Average PM and metal content in RRU's

[andu]

I get you, I do my walks and find it harder to be precise with my gramatic.
I do want to process thermal paste too as it can be made of many different elements.
Anyhow, as a funny note, i have a motorola from the 98s i opened up (it had it's antena too) and it is gorgeous inside, i'm actually saving it for laser decapsulation of it's chips.
I'm far from processing anything, i'm at the stage of stacking.
Specific elements like BeO are still a unknown world for me and no idea how to deal with them but time will come.
Didn't know ceramics can have zirconium hehe I want some of that, has anyone seen hafnium is at 5k a kilo?

Find it funny I could set up a small 4g network.

 

[Yggdrasil]

I really do not know if I’m deliberately misunderstood or I’m too vague.

Of course it is nice if the members have a grammatically correct English.
But that is not what we ask of you guys.

But use correct lower/upper caps for Chemical abbreviations.

DO not use text language like ty, u and so on.
They do not translate well.
Even for me as a non native speaker, some of the things used in the day to day language some places, stands out like a sore thumb.

 

[spectrumpainters]

I really do not know if I’m deliberately misunderstood or I’m too vague.

Of course it is nice if the members have a grammatically correct English.
But that is not what we ask of you guys.

But use correct lower/upper caps for Chemical abbreviations.

DO not use text language like ty, u and so on.
They do not translate well.
Even for me as a non native speaker, some of the things used in the day to day language some places, stands out like a sore thumb.

it's not unclear at all and happy to but I will say that it will require a lot of effort haha. my man OP might have been adressing a few posts back, i'm sure he understands too. all the best

 

[spectrumpainters]

I get you, I do my walks and find it harder to be precise with my gramatic.
I do want to process thermal paste too as it can be made of many different elements.
Anyhow, as a funny note, i have a motorola from the 98s i opened up (it had it's antena too) and it is gorgeous inside, i'm actually saving it for laser decapsulation of it's chips.
I'm far from processing anything, i'm at the stage of stacking.
Specific elements like BeO are still a unknown world for me and no idea how to deal with them but time will come.
Didn't know ceramics can have zirconium hehe I want some of that, has anyone seen hafnium is at 5k a kilo?

Find it funny I could set up a small 4g network.

interesting, didn't know a lot of this stuff. i'm off to youtube to look up that laser thing haha. careful handling the internals of that 98 phone too haha

 

[spectrumpainters]

ok. this is the coolest thing i've ever seen

 

[andu]

interesting, didn't know a lot of this stuff. i'm off to youtube to look up that laser thing haha. careful handling the internals of that 98 phone too haha

I simply love decapsulations.

 

[spectrumpainters]

Per the bold print - you are talking about beryllium oxide that is in fact a ceramic

As a ceramic it will not dissolve in acids (nitric, HCl or AR) so is of NO concern !!!

Also - being ceramic - it ONLY becomes a concern if it is ground to a FINE powder that can become airborne & breathed in - other wise it is of no health risk !!!


That is a different story as the beryllium is actually alloyed with the copper & will go into solution along with the copper when dissolving the copper thereby creating a VERY toxic solution

I don't see ANY reason for beryllium copper being used in the components shown in this thread

Beryllium copper in electronic scrap is only used where the copper needs to act as a spring

Kurt

You should edit this or respond to my reply in case someone reads this first page and not mine

 

[Martijn]

from the largest ptoducer in the usa



"To remove heat, most Si power transistors are soldered to their substrate with gold/silicon solder. Since AuSi is a “hard” solder, the thermal expansion of the substrate should be between 3 and 10 x 10-6 /°C, in order to prevent cracking of the Si upon temperature cycling. The substrate can either be a dielectric or electrical conductor, depending on the type of transistor. Si VMOS and bipolar transistors must be soldered onto an electrically isolated pad on a thermally conductive dielectric. Materion’s BeO ceramic substrates, known as Thermalox™ BeO, offer a unique combination of high thermal conductivity, high electrical resistivity and low dielectric loss over a wide frequency range. Materion provides hot pressed BeO ceramic substrates, manufactured at its Tucson, AZ facility, to meet this requirement. Materion’s facility in Newburyport, MA then screen prints patterns of thick film MoMn paste that is fired onto the BeO, plated with Ni and then brazed into a package using braze alloys supplied by Materion’s facility in Buffalo, NY.

In the mid-1990’s Motorola invented a new type of RF transistor called LDMOS. LDMOS transistors could be soldered directly to an electrically grounded metal flange, thereby eliminating the need for BeO. The elimination of BeO reduced the cost of the package, as well as reduced the overall thermal resistance since most BeO packages contain a flange brazed beneath the BeO. LDMOS transistors ramped up in popularity by the end of the 1990’s. With the conversion from analog to digital cell phones in the early 2000’s LDMOS transistors dominated the market for amplifiers for cellular base stations.

