# The mother boards I have



## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

This is my main source to collect from. going from bottom to top The first picture is what 1 pound of these boards look like. I think It was 10 boards to the pound. they do vary in size a little but I tried to average them out. 
the next picture is where I removed some plastic around the fingers to give you a better look
the third is of the whole board. 

I have about 40 to 50 lbs of these boards.

Any comments? What would be the best process for the entire board?


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## publius (Jun 18, 2012)

Sell them to boardsort???


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## Barren Realms 007 (Jun 18, 2012)

Sell them and then look for more material.


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

publius said:


> Sell them to boardsort???




So even though these are worth $10 a pound to board sort, they have no precious metals in them thats worth retrieving for me?


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## Geo (Jun 18, 2012)

yes they do. the value is whats in question and not really content. how valuable is your time? some members feel its not worth their time to recover and refine from poor quality scrap. its a matter of personal preference. the chips on the boards contain more gold than the pins you can see. each flatpack has small gold bonding wires. each leg on the chip has one bonding wire. the scrap on those boards is actually (pound for pound) higher yield than mother boards. the board in your pictures is "logic boards" from disk drives.


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

Geo said:


> yes they do. the value is whats in question and not really content. how valuable is your time? some members feel its not worth their time to recover and refine from poor quality scrap. its a matter of personal preference. the chips on the boards contain more gold than the pins you can see. each flatpack has small gold bonding wires. each leg on the chip has one bonding wire. the scrap on those boards is actually (pound for pound) higher yield than mother boards. the board in your pictures is "logic boards" from disk drives.




Yes. thats what all the 50lbs are. logic boards from hard drives. The info about the flat packs is very interesting. Are all the flat packs on Hard drives similar in nature. The reason I ask is that I had sold maybe a total of 50 lbs of logic boards off of older larger 80's era hard drives. Gold was over 1400 at the time but I was only able to get 1/3 of what I get for these smaller late 90's and early 2000 era logic boards. Wish i had a picture of the older ones so you could see. from what i have learned recently the older ones would have produced a higher yield. 

Is that true? I maybe getting more of them soon.


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## Geo (Jun 18, 2012)

some of the very old logic boards had gold traces under the solder mask and were larger containing more components. so, yes, the older the vintage on these boards, the more gold there is.


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## silversaddle1 (Jun 18, 2012)

So you have 500.00 wort of boards, all you have to do is ship them. Collect your cash and seek more.


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

silversaddle1 said:


> So you have 500.00 wort of boards, all you have to do is ship them. Collect your cash and seek more.




Yes that is true. But if I followed your logic strictly. And I decided to go out and buy my solid wood tv stand I would have spent no more money than when i milled the wood and built the tv stand I wanted. I would have in fact saved many hours of time. And I could have saved a large amount of money because I would not have needed all those expensive tools I love so much. But I would never have gotten to build a piece of my own furniture either ( I have in fact created several nice pieces) 

Now if you were to tell me I was going to spend 2 to 3 times more money than I would recover in gold value then i would probably rethink this. But I don't think this is the case. If I do no more than break even then i will be happy and the next 50lbs of boards may just be sold like the last 50 lbs were. 

At least thats the way i see it. Not everyone is destined to be rich and being rich is not my motivation. I do want to recover every fraction of a gram (within reason) that i can from my logic boards.


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## ericrm (Jun 18, 2012)

i will just give you my opinion
that is a wonderfull idea ... in idea....
im to my 3 batch of ic and i still endup with no gold ... i have tryed panning,i have tryed chemical, i just cant find that d..n gold.
but why not ...... try it for yourself on a small scale and see if you do better... who know maybe you will come up on the forum with a process that i can finaly folow :mrgreen:


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## Geo (Jun 18, 2012)

i just did 2 pounds of IC's and recovered 2 grams of refined gold. this is what i do. 

