Pulverized unpopulated circuit boards with shaker table

[kjavanb123]

Jid,

I was the one who posted that link if I recall it was a study done by Dubai university, and that has not good reviews here by pro members due to lack of waste solution treatments and lots of acid usage. So it is not feasible.

The standard procedure to process ewaste circuit boards is incineration, magnet separation, ball mill, screen metals and non metals, melt the metals into a bar called refiner bar, sample the ashes passed the screen called "pulp", assay both and sell them to a copper refinery.

The method discussed in this post and video you see has been in my mind for a while, hopefully by the end of this month once the assay of each discharged materials prepared we know how efficent this method has been.

Regards
Kevin

 

[kjavanb123]

All,

For those of you who have been following my venture in using shaker table to recover metals from PCBs, Steve from Mt Baker Mining and metals have sent me another greqt video, where he is grinding and shaker table on low, medium and high grade boards,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5GBGbcDY6c&google_comment_id=z133ufnyqyqtytrff23ojl3bcoysvna3i&google_view_type#gpluscomments

This company has some excellent shaker table, that has shown lots of hope for recovery. I will post the assay result as soon as I get them.

Regards
Kevin

 

[kjavanb123]

All,

After a long awaiting, the assay results for discharged materials from shaker table manufactured by Mt Baker Mining and Metals, finally arrived. It looks very promising, here is what I gathered from reading the assay results. Please also note since I am out of state, so I don't have the exact weight for each sample bags which was tested, therefore the metal compositions of each bag is yet unknown as I am awaiting to hear those numbers from the American Analytical labs.

View attachment 10lb assay result.xls

Here is my understanding, please leave your comments and take on this results,

-Au
According to the fire assay result, there was total of 250 toz of gold per ton, and bag1 contains 94.4% of all gold that was in the 10lbs sample we ran. Bag2 contains 3.4%, bag3 contains 1.5%, and tailing or bag4 contains 0.6% of all the gold there was in the sample.
Now I do not have the net weight of bag1 or other bags that would tell us how much gold per ton of PCBs I grinded. Again 94% recovery is pretty neat for a process that does not involve incineration and copper electrolysis.

-Ag
Reading the fire assay results which are more accurate, there was total of 756.6 toz of silver per ton of materials in all 4 bags. Hence, bag1 contains 51.8%, bag2 contains 33.4%, bag3 contains 13.2%, and bag4 (tailing) contains 1.4% of all silver in sample.
I think bag2 and 3 needs to be re ran on table or maybe concentrator. Blue bowl?
Then again part of this silver unlike gold is alloyed with palladium or tin in components, so maybe running it on gravity separation wont improve the result.
I am sure there is a good refining for silver which I am sure guys can assist.

-Pd
Since the result for bag is pending cant really calculate the efficency of separation.

-Pt
I am very surprised to see traces of Platinum in my boards. As the first bag result is pending but the other 3 results show most of the Pt got collected in hole#1 and 2.

-Rh
There should be none in modern boards only in telecomm servers mostly manufactored in Israel.

-Ta
Amazing reading there too. Most refineries do not pay for Ta in boards, but we have it here, and I know tantalum is used in boards in its metallic pure form.
Total tantalum detected in all sample bags is 35,380ppm. So that makes tantalum distribution for bag1 to be 38.15%, for bag2 to be almost 60%, bag3 to have 1.9%, and tailing to have 0.01%. I am surprised to see bag2 contains more tantalum than bag1. But almost 99% tantalum recovery is just so good.

-Cu
Copper which is a major revenue source for refineries, is as following,
Total weight of copper in all bags is 931,380 grams per ton. Bag1 contains 22.76%, bag2 contains 37.36%, bag3 contains 39.08%, and finally the bag4 contains almost 0.8% of the total copper recovered.

-Sn
One of the most troubling metals for refineries. It poses a penalty above certain levels for copper refineries, but at prices of $15/lbs, and its percentage in PCBs can add to revenue. Tin also as in case of silver is used as alloy with lead, silver and even gold on PCBs. But I have recovered tin electryically before so it should be no issue here.
Total tin according to result is 291,000 grams per ton, so that makes the bag1 containing 55.6%, bag2 containing 38.4%, bag3 contains 5%, and bag4 contains 0.22%. This tells me bag3 that contains most of the copper from processing boards contain small amount of tin which is good if one wants to go to refine the copper electrolytically.I think a concentrate or dilute sulfuric acid bath would solve problem with tin and lead in bags 1 and 2.