Going forward, Materion is addressing other requirements of the RF transistor industry by manufacturing air cavity packages comprised of a ceramic frame brazed to a metal flange. The industry is demanding flanges with higher thermal conductivity and lower cost. Materion offers brazed ceramic packages with flanges made of CuW, CMC and CPC (Table 1). Various Materion locations are working with key customers to develop flanges made of copper, which will require an entirely new method to solder Si onto the flange due to the severe thermal expansion mismatch between Si and Cu."

but sure, nothing to see here.

except me not capitalizing a chem formula when i'm walking the dog

atleast now i know daily public exposure limit is for not using caps

me on the other hand, i can take 10X the exposure apparently, that helps because i've seen the non-hardened ceramic version of the stuff i was trying to warn OP about before i realized this is one of THOSE forum cultures where cred is more important than imfo

Thanks for the safety info. A well informed person can take better decisions on safe working methods.

but as Kurt said: not everything labeled Beryllium Oxide is lethal in the form it is in.
like asbestos, one fiber can kill you, but if it's not airborne, you can't breathe it in. if it's wet, it can't get airborn, if it's not broken or worn, no fibers will be released. So in which case is it (BeO) dangerous? When broken, ground, worn, or damaged?

To comment on your grammar and spelling knit picking point: we all have something different to contribute, one will have chemical things to say, the other ethics or legality.
Have you considered you comment is so important it should not be misread by some artificial super intelligent translator (which are not the best)
Some info is not worth correcting, yours in fact was and needs to be correct in grammar.
Please see it as a compliment.

Martijn.

 

[kurtak]

You should edit this or respond to my reply in case someone reads this first page and not mine

My response to what you have posted is the same as what Martijin just posted -------------

but as Kurt said: not everything labeled Beryllium Oxide is lethal in the form it is in.
like asbestos, one fiber can kill you, but if it's not airborne, you can't breathe it in. if it's wet, it can't get airborn, if it's not broken or worn, no fibers will be released. So in which case is it (BeO) dangerous? When broken, ground, worn, or damaged?

And for what it is worth - I used to handle actual TONS of E-waste/scrap per month & though the vast majority of it went to large volume buyers of such scrap - ALL of the HIGH grade & VERY HIGH grade stuff I processed "in house"

That included the leach &/or smelting of both BeO ceramics & BeCu (& of course there is always the BeO paste involved when dealing with E-waste)

The bottom line here is that as long as you don't actually get it (Be) in your system (breath in ultra fine dust - drink a solution it is dissolved in - or lick the paste off your fingers) it is not going to poison &/or kill you --- I guess I am living proof of that fact considering the vary large amounts of it I have dealt with over the years

Odds are - I will likely die from the pack & a half of cigarettes I smoke everyday then from the Be encountered in dealing with E-waste

And also - for what it is worth - the concern about Be in E-waste has been discussed on this forum MANY times before - so your concerns about Be (& how to address those concerns) is not something new here

But thank you for bringing it up (as a concern) again as that is always a good thing - it is just not "the sky is falling" kind of thing - so please do not try to make it such

Kurt

 

[andu]

I spent a while trying to desolder this without success, so i took screwdriver and hammer, all that heatsink for that lil thing?
I opened a few more of these boxes and seems some are silvery instead of gold plated, and some besides that only have one board and those two heatsinks on the backside.
Note: On some, if not all, it says Pb free, if it's free of lead shouldn't they be free of Be? All the devices seem to be from like 2016 eventho 4g came earlier and i guess they could be as early as 2010.

 

[BShan]

I spent a while trying to desolder this without success, so i took screwdriver and hammer, all that heatsink for that lil thing?
I opened a few more of these boxes and seems some are silvery instead of gold plated, and some besides that only have one board and those two heatsinks on the backside.
Note: On some, if not all, it says Pb free, if it's free of lead shouldn't they be free of Be? All the devices seem to be from like 2016 eventho 4g came earlier and i guess they could be as early as 2010.

I think Pb-free is not always the same as RoHS. And RoHS doesn't attempt to restrict Be, apparently. This maybe confused me more than helped me, but here's wiki page on RoHS: Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive - Wikipedia

That white ceramic is the possible Be concern in this case. Sometimes, you can look up the datasheet of the rf mosfet and get a better answer about whether or not it actually is a Be concern. I couldn't pull up any results, but I'm not the best searcher.

Edit: I should add, my understanding is that the main concern is Be dust. Cracking off that white cover will produce some small amount of dust, but will mostly break in chunks. It's up to you to decide if it's worth the risk to see what's inside. If you leave it as-is, I don't think there's much hazard than accidentally breaking it when you didn't want to break it.

