# Way south of the border



## JJH (Oct 1, 2010)

Greetings,

First time post. I have been doing an incredible amount of reading on this subject and have enjoyed and some times laughed at the comments that ya'll have made. 

I am doing humanitarian work here in Central America and have run across hundreds + of old computers that are just being thrown away. My friend who owns a computer center repair store is collecting them for me. We are on target to having 2000+ lbs of pent 1 and earlier processors by the end of the year. If I talk much more I will really show my ignorance on my ability to refine PM. Thanks for all who are willing to share their experiences. It is helping me to continue to help others with water and education.

Jon 
in Central America

P.S. where is spell check


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## qst42know (Oct 1, 2010)

> P.S. where is spell check



Open Office free download is where I got mine.  

Welcome to the forum.


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## rusty (Oct 1, 2010)

qst42know said:


> > P.S. where is spell check
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I thought it was built into Firefox the worlds favorite web browser.


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## qst42know (Oct 2, 2010)

Sorry about that. I thought it came with open office but when I looked for the version info it appears to be built into the google tool bar.


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## nickvc (Oct 2, 2010)

It sounds like you need to do a lot of research here on the forum,you may be missing other goodies in the computers. I know very little about e scrap but we have some real geniuses on here who know what's worth scavenging and the best methods to extract the values and if you don't want to process them yourself even potential partners or purchasers of your scrap.


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## JJH (Oct 2, 2010)

I agree Nick, 

I am doing alot of reading, and when the time comes I plan on working with small batches till I am comfortable with the process. I did notice on the hit map for this site that no one has been here from the country I am in....so it looks like someone who wants to start computer refining has an open market here.

Jon


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## Oz (Oct 2, 2010)

JJH said:


> I agree Nick,
> 
> I am doing alot of reading, and when the time comes I plan on working with small batches till I am comfortable with the process. I did notice on the hit map for this site that no one has been here from the country I am in....so it looks like someone who wants to start computer refining has an open market here.
> 
> Jon



That is odd JJH, as your profile says you are from the USA. Not the best way to gain trust on a forum.


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## Harold_V (Oct 3, 2010)

Oz said:


> That is odd JJH, as your profile says you are from the USA. Not the best way to gain trust on a forum.


He makes mention that he is working in Central America----and his IP is a Guatemala registration. Nothing appears to be out of the ordinary here.

Harold


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## JJH (Oct 3, 2010)

Hello again,

Been very busy (I have not had time to finish my profile).......and yes in Guatemala. Didn't realize that I had to build trust oz, but I realize that it is a wierd world we live in today. Yes I am on the level. My web site is http://www.midianministries.com I am based out of the U.S. in Indianapolis Indiana. I am re-married after my wife fought with cancer for 15 years she died in 2005. I now am married to a Guatemalan and have 2 children ages 1 1/2 and 3 years old. If you would like to private mail me I will give out my phone numbers, or you can see them from my web page. I have been working here 13 + years spending my father and mothers inheritance after he died of parkenson's and she died a short time later. I am the director of a school plus I am building schools and water project to help the extremly poor. 

Just let me know if you would like me to be more on the level and I can give out more trust building personal information.

JJH


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## nickvc (Oct 3, 2010)

JJH said:


> Hello again,
> 
> Been very busy (I have not had time to finish my profile).......and yes in Guatemala. Didn't realize that I had to build trust oz, but I realize that it is a wierd world we live in today. Yes I am on the level. My web site is http://www.midianministries.com I am based out of the U.S. in Indianapolis Indiana. I am re-married after my wife fought with cancer for 15 years she died in 2005. I now am married to a Guatemalan and have 2 children ages 1 1/2 and 3 years old. If you would like to private mail me I will give out my phone numbers, or you can see them from my web page. I have been working here 13 + years spending my father and mothers inheritance after he died of parkenson's and she died a short time later. I am the director of a school plus I am building schools and water project to help the extremly poor.
> 
> ...


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## JJH (Oct 3, 2010)

Thanks Nick,

Sorry about the sarcasim in my last post. I am very interested in learning the process. I may ask some very simple questions like can I get lazer steve's video in e-form since I don't make it back to the states as often as I would like, but I want to learn the process for myself. If you were to ask to come down and do it for me I would say no. I have already had a person ask if I wanted to sell the scrap and I turned them down. First shipping is a nightmare here, second. I would not be much help since I do not know the ropes of what is valuable and what is not. Thanks for your offer as well as others to help with information, and don't worry I will never ask for money or pander what I do here to help other. When I no longer have money to continue I will go back home. 

Once again thanks, and hope I didn't start out on the wrong foot!

Jon


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## Oz (Oct 3, 2010)

You are fine Jon, and you have not started on the wrong foot. It just raises questions when new members have conflicting information. Some members here (at least I do) like to know the motivations of new members in joining.

