160 pounds of gold pins!

[Barren Realms 007]

Might want to think about running a magnet first.

 

[goldsilverpro]

$60/pound would be 8 oz. Many refiners have CN stripping capabilities - it's so easy and fast to do, that's how I would do it. For some, they might just melt it, cast it into bars, and ship it along with everything else. It would be one of the two. Heaven forbid, no professional refiner on the planet would ridiculously dissolve the base metals. That would surely be a loser. However, this is a hobbyist forum. You do what you can do.

 

[samuel-a]

Why melt when all the value is on the outside readily accessed?

Karat scraps yes, but in this case there is no point in blending it with base metals.

Cyanide or a sulfuric stripping cell with a tumbler.

What do the pro's have to say?

well... sorry for the confusion, but by "pro" i didn't ment for the home refiner, rather to the large recycler's that also salvage the copper, zinc, lead, silver, tin, iron and beryllium that present in this kind of lot.

 

[Anonymous]

Heaven forbid, no professional refiner on the planet would ridiculously dissolve the base metals. That would surely be a loser.

I can see how what I wrote was confusing to some,I was reffering to the "really thin plates" I mentioned in the beginning,being processed in nitric.
I am sure you read the part about me running 10 lbs of pins at a time in my cell,so obviously I only dissolve certain pins in nitric.I will try to be more specific.My apologies.

 

[butcher]

Mic I do not think you understand the killing of two birds one rock
it is how I would refine them as I do not use the sulfuric or tumbler cell, and do not have a source for bulk cheap nitric acid.

Quote:but for home refiner make nitric acid with them, using sodium nitrate, 60% sulfuric acid, distill nitric, use boiling water to keep copper sulfate salts soluble and filter gold foils.

Mic Quote "Several problems with that,first the time it would take to make enough acid to process 160lbs of pins would be almost inconcievable,"

the process makes nitric acid as it deplates the pins.
and you have distilled nitric.
copper sulfate can also be used.

Mic Quote "second,running a boiling acid through any traditional filter is almost not possible.They tear and rip apart too easily,especially with nitric and sulfuric acids.However if you can find a synthetic filter you may be ok."

the copper sulfate solution filters easily no problem using paper filters to seperate gold foils from copper sulfate solution.

 

[Anonymous]

Mic I do not think you understand the killing of two birds one rock

You mean "Killing two birds with one stone" and yes I do know what it means.I just misunderstood what you meant.
I am not familiar with that process,so I will not speculate.

 

[goldenchild]

I think nitric would be the wrong way to go about this. Straigt AR would be bad for sure. You would need about 68 gallons of nitric(if you're lucky) to get rid of all the base metals. Cyanide or a stripping cell would be the way to go. Since most of us on the forum have never handled or even seen cyanide in use(which I think is a good thing) most would resort to the stripping cell.

 

[HAuCl4]

Been thinking. If I wanted all the gold in 1 day or less at minimal expense and without having a large electrolytic copper plant, I still don't know what I would do.

A large flat sulphuric cell with large flat electrodes seems to be the cheapest, fastest I can think of, but for some reason it doesn't satisfy me.

 

[dtectr]

but for home refiner make nitric acid with them, using sodium nitrate, 60% sulfuric acid, distill nitric, use boiling water to keep copper sulfate salts soluble and filter gold foils.

Several problems with that,first the time it would take to make enough acid to process 160lbs of pins would be almost inconcievable,second,running a boiling acid through any traditional filter is almost not possible.They tear and rip apart too easily,especially with nitric and sulfuric acids.However if you can find a synthetic filter you may be ok.
I would have suggested seperating those really thin plates,however 160lbs would take you an aweful long time.I always keep my material seperated by surface to mass size,and material containing silver goes into a seperate pile.
You have many choices to choose from,but it depends on your experience and tools.The easiest way would be nitric.I get 55 gallons for $210(about $3.80 a gallon),If you can get it at that price I would suggest doing them all in nitric.You can always deplate them in a cell,but of course there's the energy and time consumed to do them all.Unless you have a tumbler they will have to be constantly attended to,not to mention how many times you will have to change the acid.My cell is about 20 gallons with a tumbler and a drain spout about 3 inches from the bottom.This way I can run countless pounds of material,let it settle over night,drain the (relatively)clean acid on top,put it to the side,then rinse my gold into another vessel for washing.Then you can put the acid back in the cell and keep going.I currently use a 4 gallon container for my tumbler and can effectively process about 10lbs at once.
The least expensive method for most people is either the cell or AP.

mic
do you have a photo of your set-up? you can e-mail it or PM me, if you want. I saw the youTube video for tumbler - just wondering how everyone is adapting it.
thanks
jordan
P.S. if this is off topic, I apologize.

