# Processing PC and mobile phone boards to extract the gold.



## Ardibash (Sep 25, 2011)

Hello, 

I have a pile of gold plated boards and pins taken out from laptops and mobile phones. 
I have treated them with boiling Hydrochloric acid to remove all solder.

Here are 2 questions I have and nay feedback would be much appreciated. 

1: After boiling in HCL I have some very fine black powder deposited on the gold plated parts (can't see gold anymore) and mixed in the solution. When rubbing I can expose the gold, and the powder blackens my hands when scrubbing off the SMBs (I touch them only after it's treated with saturated sodium bicarbonate solution). 
Is this black powder the silver from solder? 

2: A friend recommended a recipe of dissolving only gold from this material. 1000 ml of concentrated Sulphuric acid (H2SO4) + 80ml of Aqua regia, this will dissolve the thin layer of gold, after the acid is saturate or neutralized, the gold can be precipitated with diluted Hydrazine hydrate. has anyone tried this method?

P.S. 

Can I recover the evaporated HCL with Distillation Condenser?


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## Ardibash (Sep 25, 2011)

Here is a setup I'm thinking, any comments would be much appreciated.


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## Geo (Sep 25, 2011)

i believe the deposit on the gold is tin dissolved by the hcl. this would have happened if you had just soaked it in hcl for a few hours. there may be a small amount of silver in the black powder in the bottom of your vessel, this would be what came out of the solder that was dissolved. i have never seen a method of selective dissolution (aside from reverse electroplating) though im sure with the right chemistry its not impossible but if you use AR in any combination before you remove the base metal you will just cause problems for your self. i would suggest you remove the base metal first. acid+peroxide method is a good way of doing this. fingers and pins and can be done at the same time in the same vessel.


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## Ardibash (Sep 25, 2011)

I'm going to use AR only for gold, the rest of metals will be extracted tough other acids, for example Silver and Palladium, with nitric acid, etc ... I'm using straight HCL to dissolve solder ONLY, the copper will do with nitric, reason is that HCL + peroxide works very slow to dissolve the copper.

any toughs on 1000 ml of concentrated Sulphuric acid (H2SO4) + 80ml of Aqua regia t dissolve gold?


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## butcher (Sep 25, 2011)

"any toughs on 1000 ml of concentrated Sulphuric acid (H2SO4) + 80ml of Aqua regia t dissolve gold?"

Why? Removing the solder in warm HCl is a good idea,(most of the tin will go into solution) after a rinse of pins and powders ( boiling hot water to remove lead salts), remember give any powders not soluble in acids or washes time to settle.

Now if your plan is to dissolve copper in nitric you should give your pins a wash in hydroxide to neutralize any HCl the may have on them and wash the salts formed with hot water, and incinerate (this is so you do not dissolve gold by mixing these two acids with your gold).

now your ready for nitric to dissolve copper.

After rinsing, you should be left with gold powders and flakes that would dissolve easily in HCl/bleach (less trouble later) or aqua regia (which would need excess nitric acid evaporated off.

I would forget the concentrated sulfuric and aqua regia (sounds way too dangerous and very unnecessary),

Also realize you should not try and dissolve the gold before eliminating base metals, and that if you did try and dissolve the gold with base metals present that the gold would plate back out onto the base metals as un recognizable gold), and even base metal salts of acids (in powder form)will exchange places with gold in solution precipitating out the gold from solution.
Also if solutions are too loaded with base metals, or that they may have some organics or powders (colloids) in solution will not let gold precipitate out of solution,

Remember Stannous chloride your flashlight in the dark.


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## Ardibash (Sep 26, 2011)

Hi butcher

To neutralize HCL I have washed the pins and boards with hot saturated sodium bicarbonate solution, it bubbled a lot, and the water turned milky and then cleared (what was that !). 

As for gold dissolving with base metals: 
Pins contain mostly copper, tin and some zinc, I will use AR and will precipitate gold with hydrazine hydrate which works very well, have been doing that back in 1993 when was refining Soviet made computers (each containing about 500g of gold .


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## Palladium (Sep 27, 2011)

You just ain't going to listen to reason are you?