- Lead
Second most painful metals, and toxic for enviroments. Total of lead recovery was 207,600 grams if sample was 1 metric ton, so bag1 contains 57.32%, bag2 contains 36.65%, bag3 5.29%, and tailing contains 0.78%. Again there are very safe hydrometallurgical methods to resolve the issue with lead.

- Ni and Fe
Both should have been recovered before they get onto the table after the first shredder with a magnet separator.

- Ti
I am guessing Titanium will be removed by rare earth magnet separator. This has to be confirmed, but why most of it end up on hole1 is interesting, as it has a density of 5 almost. So I assume it must have been alloyed with some other elements, but with its high melting point I am curios about alloy of Ti.

-Zn
It can be dissolved using similar methods for tin and lead. Most of it end up in bag2.

There were some trace amounts of rare earth which I think can be more in cell phone boards. But element La was noticeable in the test results. Once again I have the net weight for each bag, then I have a better understanding of what is metal compositions in each bag.

Thanks and regards,
Kevin

 

[g_axelsson]

You have made several mistakes in reading the results...

Please also note since I am out of state, so I don't have the exact weight for each sample bags which was tested, therefore the metal compositions of each bag is yet unknown as I am awaiting to hear those numbers from the American Analytical labs.

You need those weights for saying anything at all about the results.

-Au
According to the fire assay result, there was total of 250 toz of gold per ton, and bag1 contains 94.4% of all gold that was in the 10lbs sample we ran. Bag2 contains 3.4%, bag3 contains 1.5%, and tailing or bag4 contains 0.6% of all the gold there was in the sample.
Now I do not have the net weight of bag1 or other bags that would tell us how much gold per ton of PCBs I grinded. Again 94% recovery is pretty neat for a process that does not involve incineration and copper electrolysis.

Without the relative weights of the fractions you can't say anything about the result. If all the fractions was equal in weight then your conclusion is correct, but if sample1 is a lot smaller than sample 2 then it would be a totally different story. For example if bag 2 would weigh more than 28 times of bag 1 then it would contain more of the original gold than bag 1.

Same goes for Ag, Ta, Cu and so on...

But almost 99% tantalum recovery is just so good.

There is a long way to extract a salable tantalum concentrate from the mix you have, many ways to loose part of it on its way.

-Cu
Copper which is a major revenue source for refineries, is as following,
Total weight of copper in all bags is 931,380 grams per ton. Bag1 contains 22.76%, bag2 contains 37.36%, bag3 contains 39.08%, and finally the bag4 contains almost 0.8% of the total copper recovered.

As you don't know the relative weight of the samples the total is impossible to calculate but it can never be more than what you started with. There is no way general pcb:s contains 93% copper. This is probably an error coming from not knowing the sample weight.

-Sn
One of the most troubling metals for refineries. It poses a penalty above certain levels for copper refineries, but at prices of $15/lbs, and its percentage in PCBs can add to revenue. Tin also as in case of silver is used as alloy with lead, silver and even gold on PCBs. But I have recovered tin electryically before so it should be no issue here.
Total tin according to result is 291,000 grams per ton, so that makes the bag1 containing 55.6%, bag2 containing 38.4%, bag3 contains 5%, and bag4 contains 0.22%. This tells me bag3 that contains most of the copper from processing boards contain small amount of tin which is good if one wants to go to refine the copper electrolytically.I think a concentrate or dilute sulfuric acid bath would solve problem with tin and lead in bags 1 and 2.

Same as for copper, no way there's 30% tin in general circuit boards.

- Lead
Second most painful metals, and toxic for enviroments. Total of lead recovery was 207,600 grams if sample was 1 metric ton, so bag1 contains 57.32%, bag2 contains 36.65%, bag3 5.29%, and tailing contains 0.78%. Again there are very safe hydrometallurgical methods to resolve the issue with lead.

Same comment as for copper and tin.

Interesting results but you need the sample weights (as dry weights so you don't add water from the shaker table into your calculations). You also need the weights of the magnetic separated fraction to tell anything about general scrap boards.

I'm also missing any gases or carbon so the samples were obviously incinerated before analysis. How much was the loss of weight during incineration, is that included in the ICMP-MS analyse?