incinerate the IC's until they are chalky white. the best way i can do it is spread them on a cookie sheet and place them on a hot wood fire. im still trying to perfect the art of incinerating in a closed canister.i have a #12 cast iron skillet i put the chips in once they are ashed. i use a piece of round iron rod stock 2.5" in diameter as a pestle and grind them coarsely. i dump them in a plastic tub and remove the iron legs with a magnet. i dump the ash back into the skillet and mill until most of the material is powdered. i put the powder in a glass pot and place the pot in a plastic tub. add a few drops of dish soap to the pot and start a gentle stream of water into the pot. i mix the material well as the water nears the top of the pot and then leave it alone. after an hour i stir the material again and wait another hour. during this time the water is moving the lighter ash up and out of the pot. if there is any big chunks or alot of ash left. i turn off the water and decant the water into the tub and return the wet ash to the skillet for more milling. i repeat this until i have remove the most of the ash. by now, swirling the water in the pot reveals nice gold color on the leading edge of the ash thats left. when i get to this point, its straight to AR. i go back through the plastic catch pan but have yet to find any gold that got out of the pot.


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

Thanks Geo. Your too cool. Do all IC's have a gold thread or just the type you would find on logic boards. I haves some transformers and each one had and IC (or 2). Are they worth the effort?


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## Geo (Jun 18, 2012)

not all IC's have gold bonding wires, but a large majority does.theres no way to visually check each one and really, who has the time. i just assume that they all contain gold and process them all. it takes just as much time and chemicals to process an ounce as it does to process a pound.i do sort by type, not because one type is any better than another, its just some are easier to process than others. flatpacks yield better than DIP processors unless they are gold capped ceramics. north and south bridge chips yield more than flatpacks because you can recover the wires from the chip inside the black top AND the foils from the green base.


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

I was actually thinking along the lines of incinerating them. I got the idea because I had seen a video of some kids in india who were heating circuit boards on hot plates. their reasons may have been different then mine will be. 

I have some fire brick and I was thinking of making an oven of sorts. A place at the bottom for some oak, a steel grate, and then fire brick on top of that to keep as much heat in as possible. A few low pressure jets of compressed air to the flame and I think it will get pretty hot. 

I was going to d an experiment where I incinerate the entire board. I would really like a ceramic vat to put logic boards in. For some reason I thought I would not be able to use cast iron or a steel plate. I guess I was thinking of something reacting with the steel from the boards. Not sure. 

Does this sound like a little over kill to you? Can I incinerate all the plastics on the boards or is it just going to make a goo that I can not separate from the metal. So far Hoke does not talk about removing metal from plastic and I seriously doubt she will.

I am also thinking I read something about tin or solder being very hard to get out of solution. Is that true? All the info is swimming together and making a mess in my head.


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## jimdoc (Jun 18, 2012)

boutselis said:


> I was actually thinking along the lines of incinerating them. I got the idea because I had seen a video of some kids in india who were heating circuit boards on hot plates. their reasons may have been different then mine will be.
> 
> I have some fire brick and I was thinking of making an oven of sorts. A place at the bottom for some oak, a steel grate, and then fire brick on top of that to keep as much heat in as possible. A few low pressure jets of compressed air to the flame and I think it will get pretty hot.
> 
> ...



Do your neighbors like you now?

Jim


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

jimdoc said:


> boutselis said:
> 
> 
> > I was actually thinking along the lines of incinerating them. I got the idea because I had seen a video of some kids in india who were heating circuit boards on hot plates. their reasons may have been different then mine will be.
> ...



Its not like they are close by. If they were, the ones I know would not care.


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## MMFJ (Jun 18, 2012)

boutselis said:


> publius said:
> 
> 
> > Sell them to boardsort???
> ...


Not that much MORE than selling them will have.

A motto we go buy around here - and it has worked out for years, proving over and over to always work toward the main goal of "less work, more pay = more profit and fewer days (of hard work in your life)" is


> Get the FAST penny, NOT the LAST penny!



Way too many people chase those pennies and trip over the dollars that are staring them in the face.

Take the $500 on this load (processing it yourself will _perhaps _yield $100?? 200? if you are lucky, $300???) Then, take that $500 and buy more loads, which you can THEN play around with because they are totally FREE....

For example;

You paid $100 for this load (you didn't say how you got them, but let's just use that number).

