Hard Drive contacts on ribbons

[Sancho_n_Pedro]

Hi,

I have a bunch of these hard drive ribbons from deconstructed hard drives.

Can anyone advise the best method for getting the gold from these (what seem like two layers of plastic) ribbons?

I was thinking to add them into a mix of gold plated pins, or are they might be better done separately?

Very simple question, I guess. I'm new to refining, but have played with smelting for a bit now. Happy to be be mocked, but also happy to learn.

I have been reading C.M Hoke's book, but this kind of item is too modern for her to have mentioned.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Martijn]

I toss them in AP after a HCL solder leach with other plated items.
I don't know if the gold runs underneath the plastic coating. It has no function there I can think of, so I expect not.

 

[nickvc]

I suspect that Martyn is right they rarely waste gold so why plate underneath the plastic.

 

[Smack]

Why waste HCL when a pair of scissors will cut the soldered part off??? There is no gold besides that which is exposed.

 

[Martijn]

Good point.

 

[patnor1011]

I do not remember who but I think it was Marcel who had assay on this kind of ribbon contacts and from what I remember yield was very very high. It take a lot of hdd and dvd/cd rom to find a kilo of them.

 

[Martijn]

I had a handfull of older drive heads and some of them appeared to have solid gold wires from the ribbons to the tips of the heads.
The value may have been in small pieces of those wires that broke off.
I think some of the tiny ribbons to the tips are thicker gold traces. Like a tiny flat cable. I just pyolyzed them and dissolved in AP.
I'll collect and separate some like the ones you have a picture of to pyrolyze and test.
I threw them in AP, so any visible gold should have come off.

 

[Martijn]

Correction: I meant to say 'pyrolyzed them and dissolved in AR' in stead of AP..

 

[BShan]

Thanks for the info! I have some from drives manufactured in the past couple decades, not expecting a goldmine, but figured as long as I'm in there I'd collect them too.

The connection between the ribbon and the tiny black read/write head looks like solder like on QFN chips, but is often gold colored. I guess they could have soldered the heads to the ribbon and then gold plated it afterwards, but I'm curious about what benefit this would have. I'd rather be hopeful and think that it's some kind of gold braze or alloy through-and-through, which maybe led to Marcel's high yield which Patnor1011 referenced.

 

[Jimbriese]

I worked for a manufacturing company that made the read heads for most of the hard drive companies and at that time a lot of the ribbon cables for the read head had platinum and gold that was plasma plated the entire length of the ribbon cable. The ends are of course a lot heavier coating than the traces themselves.

 

[Alondro]

I had a handfull of older drive heads and some of them appeared to have solid gold wires from the ribbons to the tips of the heads.
The value may have been in small pieces of those wires that broke off.
I think some of the tiny ribbons to the tips are thicker gold traces. Like a tiny flat cable. I just pyolyzed them and dissolved in AP.
I'll collect and separate some like the ones you have a picture of to pyrolyze and test.
I threw them in AP, so any visible gold should have come off.

I have a few like. Most of the drive arms have clearly copper wires, but a small number have wires that look like gold.