Another element missing from the total is silicon, there should be a lot of it in filler SiO₂ from plastic IC:s, in silicon dies and most prolific, in the glass fibers of the circuit boards. You don't need the exact number of C, Si and volatile gases, but you need it as a sum of other elements. Maybe it is the left over after adding all the ppm:s together for a bag. For example bag 1 contains 912000 ppm of analysed material, but was that relative to original content, dried content or incinerated material?

Göran

 

[Anonymous]

Kevin

Blunt words but you need to listen to them please. Goran makes a good point politely. I'll make the same point in a cleaner manner.

Your results are all over the place. They are skewed for a number of reasons, including the fact that you're really not doing this scientifically. You're randomly messing around and picking out something to "recover, melt into a bar, and send for assay." Because you are not doing it scientifically your results are actually in many cases dangerously wrong if people pick up on them and take them as legitimate.

Your results from the multiple threads serve no purpose apart from providing entertainment value. Either you like wasting money trying to reinvent the wheel, in which case carry on mate that's your dime. Alternatively you're looking to do something commercially and you're wasting your time trying to reinvent the wheel. Same old same old.

If you have a great source of this product you can make a lot of money trading it if you are getting it at the right price, but everything else you're doing is fun to look at but otherwise pointless. Oh, and a waste of money.

I know you won't listen but I thought I'd put it out there anyway. I do this for a living, as do others on here.

Jon

Edit for typo

 

[kjavanb123]

All,

Interesting, I mentioned in my post since I do not have the net weight for dry samples I can't calculate the amount of gold and silver etc per bag, but this data provides info about how the shaker table separated pulverized boards, Please advise if this is incorrect.

It showed where most of the aluminum went and gold etc. this is not a game for me, I thought to share this to have conversations and debate, as far as being scientific.

I really was hoping for some advise rather than pointing out the assay is useless unless I know the weight of each bag, which I clearly said I did not know that since I did not handle the bags myslef, but can this assay shed a light on how dhkaer table performed?

 

[Anonymous]

I've already suggested to you how a shaker table performs. I've even offered to give you a confidential show round of a facility with one of the largest metal refiners in the world who already utilises this, despite your thinking that it isn't used or done.

You've chosen to ignore that, just as you do any practical honest advice that you get that conflicts with your own views.

You say you want debate, so I'm debating. Deal with this. You can't just listen to views you like you have to listen to them all in a debate. You're trying to reinvent the wheel. Large corporations have already done what you are trying to do. With a lot more money than you have and with a lot more scientific and chemical backing.

As I said in my previous post if it's a hobby and you have plenty of money to fund it then crack on. However you've said it's meant to be a business so my alternative advice still applies. Don't get all butthurt about it, just take the advice or not. It's your money after all.

 

[g_axelsson]

All,

Interesting, I mentioned in my post since I do not have the net weight for dry samples I can't calculate the amount of gold and silver etc per bag, but this data provides info about how the shaker table separated pulverized boards, Please advise if this is incorrect.

It showed where most of the aluminum went and gold etc. this is not a game for me, I thought to share this to have conversations and debate, as far as being scientific.

I really was hoping for some advise rather than pointing out the assay is useless unless I know the weight of each bag, which I clearly said I did not know that since I did not handle the bags myslef, but can this assay shed a light on how dhkaer table performed?

To be scientific is to point out errors when you see them and accept criticism when it is motivated. That way science is evolving. To just ignore criticism is not scientific.

What I said was that you need the individual weight of the bags, until then it is hard to draw any direct conclusions.

I've tried to give you advice before and been totally ignored. I'm not going to waste my time to do it again. The only one I write for in your threads is all the other forum members that follows or finds these threads. I'm not expecting any answers, I just want to add a sober look at the numbers and what they are telling or not telling.
I'm trying to help those that actually listens to my advice even if I don't know who does... actually I do know a couple of people that does. :mrgreen:

Göran

 

[kjavanb123]

Gentelmen,

I really cant see anything you say that I have not disagreed. Assaying each bag content is something that can not be drawn using these numbers, and I also said it in my post that since I do not have the samples weight I cant say anything about ppm of a ton boards.

All I wanted to see from this number is how efficent the table has been or not, does it need adjustment to table to allow more separation and such.