If you process, you might break even, or maybe make a slight profit.

By SELLING the boards now and buying more with the PROFITS, you will have FOUR more 'lots' of material, which you could then take the original amount and 'play' with. If you totally screw up, you have lost nothing, and still have four 'lots' to sell, again at $500/lot.....

Keep this up a few times, and now, you may be able to RETIRE, and have all the time in the world to 'play' (or, hey, at least a few days off now and then!)

Well, at least, that's the way I see it...


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## boutselis (Jun 18, 2012)

MMFJ said:


> boutselis said:
> 
> 
> > publius said:
> ...



i know a man who is very close to me. He followed your philosophy. He has millions. He retired completely a few years ago. bought a very expensive corvet and this giant motor home. This motor home is about as large as the trailer I grew up in. HUGE> He went on one trip with the motor home. he has been battling cancer ever since and has pretty much lost the fight. He has months left. maybe only weeks. I'm not jerking you around. He is a good friend and I am going to miss him. 

I paid nothing for the boards except the work of taking apart the drives and that work paid for itself pretty well. IF there is not over $500 of silver and gold in the boards then I am a con man to be sure. I just didn't know it. Some where on this site I said I made some furniture. I have a lot of wood working tools that I had to save up for. I could have saved thousands and not bought the tools. Probably paid no more for my beautiful TV stand than I spent in hard woods to build it. AND save a lot of time. But then i would not have had the pleasure of building my own Tv stand. Or I could have waited and built one later. All those years not doing what i wanted because it would make me more money to do something else. And then die of a heart attack at age 50. I like money. I certainly can't live with out money. I don't love money. If I break even or even lose a couple of hundred in the process but end up with my shiny 4 gram button (Which I'm not planning on selling any way) then I will be happy. If I can figure out how to make it 6 grams in stead of 4 then i will be happier still. not because I made more but because I did a better job at what i was trying to do. If it comes out to be 12 grams then I will keep that one also but then get to work taking apart 1000 more drives and make another 12 grams of gold. A tiny silver bar would be pretty cool also. 

The short version is. I didn't come here for financial advice or life planning. There are forums for that. This isn't it. I came here to talk about refining gold and silver and the like. Thanks for the advice but if its all just the same to you my sails are set and there is sun just over that horizon and thats where i'm going.


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## jimdoc (Jun 19, 2012)

Just figure on doing what you plan safely, as some costs aren't about money at all. And the dangers with this hobby are plenty, if you don't do your homework. Free gold isn't free if you damage your health getting it. In wood working you may cut off a finger, it will hurt and you will miss it. But not as much as you would miss your lungs and breathing, or your eyes.

Jim


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## MMFJ (Jun 19, 2012)

jimdoc said:


> Just figure on doing what you plan safely, as some costs aren't about money at all. And the dangers with this hobby are plenty, if you don't do your homework. Free gold isn't free if you damage your health getting it. In wood working you may cut off a finger, it will hurt and you will miss it. But not as much as you would miss your lungs and breathing, or your eyes.
> 
> Jim


And, this is EXACTLY why I recommend flipping the boards - gives you time to STUDY, and MONEY to buy the right equipment to do it SAFELY (and hopefully some time to gather patience to support the struggles in learning and testing!)

Nobody is, in any way, trying to 'steal a dream' or anything. The story about the guy with the bus - OK, but I could reply with the one about my part-time helper that is 42 and broke as a church mouse that was just a few days ago diagnosed with cancer in his left kidney. Seems that stuff really doesn't care about money and is not really the crux of the point. (It is truly odd to me why people like to bend conversations of gathering a bit of extra cash to "miserly" proportions - we were talking about $500, not "millions", weren't we???? - if you think this load is going to "spoil you with riches" you have really got another think coming....)

What IS important is that you take learning to process S L O W L Y and flipping a load a few times allows you to both grow some cash and gather some very valuable insight on what DOES contain that gold you seek. Many things are better and simpler to process and refine than hard drive boards and, again, (oh, yes, here I go, _again_.....), I think you would be much better off SELLING the boards and buying something that is much simpler (and likely safer) to start with. 

