# Grams per pound?



## GoldFingers

I'm going out on a limb here, so please tell me if I am way off base! (I'm sure you will anyhow :lol: )

I was looking for general grams per pound figures on cleaned scrap, so that I could figure out what a good (safe) price to pay for cleaned scrap would be, and after reading many posts and observing the results of many for different types of scrap. I have a few numbers in mind.

Gold plated computer pins or fingers (cut from boards)

1lb clean pins or gold fingers= 2+ or - grams of gold 

2+ grams if older deep colored gold with a hint of red
about 2 grams if dark gold (a little brighter)
2- grams (or less than) if bright shiny yellow.

If it's flash plated then there is next to nothing to salvage!

So am I safe using this as a general buying guild for cleaned pins and fingers?

I'm still working on square inches calulations based on industry standards for thickness. Lots to learn here!!!


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## silversaddle1

I thought the conclusion was about 1 ounce of gold for every ten pounds of fingers. Maybe I'm wrong.


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## GoldFingers

silversaddle1 said:


> I thought the conclusion was about 1 ounce of gold for every ten pounds of fingers. Maybe I'm wrong.



Hmm! I don't know if I would feel very safe paying $1000 to $1100 for ten pounds of pins, as a base, based on value!

$66.00 per pound seemed a lot safer to me from a value stand point!


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## samuel-a

according to my experience with computer pins (header etc...) they usually run for 1 gram per Kg or 0.1% by weight give or take 

fingers however, run about 2.5-3.5 grams per pound, depends how old it is...
this is 0.55%-0.77% by weight and it can vary anywhere in that range


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## GoldFingers

samuel-a said:


> according to my experience with computer pins (header etc...) they usually run for 1 gram per Kg or 0.1% by weight give or take
> 
> fingers however, run about 2.5-3.5 grams per pound, depends how old it is...
> this is 0.55%-0.77% by weight and it can vary anywhere in that range



So I was pretty close on the pins (just a little high 0.1kg) and I was a little under on fingers (if they are not flash plated).

Thank you Sam!


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## samuel-a

with pins, before you buy them, you have to account also for acid cost, labor and waste treatment (and thers a lot of it) in your biddings...

tell you the truth... i would agree to get pins only for free... otherwise... it's not worth it.... to dissolve 10 pounds of pins will take an emance amount of acid for a long time... you could recycle your acid, but this will make the long process even longer.

good luck, and stay away from the suckers zone on e-bay


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## GoldFingers

samuel-a said:


> with pins, before you buy them, you have to account also for acid cost, labor and waste treatment (and thers a lot of it) in your biddings...
> 
> tell you the truth... i would agree to get pins only for free... otherwise... it's not worth it.... to dissolve 10 pounds of pins will take an emance amount of acid for a long time... you could recycle your acid, but this will make the long process even longer.
> 
> good luck, and stay away from the suckers zone on e-bay



I also see pins as a hazard zone (best left or disposed of in the sucker zone). Cleaned fingers is what I am looking towards mostly. The math is never the same twice though so I was looking for a safe zone for bidding and buying localy. It's much easier to buy it if I can see it (in hand) and peal a bit of foil back to see how thick (or thin) it is!


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## glorycloud

Not all fingers are completely plated as well. One pound of gold
fingers that are mixture of ISA, PCI could be very different in gold content
due to that fact.


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## creth

Though i have only run three batches of fingers and my first test batch of pins is soaking. I have averaged .5% for a yield from the fingers. So far im average 2gr per LB of fingers.


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## patnor1011

GoldFingers said:


> samuel-a said:
> 
> 
> 
> according to my experience with computer pins (header etc...) they usually run for 1 gram per Kg or 0.1% by weight give or take
> 
> fingers however, run about 2.5-3.5 grams per pound, depends how old it is...
> this is 0.55%-0.77% by weight and it can vary anywhere in that range
> 
> 
> 
> 
> So I was pretty close on the pins (just a little high 0.1kg) and I was a little under on fingers (if they are not flash plated).
> 
> Thank you Sam!
Click to expand...


You were not even close on pins. You stated 2grams per pound. That makes 4+grams per kg and Sam said 1gram. Your calaculation was in fact 4 times higher than Sam`s.


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## GoldFingers

You are right my math on the pins was wrong,


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## teabone

There are so many variations on the types of pins , that to set a certain number would not be feasible. I've had some mil-spec pins that averaged out to over 3 grams of gold per pound. There has been other times where the lower grade pins averaged less then 1/2 a gram per pound. The same goes with cpus and fingers. One rule of thumb , however , is the older the scrap the better.


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## patnor1011

yes teabone is right. buying pins is like farming. you never know in advance if you will have good year and if crops will yield more or less than last year ... price of seed and fertilizer will probably increase anyway...


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