As for the visiting the facility in UK, it does not needed as I think if we research this shaker table processing I can customize this to work for myself. I do not re-invent anything, just trying to make existing equipment to work, and assaying the result is the first before any further testing.

From the fire assay result for gold, combining the ppm for each bag, then find percentage of gold for each bag to know where most of the gold ended up in shaker table, based on that 94% of gold is concentrated.

Regards,
Kevin

 

[solar_plasma]

The only one I write for in your threads is all the other forum members that follows or finds these threads.

Only having some skills in soft sciences I love to learn from you hard sciences scientists, - and there is a lot to learn and to soak up.

Soft sciences are soft, because they often have to examine phenomena that are hardly accessible, using indirect methods to draw conclusions that are worth to be examined further. But maybe just this could help making your data less useless:

If we make three assumptions:
- e-scrap has (to some degree/the margin of failure can be calculated) comparable contents at a given timeframe all over the world
- your process is correct
- a second batch of your material would have the same behavior in your shaker table like the first one has had.

Then you should be able to find and calculate all the missing data in order to interpret your observations. Ok, this will not yield hard facts because of the broken chain of evidences, but with some luck and after a plausibility check, it will point you in some direction, like it is typical for soft sciences. And it will not cost anything.

 

[mls26cwru]

Interesting to follow. If it is indeed 90+% efficient, that seems pretty good. Obviously you need original weights of the bags, but in addition, you need to know the repeat-ability... the most efficient separation process possible is useless if you cant replicate it time and time again. also, if you have the money, it would probably be really helpful to see this process in use... If i were in the situation, i would take spaceships up on his offer to see the process first hand.

just my thoughts....

 

[kjavanb123]

Mls,

I posted a link video of Mt Baker Mining and Metals person ran 20lbs of their own mix of PCBs, and as I am communicating with them, they are using different mesh size materials and run them on shaker table, and will send result for assay.

I think if PCBs are pulverized to mesh 100 or less, then there will be more recovery. This result are from just one trial on shaker table, Steve from that company is sure re-running each cut from the table on the shaker table would separate even more.

This is progressing as we run multiple tests.

Regards,
Kevin

 

[kjavanb123]

All who are following this threat, I just recieved the weight of each sample bags which was sent to the lab for assayX, as following, so now we can know the ppm of each metals per ton of board,


Bag 1 - 53.4 g
Bag 2 - 252.7 g
Bag 3 - 211.9 g
Bag 4 - 95.8 g

Regards and happy new year in advance,
Kevin

I recalculated the ppm for gold for one ton of this mixture of boards and came up with 130g per ton of mixed boards, based on the following calculation, please advise or comment,

Bag #1 according to fire assay contains 236 toz/ton, that is 7,340 g/ton of gold. Since bag #1 weighs 53.4g, then actual gold in bag 1, will be 53.4 x 7,340 divided by 1,000,000, which is 0.391g of gold. Also using the formula of 30% recovery of minus 30 mesh that my grinder produces, I sent Steve 20lbs of minus and plus mesh 30, and with 30% of it become minus 30 mesh which he ran on table, then the weight of material he ran becomes 6lbs. Since 6lbs produced 53.4g of concentrate that has 0.391g gold, then 1000kg of the same materials would have 1000 x 0.391 divided by 6lbs (3kg) which comes to 130.65g per ton of mixture of boards that Steve ran 3kg of it on his shaker table.

Regards
Kevin

 

[g_axelsson]

What you need is the total dry weight of each fraction, not the weight of the sample bags. I assume you tested more than 600g of crushed circuit boards.

Göran

 

[eastky]

Kevin
I like reading the post you do here of the forum. You think out of the box and go at it your own way. Nothing wrong with that I do it to. I don't post much and I do enjoy reading and learning new things.

Everyone looks at away that the little guy can get in on something and make ago at it. Time and time again here on the forum it has been said to high grade and sell the rest. I honestly think that is the best thing to do. Remove the goodies from the parts and sell the rest to a bigger company that recovers everything that can be recovered.

You honestly need to set down and think about how you go about doing things. Sometimes we have to step back and look at the BIG picture. Ive read all the replies to this post and wasn't even going to post. Being a part of this little community
I felt that I should post something.

I didnt want people to see the numbers you have posted in this post and get dollar signs in there eyes that aren't there.

