kierski (Dec 25, 2011)

Glondor---i think that in my case ,the pre-treatment of the powder failed--since a lot of pms stayed in the powder--- by pre- treatment,i mean crushing,sieving,separating magnetics---- so when this powder was processed pms were cemented on base metals----as i mentioned in my thread,i will after doing the traditional leach(ar,etc),do finally the ssn leach----------i also think that if the material is still wet,there might be pms in the wet powder------i use a very stong vacuum buchner filter pump where i throw all the leached solution with the powder and wash the powder until the liquid filtered is white(clear water-no collour)and the powder left in the filter is almost dry(humid)
by the way----i will do a 2nd leach in the powder that i found gold----my shock was great

regards to all
Arthur


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 25, 2011)

Does anyone have proof that any of the ceramic CPUs have gold between the ceramic layers? If so, which ones?


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## samuel-a (Dec 25, 2011)

goldsilverpro said:


> Does anyone have proof that any of the ceramic CPUs have gold between the ceramic layers? If so, which ones?




I broke many hundreds of them during the years, many different types of ceramics packages and inspected each with a jewelers loupe.
Never found gold traces or wires...

(can't say that i checked ALL types of cpu's, but enough to let me know not to look anymore)


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## Anonymous (Dec 25, 2011)

If there is no gold between the ceramic layers,then the gold we are recovering the second time around,must be gold that we missed the first time around?


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## niteliteone (Dec 25, 2011)

If there are no gold wires in the ceramic then what are they connecting the CPU to the pins with. :?: 

Looking into the cpu socket I can see the gold traces connecting the cpu to something inside the ceramic package that leads to the pins. 
Could those thin gold traces extend all the way to the pins :?: 
That would explain why no wires are found.

Don't know, just a thought.
Tom C.


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 25, 2011)

niteliteone said:


> If there are no gold wires in the ceramic then what are they connecting the CPU to the pins with. :?:
> 
> Looking into the cpu socket I can see the gold traces connecting the cpu to something inside the ceramic package that leads to the pins.
> Could those thin gold traces extend all the way to the pins :?:
> ...



I think there are gold wires in at least some of the fiber CPUs but not in the ceramic ones. I think that, in all or most of the multilayer ceramic packages, the center layer contains thick film traces usually composed of Mo, Mo-Mn, or W. These thick film pastes and the ceramic layers themselves contain a glass frit. When the green ceramic (imprinted with the traces) is then assembled and fired, the glass melts, bonds everything together, and produces a total seal of the layers. The internal Mo, Mo-Mn, or W makes up the traces (which are connected to the legs), the IC pad, and the internal wire bonding fingers. After firing, the package is plated as desired.


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## Anonymous (Dec 25, 2011)

I had a video on my old computer that showed what happened when I dropped stannous on powder that had been sitting in AR for days.When the stannous hit the solution,there was no reaction,but if you tilted the bucket just enough to expose the powder,then dropped a drop of stannous on it,it turned black instantly.It made no sense whatsoever.If the gold,precipitated on the powder,then there should be no reaction,either in the liquid,or on the powder.But I had a video to prove it.I think I need to make another one and post it.


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 25, 2011)

On some of the very old white side-braze CPUs, you can actually see (barely) the Mo-Mn traces through the thin top ceramic layer. Check the 2nd photo in the first link and the 1st photo in the second link.
http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/8086/index.html
http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/4004/index.html

Here's a better shot of the 4004. I think this package has 2 layers of ceramic, whereas most of the others have 3.
http://www.cpu-museum.com/Bilder/Intel-C4004_1a.jpg


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## qst42know (Dec 25, 2011)

Where do these fall on a cementation table?



> thick film traces usually composed of Mo, Mo-Mn, or W.



Is it possible any secondary recovery could be attributed to cementation to these traces?

Gold wires in a ceramic package wouldn't survive the firing process would it?


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## Anonymous (Dec 25, 2011)

qst42know said:


> Gold wires in a ceramic package wouldn't survive the firing process would it?


If it is an assay,yes.When I tried to incinerate a batch,all of the powder stuck together like a rock.


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 25, 2011)

> Is it possible any secondary recovery could be attributed to cementation to these traces?


Maybe, but I tend to doubt it.



> Gold wires in a ceramic package wouldn't survive the firing process would it?


They would probably survive the firing but I would think there would be leakage. With the pastes, the glass melts and seals everything. The fiber/resin packages are a different story, since the resin would conform to the wires and produce a good seal. For longevity of the circuit, sealing is all important in the internal structure of these packages. Basically, with the ceramic packages, they strive to end up with as close to a monolithic unit as possible. Monolithic chip capacitors are made similarly - metal paste, glass, and ceramic. Glass is the glue that bonds everything together in the ceramic packages.


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## qst42know (Dec 25, 2011)

I doesn't make sense to include gold wires which may lead to ceramic package failures if a conductive non-precious paste smeared into molded tracks serve well.


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## glondor (Dec 25, 2011)

Mo, Mo-Mn, or W traces ......Could some one translate? the google is no help on this.


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## qst42know (Dec 25, 2011)

Element letter abbreviations.

http://www.webelements.com/


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## glondor (Dec 25, 2011)

Mo, Mo-Mn, or W traces Molybdenum Manganese Tungsten


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## goldsilverpro (Dec 25, 2011)

Here's another list.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_elements


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## glondor (Dec 25, 2011)

Thanks GSP 8) .


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## spooks69 (Jan 8, 2012)

Will this work as a mall mill? Found it at Harbor Freight...

http://www.harborfreight.com/3-lb-rotary-rock-tumbler-67631.html


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## butcher (Jan 8, 2012)

That is a small rock polisher, it works with a grit to polish rocks, A ball mill will tumble and beak up rock to fine powder, it is bigger and heavier duty, these have similar principles. but much different at the same time.

My short answer is NO it will not work, unless you run miniature items forever.
That would be fun to polish rocks with though.


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