I commend you on your decision as to vocation and location after suffering the losses you have. If I can help you I will. As to “needing” to build trust here, no it is not necessary, but it sure helps as many people in this world do not always have altruistic motives behind their actions despite their words to the contrary.

Welcome to the forum.


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## dtectr (Oct 3, 2010)

JJH said:


> Thanks Nick,
> 
> Sorry about the sarcasim in my last post. I am very interested in learning the process. I may ask some very simple questions like can I get lazer steve's video in e-form since I don't make it back to the states as often as I would like, but I want to learn the process for myself. If you were to ask to come down and do it for me I would say no. I have already had a person ask if I wanted to sell the scrap and I turned them down. First shipping is a nightmare here, second. I would not be much help since I do not know the ropes of what is valuable and what is not. Thanks for your offer as well as others to help with information, and don't worry I will never ask for money or pander what I do here to help other. When I no longer have money to continue I will go back home.
> 
> ...


I agree with the comment re: not getting "CPU-crazy" (my words) - almost all yields data is very fluid, especially at 1st, so a multi-pronged approach makes sure you don't miss any values. 

My son began doing volunteer missionary work in Dominican Republic many years ago, is now married to a Dominicana & they have 2 children, & work to support themselves in their mission, as well. My 2 nephews are in Ecuador doing the same. They usually send anything of value with a friend or family member to carry in person, because of widespread corruption. It may be wiser to recover & refine in country, thereby transporting only the weight of precious metals, rather than all the extra junk. Do you make periodic visits home? 

Do you have access to high-speed i-net? I editted out the last sentence as i was speaking 1st, thinking later, as I often do. Adult ADD, its a blessing ... 
& a curse. May I reccomend, if you have not done so yet, to download the Gold Forum Refining Handbook, I think its available from Lazersteve's signature line. It has been valuable to me, as it contains directions from a variety of perspectives - for example, I & Barren Realms 007 speak fluent redneck! but not everyone else does. Also, download as well Hoke's "Refining Precious Metals Waste".

Good luck, & hang in there.
jordan


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## nickvc (Oct 3, 2010)

Seems your getting friends and advice already....see I told you we are a friendly lot so hang on in here and hopefully you will make enough to help those that you have decided need it. My knowledge of e scrap as I've stated before is nil but there are some real clever members on here who can really point you in the right way and make your enterprise so worth while.
Keep reading and learning and if you get lost ask questions.


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## Chumbawamba (Oct 3, 2010)

Wait, did you say 2,000 POUNDS of Pentium processors? Do you mean the processors themselves, or the entire CPU box (drives and all)?


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## escrap (Oct 3, 2010)

Haha, I was thinking the same thing. That is alot of processors.


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## Juan Manuel Arcos Frank (Oct 4, 2010)

Jon:

Why do you want to work hard for the money with gold in microprocessors?..look,I am sure you have seen a 25 cents coin of Guatemala called "Choca",well,this coin worths double its face value due to its high level of base metals (copper and nickel) so all you have to do is changing all your money to 25 cents coins and double your investment.

Saludos.Dios te bendiga.

Manuel


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## JJH (Oct 4, 2010)

Juan Manuel Arcos Frank said:


> Jon:
> 
> Why do you want to work hard for the money with gold in microprocessors?..look,I am sure you have seen a 25 cents coin of Guatemala called "Choca",well,this coin worths double its face value due to its high level of base metals (copper and nickel) so all you have to do is changing all your money to 25 cents coins and double your investment.
> 
> ...



Manuel....sounds great and yes I am very familiar with the "choque" that you are refering to. Actually there is the peace quetzal that weighs more and probably has a higher brass content than the 25cent....but where in the heck (that is as close as I come to cussing) do you find information on what the content is of the coin and how the "heck" can you extract only the valuable metal. I am still reading on the subject but am swamped with school. Our break here is from Nov. 1st to Jan 12th. I had thought of this before and looked over the website that talks about the melt value of coins and what they contain, but it only contains information about U.S. coins, Canadian coins and he said that he is just starting on Mexico's coins.....Guatemala is a long ways off.

Jon Hutton


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## Harold_V (Oct 5, 2010)

It isn't likely that you could process coins made of base metals and make a profit. That might not be true with a large scale operation, but sourcing the coins to make it possible isn't likely to be easy, and it may not be legal. 

Harold


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## JJH (Oct 5, 2010)

Thanks Harold,

Looks like a great business that you are in! Some days I wish I could pack it up and go back to the states and start again.