Everyone knows that there are loses in refining and recover precious metals from circuit boards. How much nobody really will know. You send a ton to a refiner all he can do is what he does. He will not recover 94% of the gold in any case. He can turn the heat up and send a quanity of your gold up the stack to be collected later at a reward to him.

I think Palladium said in one of his post he doesn't give an estimate of gold that could be recovered. He tells them it is what it is. Whatever is recovered is what is recovered. He doesn't give false hopes or expected yields. That is being honest.

Kevin if you were to do some math you would see where your assay numbers come from and how to really get a grip on them. If you were to work with the numbers you would see that you are reading them the wrong way.

I have found that doing some numbers is the best way to see the whole picture and not what one wants to see. Math doesn't lie unless you want it to.

The numbers I am going to post are your numbers you posted in this thread. I just worked them with math and did some figuring with them.

You started with 9kg of boards = 9000 grams of material

They ran 5kgs on the shaker table = 5000 grams of material

They ended up with 618 grams of material and this is what the assay was performed on.

Seeing the assay from this 618 grams is where the eyes get big and people start thinking they can get rich of circuit boards.

This is where the math come into play.

All you did was concentrate 9000 grams of material into 618 grams. Which will give you false numbers if you dont do the math with an open mind.

These are your numbers not mine.

Gold 250toz per ton =7775 grams

Silver 756.6toz per ton = 23,530 grams

Copper 931,300 grams per ton

Tin 291,000 grams per ton

Lead 207,600 grams per ton

One metric ton is 1,000,000 grams

All your numbers added together equals 1,461,205 grams

The value for your gold $283,012.00 USD silver about $11,458.00USD I figured copper at 70 cents a pound for $1539.00USD

 

[eastky]

Kevin
Just wanted to finish what I was going to post. Misplaced some figures earlier and couldn't find them. Found them and just wanted to add those. To much math to many scribble sheets and things get fuzzy. I didn't want to post anything until I had things figured out.

Hope you understand and the folks that read this can understand it also.

Just by the picture of the boards you posted and stated they were the type up processed. In my opinion those are low to mid grade boards. They looked to be sparsely populated and had quite a few aluminum capacitors on them. Low grade boards mean low yield and disappointment.

I just worked with the numbers from the first sample. I guess you can add all your totals from your samples and see the yield. You started with a certain amount of material and you ended up with different size material and lots. It all goes back to with you started with.

Sample 1 had 53.4 grams. You started with 9 kg = 9000 grams
A metric ton is 1,000,000 grams

1,000,000 grams divided by 53.4 grams = 18,726 lots of 9000 grams each 9 kg = 9000 grams

You started with 9 kg = 9000 grams X 18,726 lots = 168 metric tons

That's a lot of circuit boards. The amount of gold per ton may seem huge but the amount of material to get it is huge.

Now the dollar signs fly out the window. Just wanted to give you a perspective on what you are trying.

You broke down weight and concentrated the material down and got good results just looking at the numbers.

I had an assay done on some contact points. 1 gram came back 3% gold. So if I collected a metric ton of contact points there would be close to 1000 troy oz per ton. That was just the contact being cut off the connector as much of the metal removed as possible.

Well good luck

Just wanted to add if you take the total grams of each bag at 618 grams. That away your numbers aren't all spread out.

1,000,000 grams divided by 618 gives 1618 lots of 9000 grams.

1618 X9000 grams = 14.56 metric tons. Calms the number down and doesn't look so daunting of a task.

 

[necromancer]

(snip) if I collected a metric ton of contact points (snip)

:idea: the hard math.

how long would it take to collect a ton of the same type of contact points :?:

 

[eastky]

(snip) if I collected a metric ton of contact points (snip)

:idea: the hard math.

how long would it take to collect a ton of the same type of contact points :?:

If you could come up with enough to recover a ton of those contacts. I would say it would take awhile. You would need about 138 million contact points.

 

[patnor1011]

What about tiny tiny particles of gold which end up smeared on other metal in "pulverizing boards" phase?
What if there are many of them?

That mean everything need to be processed, even waste water.

 

[kjavanb123]

At 3000 rpm I doubt any gold bonding wires would have the time to smear to blades. I am going to send another 10lbs of mixed boards I have to be run on a 2x4 ft shaker table by Steve from Mt Baker mining and metals, this table has only 3 holes and this time weigh the discharge materials and send them again to a lab before I make the purchase.

Regards
Kevin