Gold inside chips (black, flatpacks - not CPU)

[Palladium]

Welcome to the forum!

 

[patnor1011]

Good point.
One start thinking. Another thing is that that was not all gold what was in there. I still do have all legs from inside of those IC chips and I can say that there is some nice amount in there too. So I would not say that 35$/lb but a bit more. 35 can be a rough estimate, it all depend on what is in your mix. Some chips do have more bonding wires some less.
I will try upload another pictures, it was pain to take them. I was thinking about that very small IC chips I was lazy to take out until recently when I took few of them, incinerated and whoa - they had gold bonding wires too. I am talking about very small cca 2mmx3mm with 3 legs on both sides. :lol:

 

[notchormama]

Just a little info , I just posted some figures ( read "fuzzy math" lol ) , regarding the value of a 3com PCI NIC card . Included is the flatpack weighing 5 grams , and based on the $35.00 a lb figure , that's 38.63 cents for one measly chip !

http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=60&t=15361&p=155473#p155473

 

[Random]

interesting

 

[patnor1011]

Small IC Chips, 6 legs - three on each side. I thought a waste of time to collect from boards or floor, well gold is where you find it...

 

[notchormama]

That is an eye opener . I guess I have lost alot of money selling green board for 30 cents a pound to the local scrapyard . These types of chips are on many of those "mid-grade" boards . The Monolithic Capacitors and the palladium within are on many of those as well . Of course , the money takes a little "elbow grease" to get it out , but with your method , I have big plans :mrgreen: .

 

[ericrm]

0,30$ lbs ??? you should look on the forum to see who is around you, you might find a better paying person...

 

[patnor1011]

I do "recycle" even power supply boards. Aluminum, copper and 2+ grams of monolythics and resistors. Also some of them do have IC chip in there. Same with small boards from back of lcd screens. Fingers are poor but they are there and many capacitors, resistors and some IC chips too. I tend to start thinking that most of PM value on board is hidden from plain view.

 

[patnor1011]

Now I only need to find economical and fast method - how to separate aluminum from the rest from wet capacitors. :mrgreen: :arrow: :idea: :|

 

[Palladium]

Not sure what you mean Pat, but NaOh will eat Al quiet quickly.

 

[patnor1011]

I was joking. When I finish up with board the only thing which will remain on it are capacitors - the round ones, I believe they are called wet capacitors or electrolytic capacitors. They are aluminum tubes covered with plastic and inside there is some paper/cotton something with some electrolyte.
I hate to throw away aluminum, no matter how small at the end of the day it all add up.

 

[joem]

Maybe and maybe not. That is why I collect any chip with more than 8 legs. I have found gold in chips with pins on two sides too, generally consensus here is that we call (or at least me in this thread) flatpack all black chips with more than 8 pins.
I separate them in 3 cat similar like Geo is doing:
1. low yield - rectangular chips with legs/pins on two sides, eprom like plastic/resin type (less than 1g/kg)
2. middle yield - all square and rectangular with pins on all 4 sides and 2 sides pin chips from ram (1-4g/kg)
3. high yield - black top parts from south and north bridge BGA type chips from motherboards and video cards (5+g/kg)

I have just processed about everything I had but I might find some and I will try to take few pictures.

Hey Patrik
Did you get some pictures of your low, middle, and high grade?

 

[patnor1011]

No Joe, but I can do some in next 2-3 days. Little bit busy in work and on my last project. I recently processed nice lot of southbridge BGA IC chipsets (flatpacks) for one member. It was 1336 g precisely (2.94lb)
I did that like I wrote in by eBook but slightly changed my method and at the end I produced nice healthy 7,1 g little beauty, which was sent to owner.
Enjoy pictures.

hmmm we really need to come to some conclusion on how to call different type of IC chips :|

 

[oldgeek]

Pat,
I have been following your work on this for a long time , and I have to give you credit, you are a MAJOR contributor to this forum. Thanks for all of the information, and hard work.

I have a question on yields. In your last post, you processed 1336g of (mostly) southbridge type BGA's for a recovery of 7.1g
Did that include both parts of that type of chip? I know you process the tops, and the bottoms separately. Is that correct? Do you have any yield figures for recovery of the tops only?

Oh yeah, Are you gonna tell us how you tweaked you process? :wink:

Thanks,
Scotty

 

[patnor1011]

Well thanks
If major contributor then perhaps in this thread and this particular process - that is what I can agree with. :lol:
My number of posts show that many times I talked when I should be quiet but I am trying to stay cool and do not react to everything.
Yes, yield is 7.1g from 1336g of whole IC chips, top and bottom part. From my observation I can say that bottom part with visible plating will not be more than 5% of all gold recovered. I mean it is so little that perhaps it will be wiser to list it on eBay than actually try to recover that gold. I was trying to recover gold as foils to have final weight from this bottom part but I must admit that I resigned trying to leach it out as foil when it was in Nitric for 5 days and about 30% of foils still attached. At that point I just put all that in AR.

I do have about pound of s/n bridges so I may do some additional math where I will try to find out what % of that 1336g was top and bottom part so in that way you can get answer about yield from top part only.

 

[butcher]

patnor1011,
I also feel you have been a major contributor to the success of this forum, I have liked reading what you have had to say, (although I do not always join into the conversation to say so) and I like that picture of the gold button above it shows you know what you are talking about.

 

[oldgeek]

Well thanks
If major contributor then perhaps in this thread and this particular process - that is what I can agree with. :lol:
My number of posts show that many times I talked when I should be quiet but I am trying to stay cool and do not react to everything.
Yes, yield is 7.1g from 1336g of whole IC chips, top and bottom part. From my observation I can say that bottom part with visible plating will not be more than 5% of all gold recovered. I mean it is so little that perhaps it will be wiser to list it on eBay than actually try to recover that gold. I was trying to recover gold as foils to have final weight from this bottom part but I must admit that I resigned trying to leach it out as foil when it was in Nitric for 5 days and about 30% of foils still attached. At that point I just put all that in AR.

I do have about pound of s/n bridges so I may do some additional math where I will try to find out what % of that 1336g was top and bottom part so in that way you can get answer about yield from top part only.

I have been collecting this type of chip quite a while now, I separate them as I get them. The tops go in one bag, and the bottoms go in another bag. So far I have 260g of tops, and 330g of bottoms, which equals 590g total. I am sure the results of weights of the tops verses bottoms could vary GREATLY depending on the way the chips are removed from the boards, and how much solder came along with the chip. I remove mine mechanically, and a lot of solder usually comes off with them. I also noticed that most of the top layer of fiber sticks to the top part when the chips are separated.
I will just keep on collecting them until i am ready to try your process out. 8)

I have also been thinking about processing the resulting ashes with a flux/collector in a smelting setup and pouring the lot in a cone mold. (I don't have a furnace though)

(edit for typo)

 

[Geo]

the gold foils on the green base will come off and stay stuck to the top if you just rip them off leaving the green bottom virtually worthless. the best way to separate the top and bottom is to heat the top (not the green base) until the top pops loose. you will see it when it happens. until i started using a heat gun, i just layed them with the top down on my single electric burner until the green base popped up.

 

[xALmoN]

So how are the chips removed from the PCBs?

Heatgun? Geo's sandbath method? The heatgun method sounds painfully slow and tedious though.

 

[Geo]

after the gun heats up (well, mine at least) the end is almost glowing. it only takes a few seconds for any components to come loose. keep in mind that a heat gun works good if you have a few pounds of material to work.the sandbath is only cost effective if you have enough material to keep you busy for a couple of hours. it takes time for the sand to heat. i wouldnt start the sandbath for only a few pounds of material.