# Sun Ultra Sparc CPUs



## kurt

Just tore down 2 main frame servers I got from a scrap yard the other day got 20 of these CPUs out of them (18 of the smaller ones & 2 of the larger ones) along with the plastic thing (loaded with gold wires) that makes the connection between the CPU & the board.

The plastic things (that make the connection between the CPU & the board have about .65 grams of wire each so thats about 13 grams of wire recovered in the dish - not sure yet if that equals a 13 gram gold yeald - if so the wires alone will more then pay back what I payed for the entire tuck load of computers I bought that included the 2 servers

Anyone have any info on recovery &/or value of the CPUs - is it just the gold plating on the bottom - or are there gold wires under the lid &/or inbedded in the ceramic ?

Kurt


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## g_axelsson

kurt said:



> The plastic things (that make the connection between the CPU & the board have about .65 grams of wire each so thats about 13 grams of wire recovered in the dish - not sure yet if that equals a 13 gram gold yeald - if so the wires alone will more then pay back what I payed for the entire tuck load of computers I bought that included the 2 servers


The "wires" is small gold plated springs most probably made of beryllium copper. It isn't solid gold but as they are thin the surface area is high compared to the total weigh of the springs. What that does in percent I don't know.

I would doubt that the ceramics have any gold inside, but there could be gold plate, gold bond wires and gold braze under the lid. Break one in half, have a look and let us know.

/Göran


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## chambersjr

Curious about this also. I've had a few of these that I sold as-is with other CPU's when shipping to E-Scrap buyers. If I member correctly they weren't priced anywhere close to the higher yielding ceramics. I agree with Goran that the base metal is likely copper for the wires. One thing to keep in mind is the copper is probably nickel plated. Gold plate over nickel plate over copper. 

Please let us know what you find out.


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## undero2

broke one of these apart see what was in the inside just thought you'd like to know.


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## glondor

I am not at my shop for accurate data, but (from memory) the berry-copper-gold wool is 55% gold by weight and the sun spark chips are very very low yield by weight. very low. The copper-tungsten heat spreader throws the yield numbers drastically.


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## silversaddle1

Share with us how you removed all the spring wool!


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## Anonymous

The processors are diabolical mate. Sorry to lay that on you but this was one of my first enquiries too on this forum. Even the wires in the interface plates are pretty rubbish. 

Sorry an' all but it's the sad truth.

Jon


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## auratus72

Hi, these pinless CPU connectors are called Fuzz Button connectors and yes as Glondor said their yield is very high , base metal can be Beryllium copper or Molybdenum, look for Custom Interconnect Fuzz Button Connectors and Cinch's Cin::Apse website for more information. I refined a batch of 350 grams (whole connectors,75-80 gms pins approximately ) got about 28 gram fines.


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## Anonymous

Well I'm all ears and more than willing to admit failure here! Seriously you got that return on the fibres?


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## pgms4me

I get lots of servers and the spacers with the fuzz wires are the best yielding things I ever did. There are a lot of variations and types of those fuzz wires over the years. Some have more connections than others,but the larger sparc IV processor fuzzes gave me the best yields. .65 grams of contacts (each one) yielded .4 grams of gold. The last one I did had 16 processors in it. that gave over 6 grams just for the fuzz connectors. there was 8 sticks of ram for each processor. And they were the larger heavy sticks. i dont remember exactly but it was 15 - 17 # of ram total. I found with a thin stainless straight dental pick you can poke the fuzz wires out pretty fast while watching tv or zoning. Also many of those servers I did, had silver buttons in them instead of gold. I have not processed any of those. If I can ever figure out how to post pics on here I would post the various types


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## glorycloud

How do you get the "fuzz connectors" of these plastic CPU holders? I have a lot of
them as well and I haven't cracked that code yet. I have run the whole things
in hot HCL and it seems to take forever for the springs to drop out (if they ever do).


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## auratus72

I used a knife blade to scrape/pry them off the housing carefully as they can fly away from the container and have hard time in re-collection.


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## glondor

I just put them straight into AR. The plastic is unaffected.