Yes, you can spin your wheels over and over on the boards (which really don't contain much 'easy' gold anyway) and have to learn recovery, processing and refining for each type of material you take off the board (along with the SAFETY issues of removal, processing and disposal of each kind of waste) OR you could sell the boards (I know, horrible sin.....), buy some fingers (or take the time to collect them) and then begin learning on ONE type of material, which is simple to deal with and start learning. Gotta say, from experience, things with a lot of visible gold are both more fun to find and more simple to process.

As for me (and many like me), I am in "love" with collecting, gathering and saving (spell that 'h-o-a-r-d-i-n-g' if you like) GOLD that is pure and easily resalable at some point that I (or my family, some time down the line) need to (isn't that really what it is about?). 

What I've found is that, by flipping some of these boards, I regained a lot of time to go get more and then do it again, over and over - hey, ONE process! Then, in much less time than it would take me to learn how to refine anything directly (and with my sensitive nose, shaky hands and affinity for too many details, it would take a L O N G time!), I have been able to save several grams of gold (with the latest load, should be over 1toz, in less than 6 months) and nearly 20 ounces of silver - oh, yeah, most of it is "store-bought" (I have sent some loads off to a refiner I met on the forum), but it is much more than I would have ever recovered and refined on my own (and all the extra money I've made doing this? well, it has kept a roof over my family's head and food on our table - not quite a 50' RV, but not bad, in my opinion, either).

No, I'm not a 'refiner', per se, but I believe my presence on this forum is useful to many - both as a point of view and as a 'success story' (not my favorite term, but it does show one way it can be done and has, from the comments I've had by others, given some form of insight and hope that they never considered before). 

I wish you success on your "sailing" and hope you gather and process more gold and silver than anyone ever was capable of doing from those boards, though through every step, I urge you to be safe (and, perhaps, consider some of the ideas suggested here)!


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## nickvc (Jun 19, 2012)

I think the guys are trying to give you alternatives and an insight into the work involved in recovering and refining the values from your material. We're it me I'm afraid I'm with them, too much work for too little return, gold and silver is money in it's most basic forms. If you wish to do a batch of these then fine but there are easy things to process and they in my opinion are not a good type of scrap to learn the processes from, fingers seem to be a good place to start using AP to recover and then refine them by either AR or HCl and chlorox or strip pins in the sulphuric cell to recover the gold and then again use the solvent of your choice to refine. If your stripping down whole computers then most of the money is in the base metals, the values in precious metals need to be graded and if you have a decent feed of material I would harvest high grade to process yourself and sell the rest and buy more to accumulate good materials to work with.
It might not be true to whatever dream you have but it will give you better materials to refine with less chemicals, waste solutions and toxic fumes to deal with and better yields. Make no mistake however green your aims are we deal with very dangerous materials from acids and fumes to the waste we produce and in my opinion the least material with the highest yields are the ones to look for with the least damage to your health or the environment, these worries may be reduced if you have the right hoods and fume scrubbers already if not one run with this material may change your mind.


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## boutselis (Jun 19, 2012)

jimdoc and mmfj

I do appreciate all your advice. I want you to know I believe it to be sound advice and most likely proper for most people. I wouldn't even say I disagree with you. I have flipped these boards for a few years and all the time I had been wondering "can i process these boards? . some one is. Why not me." 

It is a desire that has been burning and building in me for a few years now. I know I will be getting more of these boards ( I just picked up about 40 more drives all with logic boards on them) And I may have as much as another 100 lbs in my stash of drives and the 50 lbs is a good place to start. 

There is a very good chance I will fail. It won't be the first time I have failed. The first vanity I tried to build wasted $40 in sheet goods before I even got off the ground. The first used jointer I bought ended up being so out of wack it went to the scrap yard and cost me $150 when it was all said and done.

But in those two screw ups I learned a lot about cutting sheet goods and I learned a lot about setting up jointers.