None of us have ever done this. We don't know what we are talking about. We are all just telling you this so we can waste our time and yours. Then you go on to say you been doing this like that time since back in 93. And this all started off with the phrase "feedback would be much appreciated". Let us know how it works out for you. It’s obvious from your replies you don’t want advice as much as you are looking for the approval of the misguided course you seem destined to pursue. Of course we already know the outcome even if you don't believe it yourself. :roll:


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## Harold_V (Sep 27, 2011)

Palladium said:


> It’s obvious from your replies you don’t want advice as much as you are looking for the approval of the misguided course you seem destined to pursue. Of course we already know the outcome even if you don't believe it yourself. :roll:


That's a common human trait, near as I can figure. I've seen it time and again, both in refining, and in machining. A person has what they consider to be a clever idea (albeit hare brained), and wants everyone to know about it. All logic and alternate suggestions fall on deaf ears. They won't be denied their cleverness. We've seen it time and again. They refuse to listen to those that are in the know, creating messes that are difficult to untangle, then when it's too late to make corrections, they want help from those they've shunned. 

I have a solution for people like that. 

Leave them to their own devices, and allow them to live with the consequences. It's what they deserve. However, the voice of reason should always speak out, so those that may not understand, but seek knowledge, can learn why some things are best left undone-----why some *clever* procedures are not so clever. 

While I'm not always able to do so, I try to explain my position when a subject becomes controversial. It helps those with common sense to understand my perspective. 

Problem appears to be, common sense isn't so common. 

And so it goes. 

Harold


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## Ardibash (Sep 27, 2011)

Palladium said:


> You just ain't going to listen to reason are you?
> 
> None of us have ever done this. We don't know what we are talking about. We are all just telling you this so we can waste our time and yours. Then you go on to say you been doing this like that time since back in 93. And this all started off with the phrase "feedback would be much appreciated". Let us know how it works out for you. It’s obvious from your replies you don’t want advice as much as you are looking for the approval of the misguided course you seem destined to pursue. Of course we already know the outcome even if you don't believe it yourself. :roll:



Dear Palladium, 
1. I'm asking for simple advice or feedback not a ironic lecture about reason and listening.
2. butcher gave a very good advice about removing salts which is much appreciated.
3. As far as for gold plating back, if the acids not saturated IT CAN NOT HAPPEN !!! 
4. back in 93 Soviet made computer had different metal alloys that of today and I know what I have done and how and if it worked or not! 
5. What is the outcome hydrazine ill not precipitate gold ? 

Thanks anyway!


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## Anonymous (Sep 27, 2011)

Harold_V said:


> However, the voice of reason should always speak out, so those that may not understand, but seek knowledge, can learn why some things are best left undone-----why some *clever* procedures are not so clever.


Ardibash,
I am going to try to reason with you calmly,this one time.If you will not listen to reason,then maybe you should find a different gold forum,with people that actually know what they are talking about......cause none of us do(sarcasm implied).
If you want help from experienced people that have "Been there,done that" then you had best keep your sarcastic comments to yourself and pay attention.



Ardibash said:


> Dear Palladium,
> 1. I'm asking for simple advice or feedback not a ironic lecture about reason and listening.


Your first mistake was,singling out a member.Your second mistake was singling out Palladium.
You asked for advice,and you got it! But you weren't willing to accept that advice,because it was not what you wanted to hear,as Harold pointed out.That is what spurred the lecture about listening. 


Ardibash said:


> 3. As far as for gold plating back, if the acids not saturated IT CAN NOT HAPPEN !!!


It's not the fact that you think this is not true,that aggravates me so much.....it is the fact that you wrote it in all capital letters with a bunch of exclamation marks.That implies that you are screaming at the other person.Well YOU ARE WRONG!!!!! Gold can very easily plate back out, without the solution being saturated with base metals.If you don't believe me,place a piece of copper pipe in some auric chloride after the chlorine has dissipated,and look at the sheet of black powder that accumulates on it.


Ardibash said:


> 4. back in 93 Soviet made computer had different metal alloys that of today and I know what I have done and how and if it worked or not!


There are 2 things here that frusterate me,first off,the soviets may be using different alloys,but the metals used to make those alloys are the exact same basic metals we use today.Secondly,If you know "what I have done and how and if it worked or not!" then why the heck are you asking for help?!? 
And finally my favorite comment that you have made thus far


Ardibash said:


> As for gold dissolving with base metals:
> Pins contain mostly copper, tin and some zinc, I will use AR and will precipitate gold with hydrazine hydrate which works very well, have been doing that back in 1993 when was refining Soviet made computers (each containing about 500g of gold


There has never been a single computer in history that contained 500 grams of gold.I highly doubt that there has ever been a computer that contained 50 grams of gold.
You clearly need some help.We are willing to help you,if you are willing to listen to the advice/feedback that is offered to you.If you are *not *willing to accept the advice given to you,then all you are doing is wasting our time,and yours.I hope you come to your senses and listen to reason,because you could learn a lot here.Remember,the ways things were done in 93' ,are not the same way they are done today....if that were true we would still be walking around with pagers.