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## Anonymous

I daren't tell you how many of those fuzz connectors I have but I'm going to process a large amount in AR tomorrow and I'll let you know what I get. 

I'll get weights etc so it's done correctly.


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## kurtak

Ok - its been over a year ago that I first posted this thread - so I don't remember numbers (weight of starting fuzz - recovered value) but I do remember I was quite happy with the outcome - happy enough that they now get thrown I my personal stash for processing & not sold to my board buyers

Kurt


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## silversaddle1

Great, I know I have a small box full of those things out in the shop. Now I must go find them. Man on a mission!
:shock:


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## macfixer01

Thanks for the info. Fuzz Buttons were a new concept to me, and somehow I never heard of them before. Here's an interesting webpage on them that I found:

http://www.custominterconnects.com/fuzzbuttons.html


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## auratus72

My first and only experience with these fuzzy things was by luck. It was early learning days and I had no clue what they were when I recieved them as bonus items with a bunch of bare boards and connectors from ebay, bought 36 Lbs of boards and connectors for $350 , I thought they have high yield , instead I got literally nothing from them in the AP test run, I was upset and mad on this whole gold recovery concept, then I test run 5 connectors fuzz and I was amazed, sold the rest of the junk back on ebay, collected the gold powder for future second refining. This is how I got hooked to this hobby.


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## Anonymous

Martyn and I have put 80 into AR tonight- it's now 01:10 here so we'll pick it up tomorrow and see what yields we get.


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## Anonymous

We processed 320 in AR as a total today, with an initial yield total of 36.6g.

0.1143g per fuzzy - all sun sparc ones. We will get slightly more over time as the solutions aren't yet completely barren but we ran out of time and won't be able to have another look for two or three weeks. One thing's for sure though - it won't be going anywhere. 

Thanks for the info about these Kurtak, I had been led to believe they were completely useless and it's one of those situations where being wrong is a bonus. 8) 

I'll upload a couple of photos later when I get settled at home.


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## Anonymous

This was from the yield pic. As was mentioned by Glondor - pop them straight into AR complete and warm the solution gently and the metals are dissolved in under 30 mins. We were processing using 2 litre glassware, and counting 60 per time into the jar. Once the metals had been disoolved we decanted the AR straight into another 2 litre jar containing a further 60 fuzzies.

Rinse and repeat. (Naturally using all relevant safety processes 8) )

We did end up with two completely different coloured solutions but then again the fuzzies were manufactured in differing years so there's a chance that some had different base metals. I'm relatively sure, from research, that our final solutions contain Beryllium so we're going to deal with that properly before disposal.

The difference in colour on the gold powder is because the first batch of approx 9g wasn't washed as often as the later batches and is very slightly darker but that's no problem because we can always wash it all again. Overall the cleanliness appears very good. The quality of the initially dropped powder also appeared nearly as clean as the powder produced by clean fingers.


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## CLR

This makes me feel pretty sick..I had a guy that just brought in 172lbs of these chips and tell me he threw all those away.


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## mls26cwru

I have some of these dissolving at the moment... does the beryllium-rich liquid need to be treated any special way, or can it be treated like other waste?

Thanks,
Mike


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## hfywc

manage to pick off these fuzz buttons for up close photo. i will try to remove some more for weight determination.


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## hfywc

average of 0.385grams(fuzz buttons) per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....


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## hfywc

also there is this type, silver in color. not sure what it is...


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## Topher_osAUrus

I have a couple fuzzbuttons from the old servers i just got. An oddity, one had gold fuzz buttons, the cpu right beside it had white.
The other cpus had both gold.
I have only ran the gold ones (i didnt punch them out, i just tossed them into AR with the cpu's). I will take some pictures of them as soon as i get home from the dentist office. They arent in a plastic, its almost as if they are on the plastic. -hard to describe, but, the picture will sum it up better than myself.


