# Transistor Value



## bagus (Jun 20, 2010)

I just got these transistors from my friend. What kind of PM should I expect from these transistors and what should I do to extract the PM's? Should I dissolved these transistor in dilute nitric acid first? 

Sorry for my bad English


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## qst42know (Jun 20, 2010)

Big chunk of copper in these but I don't know if there is any pm's.


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## bagus (Jun 20, 2010)

is this kind of e-scrap worthless? My friend said that he have around 20kg of this transistor and would like to know the value of it


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## teclu (Jun 20, 2010)

baguskd said:


> is this kind of e-scrap worthless? My friend said that he have around 20kg of this transistor and would like to know the value of it




Break one and see if it is yellow inside.
What type are they, producer?
Anyway, if they are yellow inside then you can get it probably maximum 500mg Au/kg.

teclu


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## Barren Realms 007 (Jun 20, 2010)

I have found traces in them as well. A lot to disolve for little recovery.


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## bagus (Jun 20, 2010)

teclu said:


> baguskd said:
> 
> 
> > is this kind of e-scrap worthless? My friend said that he have around 20kg of this transistor and would like to know the value of it
> ...



Hi teclu,

I can't find the producer but the text written in the transistor body is 
v27
HER1003C

I'll try to break one and I'll inform you how the inside looks like


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## bagus (Jun 20, 2010)

Barren Realms 007 said:


> I have found traces in them as well. A lot to disolve for little recovery.



I see, how about silver? is there no silver in it?


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## teclu (Jun 20, 2010)

baguskd said:


> Barren Realms 007 said:
> 
> 
> > I have found traces in them as well. A lot to disolve for little recovery.
> ...



If is not gold then is silver, but silver from these tranzistors not worth, that is not profitable.


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## samuel-a (Jun 20, 2010)

baguskd said:


> I just got these transistors from my friend. What kind of PM should I expect from these transistors and what should I do to extract the PM's? Should I dissolved these transistor in dilute nitric acid first?
> 
> Sorry for my bad English



baguskd, i don't know that for sure, but as far as i know, transistors may contain Gallium arsenide (GaAs).... this is bad stuff to deal with...

i would have pass on 20kg of them even if the have 1 or even 2 gram of gold per kg.... if they even have any at all...


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## qst42know (Jun 20, 2010)

Crush a few edge wise in a bench vice the black body will crumble away. Of the ones I have crushed this way the crystal block looks to be soft soldered in place. To me they did not look interesting enough to test. I suspect the largest value in these is as copper scrap. 

I could be wrong however (and it wouldn't be the first time) if you want to be certain digest a couple in a test tube and find out.


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## bagus (Jun 20, 2010)

samuel-a said:


> baguskd said:
> 
> 
> > I just got these transistors from my friend. What kind of PM should I expect from these transistors and what should I do to extract the PM's? Should I dissolved these transistor in dilute nitric acid first?
> ...



I get your point, Thanks samuel-a.
by the way this is how it looks like in after I break the plastic, I guess there is no gold inside it 

Should I just tell my friend to discard all of it or what?


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## jimdoc (Jun 20, 2010)

I have buckets full of them. If somebody won't buy them for the
copper content now, they probably will in the future when copper
prices go up.

Jim


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## Geld Konig (Jun 24, 2010)

Hi Baguskd. I have several old trasistors that are gold plated. But they are made in 70". Others, from 80" are silver plated. in both types there are very small gold wire thar are conected with silicon wafer. Only 3 wires. Transistors from 90' and so, are solder with epoxi & silver and the wire are so fine that no worthwhile.


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## goldsilverpro (Jun 24, 2010)

Some of those, probably from the 70s, have Au plating on the outside. Even those weren't worth much per pound, though. We used to call them PLEs, for some reason.


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## Geld Konig (Jul 4, 2010)

Goldsilverpro, what is PLEs?


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## goldsilverpro (Jul 4, 2010)

Geld Konig said:


> Goldsilverpro, what is PLEs?



I have no idea.


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## Richard36 (Jul 11, 2010)

goldsilverpro said:


> Geld Konig said:
> 
> 
> > Goldsilverpro, what is PLEs?
> ...



PLEs? ... Maybe it means "Please contain PM's", lol.
Just trying to be funny.


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## butcher (Jul 11, 2010)

Multi PLE gate refers to the gate inside like tri-PLE gate transistor,

nothing to do with the metals involved, a gate can be a P N junction, and controlls the flow of electrons and the direction like a check valve in water, 
the package has nothing to do with what is inside they can be transistors, mosfets, voltage regulators and so on the numbers on the package will define what it is and data sheets from the manufacture will give details of its use property's and so on, you can also get application notes on how to use them in circuits, sometimes you can find specifications of metals they contain.

a transistor can work like a switch (very similar to a relay but instead of haveing two terminals for a coil like a relay the transistor has one base terminal), if current say 20 milliamps are applied to the base the transistor switchs ON,similar to the points closing on a relay, now we can pass a much larger current from collector to emitter, just like a relays points can pass a much higher current through the points than the coil needs to turn on the relay. 

A transistor can also act as an amplifier, say we only give the base half of the 20 milliamps the current that passes through collector to emmitter is halfed also, now we give base less current and less passes collector to emitter,


this way we can take a simple idea like a coil of wire and a moving magnet, lets tie a piece of paper to the coil of wire (if we move a magnet across a coil of wire we generate current) here we have a current generator (a speaker and when we talk into this speaker our voice bounces the paper moveing the magnet across the coil of wire generating current in synchronization with our voice, shucks our speaker will only generate a few milliamps, no sweat we can use a transistor to Amplify that current now we have enough current to make a seperate coil become a magnet, (remember if we put a battery to a coil of wire it becomes a magnet, and two magnets of same polarity repel and opposite polarity attract) weel this magnetized coil is another speaker coil, and the amplified current to this coil moves the paper, so we hear what was said into the first speaker. recognize this as an intercom or telephone ?


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## golddigger69 (Nov 15, 2010)

Seperate (highgrade) any actual gold plated ones. Incinerate the rest, (I bake them in graphite crucible in an outdoor electric lab oven). Bake to WHITE ash, not black ash.

After ashing, run through a window screen to seperate large copper flats, sell as copper after quice acid-peroxide wash to brighten. 

Process ash for PM's per whatever method you use. Poor man's AR recomended.


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## T3sl4 (Nov 15, 2010)

What kind of transistors are those? A lot look fairly unused, they might be worth more as salvage if they still work.

Tim


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## johnny309 (Nov 20, 2010)

If they are still working they valued 2 or 3 $ a piece.
If they are broken then you can think for 60 to 70% by weight of cooper.....no PM inside thid transistors,because they are built lor high current and tension,no reason to lose precios metals inside them(high amperage swicthing transistor demand that conections had to have biggers diameter to sustein the current passing thru them).They are communly used in TV sets,CRT monitors....so ,no value unless,as I told you first they are still working and can be reused.


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