Edit 2: also, sometimes the aluminum casting will have markings to indicate what alloy it is. Maybe it always has markings and I've only been successful a few times at googling them. Again, I'm not the best searcher. Usually some string of letters and numbers, sometimes even recognizeable letters like Mg, Fe, Si, Al.

 

[andu]

Stumbled upon these, they look quite nice, i cleaned them up.
I were told that separated they paid really well by kilo but i'd be tempted for refining.
The bath shines really well the picture does not make justice and feels thick at times upon scratching.
All the pieces are very slightly magnetic.
The three piece ones have some tin and gold plated copper inside.

the bold print - you are talking about beryllium oxide that is in fact a ceramic

As a ceramic it will not dissolve in acids (nitric, HCl or AR) so is of NO concern !!!

Also - being ceramic - it ONLY becomes a concern if it is ground to a FINE powder that can become airborne & breathed in - other wise it is of no health risk !!!


That is a different story as the beryllium is actually alloyed with the copper & will go into solution along with the copper when dissolving the copper thereby creating a VERY toxic solution

I don't see ANY reason for beryllium copper being used in the components shown in this thread

Beryllium copper in electronic scrap is only used where the copper needs to act as a spring

Kurt

It funnily, at times, do contain a copper string, i have one laying around but i tend to dispose of those as they ain't always shiny .

 

[andu]

Things in last picture won't react in 18% hcl at all, I will guess it's proper stainless, i were told it is paid like 50e a kilo, what would yield be on these? Also, what should be used to dissolve? Best case scenario I get like 20%hcl and 12% peroxide without getting nitrate and distillation set, my main goal is ridding of base metals and separate more expensive ones.
I do want to keep nickel, chromium, vanadium, copper, tin and such. As clean as possible.

 

[andu]

I admit I could of taken better pictures but eh, lazy morning .
These don't come right from the rru either but still part of the equipment, other side has no chip or mlcc but all dots are gold.

The white cubes first pic top second pic bot are pins, golden but not magnetic, i'll asume stainless but i think i see silver coating on them.
The golden connectors on top of second pic aren't magnetic at all, didn't try scratch see if it copper.

Boards look sweet for cherry picking.

 

[orvi]

Precautions are always important. As chemist by profession, for more than 10 years, I dealt with loads of insanely toxic, carcinogenic or nasty compounds. Chemicals with LD50 less than 2ppm etc.

Fact is, it can be done safely, with good planing, assessing possible risks BEFOREHAND and being prepared for all obvious scenarios.

Another fact is, as Kurt correctly pointed out, if nothing gets on your skin, you don´t breathe the dust or drink the stuff, nothing will harm you. This do not mean that PPE are useless (they are very important of course), but they are only second "frontier" of safety, applying only when first one fails. First one is to not breathe, touch or ingest anything toxic. If you somehow screw up and touch the liquid, there still is glove on your hand which prevents toxic stuff getting on you. Same apply for respirators, goggles and other PPEs.

Beryllium is concerning and toxic element, but in form of ceramics, there is usually not that much risk associated with it (if you work with it professionally and responsibly). I processed quite a bit of BeO ceramic RF transistors from telecom equipment, and it went OK. Many times, you don´t even need to crush them - that is a nice thing. And if yes, wear a respirator and wet the material to prevent dusting. It don´t need to be powdered. You just need to expose insides to the acid - that´s it. Assure that respirator fits tightly to your face and that you have shaved beard And do it somewhere far from people, minimizing risk to others.

Soluble beryllium, from beryllium bronze is another risk, but as long as it stays in solution, it is OK to work with. But be aware of the fact aerosols will always emerge from acid dissolutions, and watchglass on the top of the beaker do not prevent all of them from escaping out.

 

[spectrumpainters]

Orvi - that's a great response overall thanks for that and the tips.

Only thing I would add is that:

Many components in RF gear is designed with the use of low expansion alloys like Beryllium Copper where the physical volume/shape of a component needs to remain constant under extreme temperatures for it's effect on signal - so it's everywhere

The comment earlier about it only being used for springs is not a fact -

Low thermal expansion is another property of that alloy and others that include Be - and they are everywhere in comms gear - It's possible that Beryllium gold and Beryllium silver are present and given the danger/ppm it's a concern

 

[andu]

Given these devices are pretty new technology and it says pb/free even on the 3g versions AND that i'm only doing tiny scale experiments eases my heart, I however have one or two copper springs that idk what to do with and i don't want to dissolve nor melt, i think one ended at scrapyard and feelt odd, lol.

Excluding that spring on each box you find from time to time there's no copper except for the one in the boards which i trust is clean. No bronze either maybe screws.

Most I got is to burn a couple ICs and CPUs but I haven't touched any ceramic, i look at them and little more.

I trust I will be able to provide more detailed information about actual contents and processes in the future.