Non-Chemical Fiber CPU's - That's how i do them

[butcher]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactivity_series

Metals below hydrogen will not dissolve in Hydrochloric acid HCl, so copper will not dissolve in HCl, but if the copper is oxidized to CuO then HCl will form copper chloride CuCl2, so metals below Hydrogen in the reactivity series need oxidizers to oxidize the metals before they will dissolve into solution.

Base metals above Hydrogen in the reactivity series will dissolve in HCl.

Gold is less reactive than copper, so it does not oxidize (lose electrons) as easy as copper does, so it takes a stronger oxidizer to oxidize (remove an electron from the gold atom) or to dissolve the gold, we can use this to oxidize copper and dissolve it into solution as a chloride, and leave the gold atom whole or undissolved, so we can recover the gold from the base metal.

The trick here is to have just enough oxidizer to dissolve copper, but not so much oxidizer that we will put gold into solution.

 

[Feenixb1o7]

Ah, nice thank you a full answer. Thanks for taking the time to explain. I'm a complete noob when it comes to chemistry so I'm still learning the very basics.
At least now I know why it can't be done like that, and why there are more steps.
Thing is, I'm not looking to get 99.9% gold, just enough to then mix with other metals to make a ring for an old friend, chances are I could leave the copper in it as I'll be adding some anyway.

 

[Geo]

CPU pins are different in composition. they are iron instead of copper. while AP will dissolve the iron in the pin, adding iron to your AP solution is not a good idea as it will eventually foul the solution. the Kovar (iron) pins can be digested in hot hcl unlike copper. in this way, you can process iron pins without fouling your AP.

 

[Feenixb1o7]

Ah, well I have only collected CPU pins, so then surely HCL will remove almost all the unwanted metals by itself?
I never did find out, is it at all possible to do it with cold HCL, best I can do is make a small hot plate that hits 80c max as I have a small Thermoelectric Cooler/heater.

 

[Geo]

that much heat should work ok but at a slower rate. using cold hcl will have very little impact on the overall digestion of the iron base metal. it needs to be hot enough to keep the water evaporating. as the water evaporates, it concentrates the acid. do not leave unattended. do not let the reaction run dry. it will need to have hcl added to the reaction when the level gets low.

 

[Feenixb1o7]

Can you over heat it? Say if I put it on a camping stove and let it go will it be too much? It's the same camping stove I use to melt pewter so easily hits 300c

 

[Geo]

i dont recommend a boil, but if you do allow to boil, be sure to cover. the hotter you allow the solution to become, the faster the acid will be depleted. you dont want the acid to evaporate, just the excess water in the acid.

 

[Feenixb1o7]

Okay, then 80c it is, as long as it works, just takes longer I'm fine with that. I have latex gloves, goggles, a rubber apron and a cheap respirator, flasks and beakers. Next question, filters. Anything you recommend? Ideally I'd like to spend as little as possible because I'm a cheap bugger. Will coffee filters work

 

[Geo]

coffee filters works great for gold foils. a coffee filter filters to about 5 microns.

personally, i try not to filter as it just traps some gold every time you use one. after the dissolution is complete, spray down any floaters with a spray bottle (water) and after everything settles, decant slowly leaving the gold foils behind. do this down to the point you cant remove more without pouring out foils. add fresh hcl to cover the foils and warm. decant after rinsing well. refill with water and repeat until the water stays clear.

 

[jure]

Hi,
i am new to this forum so please excuse me if i am posting in the wrong topic, i came to this post from sam's page. So to my conserns, i am going to try this procedure for my first time and i need some help.
First of is it better to use just HcL and boil as described here, or to add some H2O2 to HcL ? If H2O2 is better how much should i use it ?

I am allso wondering if there is a diferent procedure for other goldplated things from computers ore are you using just pins becouse they are the easyest to colect? For example can i mix pins and (board conectors)* in the same batch?

* i dont know if that is the real name for what i have, i mean the gold stripes on a green board on the edges of motherboards. Hope you understand me

Thanks for your help!

Jure

 

[butcher]

jure,

Welcome to the forum, I would like to help you get started, but in order for me to do this, you need to understand, that you will need to study, your best bet for now is to forget about getting gold of of your scrap with chemicals, at this point all that is going to do is have you loosing your gold, and making dangerous messes, you do not know how to handle, and toxic chemical waste that you would be creating with no understanding of what to do with , basically putting yourself and others in danger.

