# Best method for "Cutting Fingers" from cards?



## Anonymous (Aug 2, 2009)

When removing the plated finger area of an Interrface Card, Slot 1 CPU or RAM Module, I used a band saw, pretty messy, lots of Fiberglass Debris all over. Anyone come up with a better method?

Eric
Wisconsin


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## Oz (Aug 2, 2009)

Tin snips


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## teabone (Aug 2, 2009)

Heavy duty paper cutter works great.


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## patnor1011 (Aug 2, 2009)

like oz said


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## glorycloud (Aug 2, 2009)

The simplest cleanest way for me is to use a heavy pair of pliers and leverage.
Take the card in your hand (I wear gloves to keep the blistering down) face up.
I grab the card in my left hand and grip one of the gold fingers of the card
with the pliers at a 90 degree angle to the card. I grip the pliers as close to the 
main part of the card as I can so I get a nice close break off point for the gold finger.
I then rest the top edge of card on my workbench and I push down hard with the
pliers while I at the same time rotate the pliers upwards toward the ceiling.
On the PCI cards, with some practice, you can get the longer edge to snap off in
one or two downward pushes. The 16 bit ISA cards and slot 1 processors cards may
take three or four downward strokes. After a while you catch a rhythm and it goes
pretty quickly. I can snap the fingers off of (200) ethernet PCI cards with three
gold finger sections in about 20 minutes or so.

No dust from saws. No chance to lose a finger on the band saw or to get blood 
on the floor. :lol: 

Works for me, Mr. Low Tech! 8)


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## glorycloud (Aug 2, 2009)

OK, I forgot to mention the part about how I put my left hand over the
head of the pliers and push down with that hand to get the finger
snapping leverage. 8)


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## EDI Refining (Aug 2, 2009)

you could use a vise to break the fingers off the boards. that would avoid blisters


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## patnor1011 (Aug 3, 2009)

hehe... blisters are part of the job. no gold is comming home easy.


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## stihl88 (Aug 3, 2009)

glorycloud said:


> The simplest cleanest way for me is to use a heavy pair of pliers and leverage.
> Take the card in your hand (I wear gloves to keep the blistering down) face up.
> I grab the card in my left hand and grip one of the gold fingers of the card
> with the pliers at a 90 degree angle to the card. I grip the pliers as close to the
> ...



Yep! That's how i do it...

I bet you could even rest the edge of the card on a steel workbench and just whack the fingers off with a hammer.


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## goldsilverpro (Aug 3, 2009)

I always liked using a vise. You can set the vise with a tiny bit of slop so you can slip the boards in and out without having to tighten or loosen the vise. When you break the fingers off, you get good leverage using the whole board.

The best method I've seen was the use of electric or air-driven scissors or shears. I spent 2 weeks at a plant that had 2 or 3 girls, on 2 or 3 shifts, doing nothing but cutting fingers off of boards using power scissors.


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## glorycloud (Aug 3, 2009)

Hey GSP, in a big operation like that, what would they do next with the fingers?
How did they process them in very large quantities?


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## goldsilverpro (Aug 4, 2009)

This was a worldwide collection point (25 years ago), in a 500,000 sq.ft. building, for all of the out-of-date and scrap computers from a huge office computer manufacturer, with branches in most countries. There were probably 100 people involved in the dismantling and sorting and they got in several semi loads each day. I was there for 2 weeks as a refiner of these fingers. After 2 weeks, the FBI closed the place down because of the hanky-panky being done by management, including a vice-president. They were stealing millions. 

My partner and I had a neat and clean professional mobile refinery on a long bobtail truck. We made contracts with manufacturers to refine on their docks, right in front of them. We used their water, electricity, and gas and started refining. We had the equipment to strip large quantities of plated scrap using cyanide, do zincing, do aqua regia, melt and cast, and do fire assays. We had a fume hood, a scrubber, waste storage, and all the needed glassware. We also bought some of their other scrap - thus, the reason for fire assays. We lacked nothing. Everything was piped in. It took us 3 months to build it.

We (2 of us) stripped in a cement mixer and ran about 50 to 100 oz. of pure gold per day, from the fingers. We were keeping up with the finger cutting. We gave them their share (~80%) in bullion.


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## glorycloud (Aug 4, 2009)

Great story! You da' man!! 8)


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## Anonymous (Mar 2, 2010)

Throatless Shear from Harbor Freights works great!!
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=38413


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## silversaddle1 (Mar 2, 2010)

I have cut over 16 pounds of fingers off boards in the last two weeks. Three metods I use. 
1. The vice. Quick, fast and a secret is to not break the finger off all at once, but to bend the board so the finger "tears" across the board from one side to the other.
2. Tin snips. Super easy to use and clean cutting. I use the red handled ones. I think they are right hand cut.
3. Sheet metal stomp sheer. This is by far the quickest, fastest, and fun way to cut fingers. You caan't do all boards this way, but the ones you can you can rip thru like a knife thru butter.

I have a bandsaw, but like the above post, it's slow and messy. Pliers work good and if you can get to a HAVC store/supplier, you can buy those pliers that have the real wide jaws. Those just might be the ticket. I have not yet tried them. Link: http://www.oldworlddistributors.com/6-hand-seamer.html


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## erogers36 (Mar 2, 2010)

Or just like Oz $7.99 Tin snips


http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=90720


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## gold4mike (Mar 10, 2010)

I bought a shear similar to the throatless shear link above. The cost was $99.00 and I make a cut roughly every 3 to 4 seconds when I have a pile of cards built up so it makes quick work of the pile. I used a bandsaw for a while but I was wearing out blades fairly quickly and have probably saved more than the $99.00 in blades since I bought the shear. I also don't have to worry about cutting my finger off any more! It won't tire you out like the tin snips will and makes a nice clean cut with very little debris added to your fingers.


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