# DMD / DLP chips evaluation



## Bigatus (Nov 13, 2017)

Hi
I am able to buy few kg of DMD chips. Did someone process them ? I don't have any idea about PGM quantities.


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## denim (Nov 13, 2017)

I doubt there is much platinum (PGM), but there might be about .75 grams/lb of AU in these. I have thrown a few of these in with other ceramic cpu's but I have never ran them separately for a yield test. I am basing this on what we usually get from AMD K6 type cpu's which I believe is about 1gram/lb.


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## Topher_osAUrus (Nov 13, 2017)

Too much acid for too little gold.

I had a batch for someone recently, and they ran pretty low. Less than a gram,per lb. The real pain is, they have to have all of their base metal dissolved to get the gold. It ends up being a lot of dissolving in AR, allowing values to cement, careful decanting, and repeating. Over, and over, and over and over and... 

Its hard to break even when chemical cost and waste treatment is considered.


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## kernels (Nov 13, 2017)

Topher_osAUrus said:


> Too much acid for too little gold.
> 
> I had a batch for someone recently, and they ran pretty low. Less than a gram,per lb. The real pain is, they have to have all of their base metal dissolved to get the gold. It ends up being a lot of dissolving in AR, allowing values to cement, careful decanting, and repeating. Over, and over, and over and over and...
> 
> Its hard to break even when chemical cost and waste treatment is considered.



This is 100% what happened to me when I ran some of those 0.05g per CPU ceramic AMDs for a guy a while ago. It seems like it is going be great getting a good fraction of the Gold without having to buy the scrap, but in the end the acid used and waste treatment made it a bad deal.


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## Topher_osAUrus (Nov 13, 2017)

The really bad thing is, dissolving in AR is really the only way to go about them. There is no action in nitric or sulfuric. Strong, dilute, cold, hot..nothing. 

So its pretty much AR or nothing. Since a sulfuric deplating cell would be difficult to get the entire outer plating -and very ineffective at braze and bond wires. Cyanide would get the outer plate, no braze, and no bond wires since they are behind glass and under some very resilient substrate alloy.

Just no fun at all to do..


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## Bigatus (Nov 14, 2017)

Thank You guys for all informations. I just saved more than 100$, because that Was the price per 1kg


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## nickton (Jun 29, 2018)

what about crushing them? Probably too difficult too I'd imagine. Or pyrolisis?


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## anachronism (Jun 30, 2018)

nickton said:


> what about crushing them? Probably too difficult too I'd imagine. Or pyrolisis?



You'd need to break them to process in AR anyway. They are ceramic- pyrolisis is used for plastic based products.


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## nickton (Jul 6, 2018)

Sounds to me like a ball mill would be useful.


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## patnor1011 (Jul 6, 2018)

Not quite, it would be overkill and it will also complicate leaching if you turn that ceramic into powder. 
One smack with a hammer to break it to 2-3 pieces is sufficient. You only want to break it so acid can get to the middle cavity to dissolve gold which may be present there.


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