 

[Chumbawamba]

GSP,

How would one go about processing this pile with cyanide? A "Reader's Digest" version will suffice, but the more details the better

 

[lazersteve]

I'm not GSP, but here's a collection of some of his previous Cyanide posts:

GSP Cyanide How-Tos

Steve

 

[goldgetternews]

Thought you guys would like to see this. That's 160 pounds of clean pins and plated electronic scrap! We are getting an accurate weight count on all our stockpiles and this tub was the first one done. Many more to go.

Hope I'm doing this right, it is the first time I have replied on this forum.
Impressive pile, it makes my few rolls of pins look like an anthill.
Years ago I stripped the plating from some pins and fingers but not enough to amount to anything. However I have seen vials of gold from electronic scrap in tourist shops in Arizona. It looked like a lot of gold but in reality was not much at all.

 

[goldgetternews]

I think nitric would be the wrong way to go about this. Straigt AR would be bad for sure. You would need about 68 gallons of nitric(if you're lucky) to get rid of all the base metals. Cyanide or a stripping cell would be the way to go. Since most of us on the forum have never handled or even seen cyanide in use(which I think is a good thing) most would resort to the stripping cell.

You would spend a fortune on Nitric or AR
There is a refining supply in NY. I think Corning, they sell all kinds of equipment. I konw the have stripping cells.
I have even considered using a ball mill to separate the gold from the base metal, then separate it just as if placer mining that way eliminating most chemicals.

 

[Harold_V]

I have even considered using a ball mill to separate the gold from the base metal, then separate it just as if placer mining that way eliminating most chemicals.

That must be some ball mill. Are you sure about separating values from base metals by that system?

Harold

 

[arthur kierski]

here we have a product called gold stripper(cianide based)---1litre strips 8grams of gold---
if you have (let say )10ounces of gold =311grams----you will need about 40 (litres) of the product at a cost of 6dollars per litre=240dollars plus less then a kilo of zinc powder to precipitate the gold
i do this almost every week and works very well----last week i did this work with 80 kilos of cellphone boards and obtained 0,13 grams of gold per kilo=10,4grams---i could have done with 1,5litres of gold stripper---but i used 4litres because of space---so with 24dollars i made 400dollars of gold
By the way:gold in celllphone boards have a maximun of 0,13grams of gold per kilo(barren boards)------thanks and regards to all
Arthur

 

[Oz]

Sure enough Arthur those of us in the US envy your nitric/cyanide pricing and availability.

I just had a friend of mine from Lima come to your town. If I had known in advance I would have put the 2 of you in touch so you could show her around. You would have enjoyed the company, sweet girl.

 

[Chumbawamba]

Arthur, so by "barren board" you mean all the components are stripped, leaving just the PCB? If so, what do you do with the rest of the components, since they contain PGMs and some silver?

I have often considered mulling or ball milling the boards since they are small and easy to handle in a smaller mill. The idea would be to produce a nice pile of "ore" and then process it further with incineration, then various chemical leaches. Would this be a way to go, in your experience, or is the cyanide leaching method you use preferable?

 

[goldenchild]

Arthur, so by "barren board" you mean all the components are stripped, leaving just the PCB? If so, what do you do with the rest of the components, since they contain PGMs and some silver?

I have often considered mulling or ball milling the boards since they are small and easy to handle in a smaller mill. The idea would be to produce a nice pile of "ore" and then process it further with incineration, then various chemical leaches. Would this be a way to go, in your experience, or is the cyanide leaching method you use preferable?

Don't incinerate boards from e-waste.

 

[qst42know]

Arthur.

I was wondering if it was necessary to depopulate the boards to strip in cyanide or is that the way the boards came to you?

 

[arthur kierski]

the boards are depopulated and the population(chips,contacts,small ics etc)are incinerated and then nitric to extract ag and pd-and at last ar to extract the gold
the barren boards after depopulating is where the gold stripper is used-----
i hope that in this thread i answered the various question asked----
oz,it was a pleasure to see you in the forum again----your friend woul be welcomed here in Saõ Paulo