Best method to refine motherbaords

[Goldmember123]

Hell everybody who can help me with advice ! Well i have 10 pounds of mother board pieces there is zero solder in the batch ! I just clipped only the gold fingers and mother board pieces where the gold is embedded in the tiny little holes on the boards ! So i wanted to see if i can refine them with out using acid but Hydrogen peroxide Vinegar and sea salt with a bubbler to knock the foils loose ! Can anyone PLEASE give me some tips or advice on how to go about this correctly and what is the technical name for the bubbler machines or name brand because when i look up bubblers my browser seems to think im looking for a glass bong for cannabis wich they call bubblers as well ! Lol

 

[nickvc]

Why are you saying you do not want to use acid and then supply a recipe to make just that :shock:
Just because you can buy all these items in most stores does not make mixing them together any safer than buying exactly what you need to do the recovery properly, in fact you will create more toxic waste and by products pursuing that method, you are not been safer or greener.

 

[g_axelsson]

Vinegar is a weak acid, mix it with salt and you got a weak hydrochloric acid with extra acetate and sodium ions. The dissolved copper is the toxic part and that you don't avoid.

"Best" means different things to different people. It can be smelting, copper chloride etching, cyanide leaching or a number of different methods depending on who is doing it.

A lot of your material is just ENIG and have just a thin cover of gold.

Göran

 

[philddreamer]

Your "bubbler machines" are better known as aquarium pumps... I bought mine at Walmart, pets dept..

Take care!
Phil

 

[rickbb]

Muriatic acid, Home Depot or Lowes, swimming pool supply section.
Hydrogen peroxide, any place that has health and beauty supplies.
Aquarium pump, any place that sells tropical fish, etc.
Plastic bucket, again almost anyplace.
Good rubber/neoprene gloves, Lowes, Home Depot, etc.
Safety glasses, Lowes, Home Depot, etc.

Use the search function, look for the "AP" process. Simple, easy, "best" way for only 10 lbs. of boards. IMHO.
PS. don't expect a lot of gold from 10 lbs. or boards. You might get a small bead.

 

[Goldmember123]

I just want to say thank you to you and everybody else that helped me with feedback ! Um so if dont mind answering a few more questions i would greatly appreciate it ! I like the field of reverse electro plating ! I have no experience ! What iv learned i did by reading watching videos and asking questions and iv felt discouraged on more then one occasion but i want to complete this project ! So how many pounds of motherboards would i need if i wanted to try n generate like 20 thousand or 30 thousand dollars ? and what kind or type of motherboards would i need need ? And where could i purchase the right amount of motherbaords i need ? And if i had 20 thousand dollars worth of motherboards what what be the best way to refine them ?

 

[jimdoc]

I just want to say thank you to you and everybody else that helped me with feedback ! Um so if dont mind answering a few more questions i would greatly appreciate it ! I like the field of reverse electro plating ! I have no experience ! What iv learned i did by reading watching videos and asking questions and iv felt discouraged on more then one occasion but i want to complete this project ! So how many pounds of motherboards would i need if i wanted to try n generate like 20 thousand or 30 thousand dollars ? and what kind or type of motherboards would i need need ? And where could i purchase the right amount of motherbaords i need ? And if i had 20 thousand dollars worth of motherboards what what be the best way to refine them ?

If you are asking questions like this you are better off just selling motherboards. Try getting them for free or as little as you can spend on them, and sell them.

 

[Goldmember123]

Why am i better off just selling motherboards asking questions like i did ? How do people make money in the reverse electroplating business ? How could i make more money selling gold plated motherboards then refining them for there gold ?

 

[jimdoc]

Why am i better off just selling motherboards asking questions like i did ? How do people make money in the reverse electroplating business ? How could i make more money selling gold plated motherboards then refining them for there gold ?

Study the forum, and you should see that doing the task you are asking about requires equipment and knowledge to do it safely. Then you have to deal with the waste responsibly.

There are easier ways to make money without the hazards. I am just offering advice, you probably won't take, as all you can think about is gold.

You are asking where to buy these boards also. People usually don't go around selling stuff to others to make easy money from. There is work and hazards involved, and avoiding those hazards could save you hassles, and your health.

 

[galenrog]

I do not process boards. I sell them. No muss. No fuss. Some go to local scrapyard. Some go to businesses like Boardsort. There are far better things to process than boards.

Additionally, if you want to learn gold recovery and refining, karat scrap is far easier to learn with.

Time for more coffee.

 

[silversaddle1]

^^^^^^^^^ Agree with this^^^^^^^^^
We process 20-30,000 pounds of boards every year. We refine nothing, period. If I want gold, I just sell the boards to a buyer and then buy gold.

 

[kurtak]

So how many pounds of motherboards would i need if i wanted to try n generate like 20 thousand or 30 thousand dollars ?