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## Geo (Sep 27, 2011)

Ardibash said:


> Hi butcher
> 
> To neutralize HCL I have washed the pins and boards with hot saturated sodium bicarbonate solution, it bubbled a lot, and the water turned milky and then cleared (what was that !).
> 
> ...


if you dissolve your pins in AR with the base metal present and for some reason all of the base metal does not dissolve your gold will plate back out of solution and i can guarantee that. it seems to me that you have never actually done this before yourself because if you had that would have been the first mistake you would have made and learned from it, the fact that you are willing to repeat the same mistake leads me to believe that either you made the mistake in '93 and didn't learn from it or you may have seen this but never done it yourself. either way if you expect to receive help here, read, listen and stop antagonizing the moderators.


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## Ardibash (Sep 27, 2011)

Geo said:


> if you dissolve your pins in AR with the base metal present and for some reason all of the base metal does not dissolve your gold will plate back out of solution and i can guarantee that. it seems to me that you have never actually done this before yourself because if you had that would have been the first mistake you would have made and learned from it, the fact that you are willing to repeat the same mistake leads me to believe that either you made the mistake in '93 and didn't learn from it or you may have seen this but never done it yourself. either way if you expect to receive help here, read, listen and stop antagonizing the moderators.



YES! if the metals are not dissolved then gold it will plate back, as the tin plated back on gold in HLC, but if the acid is still active no metals can form, even if the form they will be dissolved. 

ЕС ЭВМ , Единая система, meaning "Unified System of Electronic Computers" models 1036 and 1046 each yield about 200g of gold (from just the mainframes)
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OSJLiqfE0lQ/TZyCIxK62bI/AAAAAAAAAl8/Pmb5W0nA21A/s1600/es+evm.jpg 
ЕС ЭВМ -1022 - MORE THAN 1/2 KILO 
Nairi 3 yield 450g by tech docs 597 (can't find a photo)
and the mother of them all БЭСМ-6 more than 1.5 kg 

mic if you look around on the net you should be able to find information about this machines. 

I'm sorry if I offended or antagonized someone.


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## Anonymous (Sep 27, 2011)

Ardibash said:


> mic if you look around on the net you should be able to find information about this machines.


I did some quick research and I could not find a single website that offered any type of materials declaration on any of those machines.Nor could I find a single credible reference,of precious metals content.I did however find countless sites where members of forums and blogs,stated that these machines had insane amounts of gold in them.But if I've seen that too many times before with E-scrap and it's not true.Also I'd like to point out that these machines were not traditional computers.Most were multi-user mainframe control systems.So even if there was as much gold as you claim,my statement still stands.Even a 9000 series IBM with 16 MCM's(TCM's) does not contain over 2 ounces(62 grams) of gold,and yes that is from a materials declaration from the cpu's.So needless to say,I find it hard to believe that there is any computer ever made that had 500 grams/over 16oz/ 1.25 lb troy,of gold in it.I have been wrong before,but unless you can show me proof,or one of my mods,tells me otherwise,I will doubt that it is true.(I reserve the right to apologize if proven wrong)


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## xsspirito (Sep 27, 2011)

mic said:


> So even if there was as much gold as you claim,my statement still stands.Even a 9000 series IBM with 16 MCM's(TCM's) does not contain over 2 ounces(62 grams) of gold,and yes that is from a materials declaration from the cpu's.So needless to say,I find it hard to believe that there is any computer ever made that had 500 grams/over 16oz/ 1.25 lb troy,of gold in it.I have been wrong before,but unless you can show me proof,or one of my mods,tells me otherwise,I will doubt that it is true.(I reserve the right to apologize if proven wrong)



Yes mic, they where military main frames, 

HERE WE GO! Эльбрус 2 (Elbrus 2 - Gold 8968,46g, Silver 42588,24g, Platinum 167,06) Nearly 9 kilos of gold. 

Take a look at this link, 

http://affinage.org.ua/argentum/sovetskie-kompyutery-i-vychislitelnye-kompleksy.html

this also contains details on every SMD manufactured in USSR and their PM contents. 
I use this site to buy Russian SMDs

Also once I have refined 26kg of silver from a single TV Radio wave carrier tube (120 m) and I did is using 1 part Sulphuric acid and 0.08 part nitric acid to dissolve the silver plate. could have yielded more if used Nitric and dissolved the entire thing but it was more than 2 tons.