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## mls26cwru

the last picture 'should' be a silver impregnated elastomer... I have been meaning to try a run or two, but havent found the time. I am fairly certain the film they are on is a polyamide tape (kapton) which is darn near impervious to everything, you should be able to through it right into nitric and/or HCl.

the gold fuzz yields from my runs were similar.... i got an average of 2.7wt% Au vs. holder weight, and 18.0wt% Au vs. fuzz wire weight.


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## Barren Realms 007

Topher_osAUrus said:


> I have a couple fuzzbuttons from the old servers i just got. An oddity, one had gold fuzz buttons, the cpu right beside it had white.
> The other cpus had both gold.
> I have only ran the gold ones (i didnt punch them out, i just tossed them into AR with the cpu's). I will take some pictures of them as soon as i get home from the dentist office. They arent in a plastic, its almost as if they are on the plastic. -hard to describe, but, the picture will sum it up better than myself.



With the CPU's that's just not right. Collectors would possibly have liked those CPU's.

Got to learn your machines and know your CPU's.


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## Topher_osAUrus

Just the fuzzbuttons, not the cpu...yet anyways.

Here are the white/silver fuzz buttons thst were on 2 of 6 cpu's

And another pic is of 3 more neat ones.


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## glorycloud

hfywc said:


> average og 0.385grams per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....



I've got three pounds or so of these CPU spacers. I hope to process them in poor mans AR soon.
Anyone want to venture a guess as to what three pounds of them might yield? 8)


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## mls26cwru

3 pounds of gold fuzz wire connectors.... probably a shade over and ounce of gold... test for palladium and platinum too. it might not be much, but never hurts to add it to the stockpot if its in there.


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## glorycloud

Nice! 

I will try and update this thread with weights and at least the :G yield per pound. 

Thanks!


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## hfywc

any update glorycloud? where you able to get the net weight of just the fuzz buttons?


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## glorycloud

I still have all the cpu holders with fuzzy connectors ready for processing in AR. I just don't
have a safe place to do any processing of this sort. Maybe 2017 will be the year?? 8)


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## Tndavid

glorycloud said:


> I still have all the cpu holders with fuzzy connectors ready for processing in AR. I just don't
> have a safe place to do any processing of this sort. Maybe 2017 will be the year?? 8)


Maybe so :wink:


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## hfywc

great! so far, this is what i have accumulated... from about 2lbs of assorted fuzz connectors.


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## Topher_osAUrus

Holy cow. That is a LOT of fuzzies!

How many connectors did it take to get that bowl full?


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## hfywc

sorry i forgot exactly... but i remember counting by the hundreds.


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## hfywc

some more remaining fuzzies...


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## anachronism

That looks like a nice stash. 

Don't waste your time taking the thread out of the fuzzy connectors though. I made that mistake originally and cost myself a huge amount of time.


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## glorycloud

I tried to remove some of the fuzzy connectors when I first got interested
in them and I gave up. Indeed, it is time consuming with the mechanical removal
processes I used at that time. 8)


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## mls26cwru

my jaw hit the table when i saw that bucket of fuzz wire... 2lbs and counting?!?!?! thats a lot of gold and a lot of time removing the wire!!!


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## Tndavid

Oh my, oh my..  :G :shock:


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## Lou

If it's just molybdenum with gold over it (I seem to remember these)...

nitric will dissolve the molybdenum


but much more expedient may simply be melting with nitre to give a sodium molybdate slag and pure gold.


You see, once upon a time, I would roast platinum-clad molybdenum wire packed in a quartz tube. The MoO3 would distill off, and the platinum stayed behind. A quick rinse with ammonia solution and the platinum was quite pure. Like taking candy from a baby!


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## hfywc

i have tried processing fingers before in ap. and i find it time consuming to wash each individual sticks clean. not to mention handling stripped fingers with chemicals still present. 

removing the fuzz buttons eliminates the need for this washing step. it also produces less volume of waste solutions.

i dont know but picking this buttons off one at a time somehow relaxes me. i did it after work while watching tv. after a while i got proficient with it and finished the 2lbs. in no time.