After looking into it your rigt, most countries have laws against it including Guatemala (I would not look good in the news). It is probably also the way that most countries protect themselves against currency problems...just publicize a new coin, or better yet many new coins with shinny faces of different states and a beautiful display book to keep them in. Then rake all the old coins in melt them down. The coins that could fill your car up with gas 40 years ago can still fill your car up with gas today. No wonder it is against the law to melt coins....the different governments saw that coming from a long ways off. I'll stick with learning, making mistakes, and learning some more with e-scrap. 
Jon


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## Juan Manuel Arcos Frank (Oct 5, 2010)

Jon:

Look,I am lurking around Mexico City (the town is called "Ojo de Agua") for some silver,I am writting this post on a computer which is not mine and it has a virus so I could not post for you my research about Guatemala´s coins,I will do it tomorrow,it is written in Spanish and it is legal to melt or export those nice "Chocas".

See you tomorrow.

Manuel


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## JJH (Oct 5, 2010)

Hey Manuel,

Sounds great!!!!! Let me know.

JJH


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## Harold_V (Oct 6, 2010)

JJH said:


> Looks like a great business that you are in!


Long gone. I sold my refining business back in '94, and retired. 

Harold


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## JJH (Oct 6, 2010)

Ohhh,

I am jealous, fishing docks time with friends. I could make a long list. Hope your having a great time.

JJH


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## Juan Manuel Arcos Frank (Oct 6, 2010)

Well,now I am in my town so here it is,my research about Guatemala´s coins,take a look.

Kindest regards.

Manuel


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## JJH (Oct 7, 2010)

Ok,

I did not read where it says it is against the law, or not against the laws of Guatemala to extract the metals from the coins and sell them. So there is a risk. If you do it large scale I think you would end up dead from someone killing you for your money or end up in prison here wishing you were dead. 

I am very interested in making an electroylsis tank with a solar rechargable nickle battery bank....the secondary metal in the - choque - 25 cent coin. 

I did the numbers off of the web page yesterday, at yesterdays metal prices and this is what I came up with...I have the excel sheet that calculates it if anyone would want it.

I converted everything to pounds (mag is sold by the ton the rest by pound) added it up and this is what I came up with... I really expect that Guatemala will print new collector coins to rake in all this metal wealth that is floating around here. They will not come up with this idea from reading about it here because no one from here other than me is on the hit map.

the current exchage rate that I recalled was 8.12 so that is what I used to divide the dollar value of the coins.

1 cent coin is worth .001231527 dollars- metal worth is .00186353 a 151 percent increase
5 cent coin is worth .006157635 dollars- metal worth is .01582575 a 257.0101 percent increase
10 cent coin is worth .01575061 dollars - metal worth is .03165149 a 257.0101 percent increase
25 cent coin is worth .03937653 dollars - metal worth is .07912873 a 257.0101 percent icrease

the 50 cent and 1 quetzal coins are not worth mentioning because the metal value has not reached the value of the coin.

The old brain teaser of how much money would you have if you doubled it every day for a month would work here as well. The question is how much would electricity and the copper sulfate cost to seperate the 2 metals in the choque. Probably not worth you effort or risk, but I am new at all of this.

JJH


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## jimdoc (Oct 7, 2010)

In the beginning of this post you mentioned 2000 lbs of pentium chips,how did we turn our attention to coins (base metal ones) from that?

Jim


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## JJH (Oct 7, 2010)

Jim,

It was manuel who brought up the idea of using coins. I am at school and had time to respond and do the math. My friend is collecting and spreading the word to his friends to collect the processors. Like I mentioned I would like to have a cell of Edison batteries and have thought of this for over a year since it works better than lead acid batteries especially if I could recharge them with a solar panel since we have 5 months of pure sun here. I have a computer lab here at the school that could sure use a good battery back up system and I thought that the nickel in the coins would be a good place to start to do this. I also said in another post that my time is limited untill November when we are out of school. I have not turned from collecting processors in fact I have to go pick up some computers at 12:30 from a person that just called to donate them to be recycled.

JJH

In one of your posts you said "My advise would be to keep building up your stash of stuff to process,while you keep studying the forum until you know what your options are for each type of scrap."

This is what I am doing......good advice!


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## Juan Manuel Arcos Frank (Oct 9, 2010)

Yeah guys,me,Manuel has brought up the Guatemala´s Coin Business just for a simple reason:There are tons of 25 Quetzal cent coins and there are just a few grams in microprocessors(which means tons of scrap computers).The business is prefectly legal,the Law says so and all you guys have to do it is to collect them,no process them,do not separate metals,just melt them and they are sold as an alloy.

All of you,guys who live in USA,know that the same business(with pennies issued before 1982) can be carried out in your own town but there is a penalty of 10 years in prison and a fine of ten thousand dollars so forget to do it inside USA...but still hoarding those pennies...on day Uncle Sam will demonetize all pennies because you can not buy anything with one penny.

About those tons of Pentium chips I think it is a lie..I am an old dog to believe in those things.

Kindest Regards.

Manuel


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