5 - 6 tons (that is 10,000 - to 12,000 pounds) --- & that is if you got ALL the mother boards for free - & then sold them to a company like Board Sort

If you tried to "process" the mother boards for ONLY the gold plating on them you would need something like 3 times that many mother boards (or more) so at least 15 - 18 tons --- that is because the gold plating on the mother boards is only PART of the value of the mother boards - there is also gold in the IC chips & as well the value of the copper, silver, palladium & tantalum

In other words - when companies like Board Sort buy circuit boards - they buy them based on the values of all those metals - so if you don't process the boards to recover ALL those metal (& only recover the gold plating) you are NOT recovering all the value

In order to "make money" in dealing with electronic scrap --- you need to deal in "volume" (LARGE volume)

I know because I spent like 12 years making a living in dealing with electronic scrap --- & for what it is worth - the VAST majority of it I took in & then turned around & sold to companies like Board Sort --- or I sent them in to a company that did the processing & they then paid me out on the metals posted above --- I am talking about handling 3 - 5 tons per month - at at that volume I did NOT get rich - I just made a living

I did process "some" stuff - but I processed only the VERY HIGHEST grade of stuff - which was like maybe .5 % (1/2 percent) of what I took in --- in other words - for every 2,000 pounds I took in - I would "maybe" get 10 pounds of stuff worth processing myself

In order to "process" stuff - you first have to "learn" how to - in order to learn how to - you NEED to LISTEN to the people that ACTUALLY know what they are doing

You will find those people right here on the forum - it is the BEST place to learn --- but you have to do two things --- start "searching" info here on the forum - AND listen to what they say

One way that I can help you is if you click on my user name - then click on "user control panel" - then click on "show your post" - then start reading the something like 2,000 post I have post to this forum --- in the treads I have posted in you will find things posted by the people (smarter then me) that are/were the people that taught me

Start by going to some of my oldest post & work your way to my most recent post & read the discussions between me & the people that taught me

If you REALLY want to learn to do this - be prepared to spend MANY hours reading & researching the info on this forum --- that is how I learned to do it - & make a living doing it --- I probably put something like 2,000 - 3,000 hours of learning (from members of this forum) before I learned enough to do it & make a living at it --- in other words - the first couple years was a "learning" process --- before I learned enough to do for a living

Kurt

 

[Goldmember123]

Kurt thank you so much for putting me on the right page with reality ! You explained it perfectly and yes i will read your post ! You have been the Most Help !

 

[frankp]

I do not want to be mean but I think you should back up to the begining I do not think you even know what a motherboard is. Learn first what the different types of gold scrap are then contuine from there. I do not see a motherboard in you picture.

 

[Goldmember123]

Its cool i meant to say pieces of mother boards they are all cut up and split in half ! I ended up breaking them down when i was cutting off all the solder ! Because i was not trying to keep n refine all the other metals. Just the gold ! The truth is i started this project because my wife has her own jewelry business and she didnt have much gold which is what she wanted so i started scrapping electronics tearing all the things that i thought were gold and i didnt know nothing when i first started and i started with zero dollars and zero electronics i just found broken tv's phones DVR's blue ray players video game consoles you name it people throw away allot of electronics one time i found a bag with 25 broken Obama phones but i did have to spend 350.00 on the Acetylene-oxygen torch and 227.00 on my DC converter ! im still learning slowly ! and thank you guys for all your concerns !

 

[Dr.xyz]

You will most likely lose a lot of money in the future.

I think you were better off with zero dollars.

 

[jadedalex]

Gmember, you wrote:

What iv learned i did by reading watching videos

1.) Stop watching videos. You don't know what took place off camera. 2.) The best boards are Military grade because the equipment HAS to work the first time. Next would be High Grade Server boards or Medical electronics same reason as Military. Thereafter, the electronics gets much poorer in quality. 3.) Kurtak presented one of the best threads on how to extract and refine PMs. It was a Tour-D-Force and with the other members adding commentary it was like going to Refining School. The Best way: Pyrolize, Ball Mill, Separation, Smelting, Electrolysis. You still have lots to learn. Get busy reading the Library. Good Luck.

 

[Rreyes097]

Hell everybody who can help me with advice ! Well i have 10 pounds of mother board pieces there is zero solder in the batch ! I just clipped only the gold fingers and mother board pieces where the gold is embedded in the tiny little holes on the boards ! So i wanted to see if i can refine them with out using acid but Hydrogen peroxide Vinegar and sea salt with a bubbler to knock the foils loose ! Can anyone PLEASE give me some tips or advice on how to go about this correctly and what is the technical name for the bubbler machines or name brand because when i look up bubblers my browser seems to think im looking for a glass bong for cannabis wich they call bubblers as well ! Lol

It's called an air pump or aquarium air pump.

 

[heliman4141]

All the above advice is correct and ill interject that a day spent ditch digging for min wage will pay you far far better in the days end then messing with 10lbs. of motherboards and that you can take to the bank. These buttons took me months..........LOL and i ended up selling them when Covid hit. The material i had to refine was mind boggling for the amount of gold it gave me , one has to remember the newer electronics use extremely thin vacuum coatings of gold like the coatings on a mirror for a reflector or an eyepiece etc. 9.7 grams & 5.1 grams ....................

 

[GoIdman]

I have taken the advice of the forum members when i decided not to buy motherboards...the best choice from when i started this hobby....too much work for way small pay.... I get some motherboards when i take whole pc's but i just remove the values and resell the boards...pays more and is more cost effective...
Read the forum and take the experienced members advice...you'll save a lot of money and time...
Good luck on your quest..

Pete