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## hfywc

mls26cwru said:


> my jaw hit the table when i saw that bucket of fuzz wire... 2lbs and counting?!?!?! thats a lot of gold and a lot of time removing the wire!!!



just to be clear...this fuzz buttons came from 2 lbs of connectors.


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## anachronism

Hfy these are best processed complete in AR or poor man's AR. No need to do all this.


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## mls26cwru

hfywc said:


> mls26cwru said:
> 
> 
> 
> my jaw hit the table when i saw that bucket of fuzz wire... 2lbs and counting?!?!?! thats a lot of gold and a lot of time removing the wire!!!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> just to be clear...this fuzz buttons came from 2 lbs of connectors.
Click to expand...


Ahhh  still, that is a nice little payoff though


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## anachronism

hfywc said:


> average og 0.385grams per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....



This post is completely out of the ballpark. It's wildly inaccurate guys. It's approx 0.11g per fully loaded fuzz connector that is "full sized" and scales accordingly downwards for those that are smaller/partially filled.


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## Tndavid

anachronism said:


> hfywc said:
> 
> 
> 
> average og 0.385grams per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This post is completely out of the ballpark. It's wildly inaccurate guys. It's approx 0.11g per fully loaded fuzz connector that is "full sized" and scales accordingly downwards for those that are smaller/partially filled.
Click to expand...

I completely agree with Jon on this. I ran a rather large lot of these and the yield was no where near .385 per. Several different sizes and variations.

Edit for spellcheck


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## geedigity

I though the poster said that he got that weight of fuzz per spacer, not that weight of gold per spacer.


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## g_axelsson

There are several numbers thrown around in this thread:

Kurt, never reported back the total yield but was quite happy with the yield.


kurt said:


> The plastic things (that make the connection between the CPU & the board have about .65 grams of wire each so thats about 13 grams of wire recovered in the dish





glondor said:


> I am not at my shop for accurate data, but (from memory) the berry-copper-gold wool is 55% gold by weight and the sun spark chips are very very low yield by weight. very low. The copper-tungsten heat spreader throws the yield numbers drastically.





auratus72 said:


> I refined a batch of 350 grams (whole connectors,75-80 gms pins approximately ) got about 28 gram fines.





pgms4me said:


> I get lots of servers and the spacers with the fuzz wires are the best yielding things I ever did.
> ...
> the larger sparc IV processor fuzzes gave me the best yields. .65 grams of contacts (each one) yielded .4 grams of gold. The last one I did had 16 processors in it. that gave over 6 grams just for the fuzz connectors.





spaceships said:


> We processed 320 in AR as a total today, with an initial yield total of 36.6g.
> 
> 0.1143g per fuzzy - all sun sparc ones.



This is obvious raw metal fuzzies before refining.


hfywc said:


> average of 0.385grams per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....





mls26cwru said:


> the gold fuzz yields from my runs were similar.... i got an average of 2.7wt% Au vs. holder weight, and 18.0wt% Au vs. fuzz wire weight.



And in http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=266996#p266996


Tndavid said:


> Well after all was said and done. With the smaller surface area of these connectors the yield came out around 0.07ish per fuzzie.



The numbers are all over the place, from 0.4g for Sparc IV down to 0.07g per connector.
From 55% of metal weight to 18% of metal weight.

The yield per connector obviously depends on the size of connector. The yield per fuzz button metal depends on wire diameter and base metal content. These connectors come in several types with gold on beryllium copper, gold on molybdenum, gold on tungsten... and more. To state an absolute number for fuzz button connectors is impossible, it's a product that has been on the market for over 50 years.

Göran


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## hfywc

anachronism said:


> hfywc said:
> 
> 
> 
> average og 0.385grams per this kind of cpu spacer. but they come in different sizes....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This post is completely out of the ballpark. It's wildly inaccurate guys. It's approx 0.11g per fully loaded fuzz connector that is "full sized" and scales accordingly downwards for those that are smaller/partially filled.
Click to expand...


0.385grams is the weight of the fuzz buttons per cpu spacer. i have not refined any yet.


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## anachronism

Thanks hfywc for the clarity- appreciate it.


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