I'm sure You understand what I'm driving at and maybe with a little help from some of you fella's I can learn a lot about processing logic boards. I just hope I don't give up before I do because it looks very hard. 

thanks again. I don't want you to think I don't appreciate your thoughts because I do. Keep the advice coming.


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## boutselis (Jun 19, 2012)

nickvc said:


> I think the guys are trying to give you alternatives and an insight into the work involved in recovering and refining the values from your material. We're it me I'm afraid I'm with them, too much work for too little return, gold and silver is money in it's most basic forms. If you wish to do a batch of these then fine but there are easy things to process and they in my opinion are not a good type of scrap to learn the processes from, fingers seem to be a good place to start using AP to recover and then refine them by either AR or HCl and chlorox or strip pins in the sulphuric cell to recover the gold and then again use the solvent of your choice to refine. If your stripping down whole computers then most of the money is in the base metals, the values in precious metals need to be graded and if you have a decent feed of material I would harvest high grade to process yourself and sell the rest and buy more to accumulate good materials to work with.
> It might not be true to whatever dream you have but it will give you better materials to refine with less chemicals, waste solutions and toxic fumes to deal with and better yields. Make no mistake however green your aims are we deal with very dangerous materials from acids and fumes to the waste we produce and in my opinion the least material with the highest yields are the ones to look for with the least damage to your health or the environment, these worries may be reduced if you have the right hoods and fume scrubbers already if not one run with this material may change your mind.




Thank you nickvc. All very good points. Especially about the fumes. In fact A friend who has spent much of his life in a scientific field has just warned me that the biggest help i can get in my endeavor is with some one sending the epa to my home if I do to much of the wrong thing because of the fumes. I think he is a little drastic with his idea of the epa police but I do understand the dangers of fumes. 

The yields are secondary to me. Learning the process is first and foremost.


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## Harold_V (Jun 19, 2012)

boutselis said:


> The yields are secondary to me. Learning the process is first and foremost.


I'm going to enjoy watching your baptism by fire. 
You have much to learn, grasshopper. 
Uppermost is the ability to take well tendered advice, made obvious by your obstinance.

I'll say one thing. If you can survive processing entire boards, you'll do just fine handling materials that are easier to process. You will also, by then, understand why boards are processed by the means used in industry. 

Harold


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## boutselis (Jun 19, 2012)

Harold_V said:


> boutselis said:
> 
> 
> > The yields are secondary to me. Learning the process is first and foremost.
> ...




I am not sure what you would enjoy about it but I Hope you find it entertaining. If I took all the well tendered advice I have received over the years I would not be nearly as happy as i am today. I can not think of any of the pivotal moments in my life where I did not have some one who KNEW much more than me and was steering me in a different direction for my own good. I can think of many more minor instances where people would scoff at me and tell me what i was going to do was never going to work only to find out what i was doing worked great. I won't bore you with details. 

Enjoy my spectacular failure. Hope you find it entertaining. 

That being said. I had just come in here to say I may have changed my mind. Not completely yet but just may have decided against my goal. I will let you know.


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## patnor1011 (Jun 19, 2012)

You remind me of my brother. 
If you want to learn process please do. 
I would say that most of what you need to know was already discussed here. Some things many times over. Read Hoke and search on forum. There is hardly something what was not covered regarding processing electronic waste.


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## boutselis (Jun 19, 2012)

patnor1011 said:


> You remind me of my brother.
> If you want to learn process please do.
> I would say that most of what you need to know was already discussed here. Some things many times over. Read Hoke and search on forum. There is hardly something what was not covered regarding processing electronic waste.




Well I certainly hope you like your brother.


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## schomisch (Jun 19, 2012)

Boutselis, 

I love your ambition to want to learn something new. I would recommend getting some fingers or pins or similar concentrated material and refine it. Do this just to get you used to the chemicals and the processes. If money is not an issue, then in the meantime you can stockpile some more boards, for when your comfortable doing the whole boards. =)) I wish the best of luck to you on your journey! 