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## Geo (Sep 27, 2011)

that is some crazy stuff. seems the Russians had more money than they knew what to do with. all these resources and their technology, it seems like a terrible waste.


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## Anonymous (Sep 27, 2011)

I am still looking at those numbers skeptically.


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## xsspirito (Sep 27, 2011)

Geo said:


> that is some crazy stuff. seems the Russians had more money than they knew what to do with. all these resources and their technology, it seems like a terrible waste.



In deed a waste, thats why USSR collapsed. 
I have melted 99.9% pure silver from aircraft batteries (not refining just melting). Few days ago I got a call from a friend who was offering 50% silver alloy at $200 a kilo, BUT it was a piping from Metsamor nuclear power plant and was radioactive, any ideas how to refine radioactivity away  :lol: 

BTW I have got a audio cable used in submarine sonar but can't find documentation on PM content, I know it's worth a lot (when called the manufacturer they said is classified and offered £20g for it)
http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=11532
analyzing in a lab costs £400 analyzing chemically would take a lot of time


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## patnor1011 (Sep 27, 2011)

Geo said:


> that is some crazy stuff. seems the Russians had more money than they knew what to do with. all these resources and their technology, it seems like a terrible waste.



No. They simply had enormous amounts of resources. It is not waste just use of them. They had and still have a lot of Pd/Pt/Au/Ag but now they have a lot of buyers lined. Back then it was more common for western countries to source stuff from other parts and not from enemy. So Soviets just used them. 
It is like coleslaw. Cabbage and carrots. If carrots will be expensive and scarce in world you will see only bits of it in salad. Imagine that Soviets had tons of carrots and even that they sold some, they just put more in their own salad.

His wording was bit confusing. He was recovering gold in `93 from way much older supercomputers. Then his quote may be acceptable.



xsspirito said:


> In deed a waste, thats why USSR collapsed.


That is not true statement.


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## Palladium (Sep 27, 2011)

If i could read Russian i would be alright. lol

Here's a pdf another member from Russia posted. Maybe something in there will help you out.


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## Geo (Sep 27, 2011)

but still, America had similar technology and did not expend such vast amounts of PM's in production models. maybe prototypes. Ive seen the old reel to reel computers and they did seem to have some impressive arrays but i cant imagine the reasoning for such fail-safe connectors. if it were being exposed to the elements or nuclear weapons components, then maybe so.


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## Anonymous (Sep 27, 2011)

I am not sure if it was on here or somewhere else,but a few years ago, someone posted the estimated precious metal value of a rocket.It was pretty amazing.


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## xsspirito (Sep 27, 2011)

mic, those are very precise numbers, on of my friends is buying factory rejects from a factory in Leningrad (St Petersburg) and he's making decisions based on the data from that site

Here is the translation of the following page 
http://affinage.org.ua/argentum/soderzhanie-serebra-i-palladiya-v-soprotivlenii-sp3-37a.html

Palladium and silver content of osilating resistor СП3-37A-1 Вт
Weight of item: 2,8±0,01 г
PM in the item: Palladium, silver
Wight of the PM in 1 item 
Silver — 0,021g
Palladium — 0,022 g
Compliance to the passport (data-sheet):
90-100 % by palladium 
70-80 % by silver (meaning there was less silver recovered than the data sheet suggested)

Quantity of PM in the item by % of mass:
Silver – 0,43 – 0,5%
Palladium— 0,6 – 0,66%

Elements containing PMs:
Palladium - pins 
Silver – pins


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## Palladium (Sep 27, 2011)

mic said:


> I am not sure if it was on here or somewhere else,but a few years ago, someone posted the estimated precious metal value of a rocket.It was pretty amazing.




http://www.scribd.com/doc/26703675/How-to-Refine-a-AB-61-Nuclear-Bomb


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## xsspirito (Sep 27, 2011)

mic said:


> I am not sure if it was on here or somewhere else,but a few years ago, someone posted the estimated precious metal value of a rocket.It was pretty amazing.



Something much smaller but! 

ПТУРC Controlled antitank rocket projectile 
http://young.rzd.ru/dbmm/images/41/4074/14691

communication line is 1.7 % gold 0.8 % platinum and 5% something else that i could not identify, dissolve or even melt, weighs about 2 kilos
guidance and control 2.15 g gold 4.8 g silver


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