To begin concentrate on study of this forum, download Hokes book and begin reading it, start the forum in the guided tour (in the general chat section), when you are ready for chemicals begin with the experiments you read about in Hokes book, study the safety section and dealing with waste.

While you are studying collect your scrap, learn how to identify and separate it by types of material, learn how to prepare the material before you even begin recovery, learn what processes are used to recover that type of material...

While this sounds like it will take a long time to get gold with all of this study (it is true, it will) but without this study you will have little chance of learning how to get that gold.

Then you will learn how much of this or that you need, you will know how the reactions work and in what cases the will not work, how each type of scrap needs to be processed, and how to recover and refine gold.

There is much more to this than just simply answering your question, and telling you how to get the gold, you need to gain an education first.

 

[trix]

I am newbie to this forum and i am looking for an answer ,i have a big amount of gold plated pins ,collected from several items ,including ,exchange servers,cpu , boards etc they weight around 50 kg ,what i would like to know is beside AR process is there any way i can separate gold from pins without loosing pins , means i dont want pins to be dissolved and gold get separated , i hope i am able to make my point clear any help would be highly appreciated and thankx in advance
you guys are doing great work

 

[butcher]

trix,
To do what you are asking will take quite a bit of study.
There are several methods to get the gold and base metals like copper or iron separated.
some methods can take the gold off of the pins without attacking the base metals much,what comes to mind, cyanide (very dangerous) and the concentrated sulfuric acid cell (also dangerous but with study can be done safely).

There are also methods where the base metals are dissolved away leaving the gold as foils which can then be refined to pure gold.

All of these use dangerous acids, and procedures that can present dangers, although not that hard to do , they are not necessarily simple, and it takes quite a bit of study to learn, you may see some video or read about it and get the idea it is simple, like seeing a mechanic repair a car can look simple, but without the knowledge or skills of the mechanic, if you tried the repair it most likely would not go well, especially if you had no understanding of the mechanical workings.

If you wish to learn it is all here on the forum, but you will have to be willing to spend a lot of time studying.

There are no easy answers to most of these questions.
You either remove the base metal or you remove the gold, easier said than done.
I may not have understood the question.

 

[drlakic]

Can HCl/Chlorox/water in specific proportion dissolve just gold and not iron on an iron pins?

drlakic

 

[butcher]

drlakic,

No.
Many metals will dissolve easily as chlorides, especially one as oxidizing in nature as the Hydrochloric acid and hypochlorite solution, the more reactive the metal the easier it will dissolve into solution, this solution can hold several metals at once, the more reactive metals will dissolve into solution and push out the the less reactive metal like gold out of solution.

To get a better understanding do some research on the reactivity series of metals, and displacement chemical reactions, Google these terms to find the material to study.

These are a good place to begin with:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_displacement_reaction
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactivity_series

 

[sharkhook]

What a great read. I will be reading this one again.

 

[Captobvious]

Ah, well I have only collected CPU pins, so then surely HCL will remove almost all the unwanted metals by itself?
I never did find out, is it at all possible to do it with cold HCL, best I can do is make a small hot plate that hits 80c max as I have a small Thermoelectric Cooler/heater.

I realize I'm a bit late to the party, but you can get a hot plate for not that much at Walmart, here's the one that I use and it works GREAT!

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Farberware-Double-Burner-Black/22866796

 

[kennith76]

when doing Pins from fiber chips:
I have followed the steps posted on your website. I find that gold foils are not in fact floating they mix in the sediment (which there seems to be alot of). what could I be doing wrong to cause this? now that being said, is there a simple way to separate the gold from the sediment? Thank you for your time and resources, they have been very helpful

 

[joubjonn]

If you don't see foils then you may have too much oxidizer and the gold is being dissolved and cemented back out as sediment as long as copper is still available to cement the gold. Test your solution with Stannous to check for dissolved gold. It's probably not an issue.

 

[kennith76]

If you don't see foils then you may have too much oxidizer and the gold is being dissolved and cemented back out as sediment as long as copper is still available to cement the gold. Test your solution with Stannous to check for dissolved gold. It's probably not an issue.

how do i prevent this from happening?