~Chris!~

ps. If you need some more of the same boards in your pics, I can get you a few thousand more


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## Harold_V (Jun 20, 2012)

boutselis said:


> I am not sure what you would enjoy about it but I Hope you find it entertaining. If I took all the well tendered advice I have received over the years I would not be nearly as happy as i am today. I can not think of any of the pivotal moments in my life where I did not have some one who KNEW much more than me and was steering me in a different direction for my own good. I can think of many more minor instances where people would scoff at me and tell me what i was going to do was never going to work only to find out what i was doing worked great. I won't bore you with details.


Just as well. What you don't understand is that you hope to run before you can walk. That being the case, and that you see yourself as more clever than those who have experience, what you will accomplish is to drive away those who may have input when you hit a wall, secure in the knowledge that you don't heed anything you're told. So then, what's the purpose in trying to help? Indications are, you hope to hear only that which you wish to hear, not what you need to hear. We've had an endless stream of inquiries like yours--none of which are here long enough to show us that they knew they were right. I wonder why that is. 

You're hear for one of two reasons. One of them is you hope to learn enough that you can process for recovery. The other is to show how clever you are, and that the rules don't apply to you. One is a healthy attitude that encourages those with knowledge to share with you. The other is to discourage others from trying to help when you need it most. 

Can you guess which side I'm on?


> That being said. I had just come in here to say I may have changed my mind. Not completely yet but just may have decided against my goal. I will let you know.


Don't bother. I really don't give a damn. I already know not to try to help, and I'm not the least bit interested in watching the dog and pony show. I'm here to help where I can, not to cajole those who intend to reinvent the wheel. 

Harold


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## boutselis (Jun 20, 2012)

Harold_V said:


> boutselis said:
> 
> 
> > I am not sure what you would enjoy about it but I Hope you find it entertaining. If I took all the well tendered advice I have received over the years I would not be nearly as happy as i am today. I can not think of any of the pivotal moments in my life where I did not have some one who KNEW much more than me and was steering me in a different direction for my own good. I can think of many more minor instances where people would scoff at me and tell me what i was going to do was never going to work only to find out what i was doing worked great. I won't bore you with details.
> ...



Dude. I don't know what your talking about. I don't think I'm more clever than any one. I just know I do things different. And I am not here to show how clever I am. I could care less about how clever people think i am. Especially people I am never going to meet. I just don't see why you and a few others would try so hard to talk me out of doing something that I already want to do. Why don't I just stop doing everything that isn't profitable? 

I came here for help. so far I have gotten more crap for wanting to try than I have gotten help. I don't care what side your on. You don't want to help me then don't. Just sit back and laugh because you obviously have NO idea what my goal is. I just like doing THINGS. things of all kinds. Its just the way I am. I stumble across something I want to do and I do it. 
There is one thing I don't feel like doing. That is driving around and picking up computers and what not to find the gold in it. I always found scavanger hunts boring. What i have to work with is HERE and was super easy to get. It practically walks into my shop under its own power. I am very fortunate to have it. 

If you would like to help , and still feel free to laugh while you do as it will not bother me, then it would be much appreciated. I hope you fall on the side of helping. There are way to many people in this world that have the attitude of "if your not going to do the things i feel like helping with then I'm not helping". 

So I am asking you for your help and I hope I get it because I need it. 

thanks for your input and this short debate. I do like a good little debate once in a while.


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## etack (Jun 20, 2012)

I'm not in your debate between you and Harold. That said all the info you need is on the forum. patnor1011 has a pdf on chips in his sig. search and read


I now that most of the people that say sell your boards say that because you have done whole boards and know how much it sucks. However most of you started with MB which in my opinion one of the lowest grades of boards to start with. HD controllers boards are 3X the price of MB for a reason. They contain more with less waste and are easier to tare down.

here are some numbers to think of each IDE HD contains $0.40 in pins 10 grams of of chips (on the low end) @ $0.11 a gram that $1.50 a board without the #s for the chip resistors or capacitors. 

pin #s came from me with the help of goldnscrap.com calculator with the plating thickness at 30 as most male pins are
chip per a gram came from Geo


Geo said:


> i just did 2 pounds of IC's and recovered 2 grams of refined gold. this is what i do.



Eric


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