RAM modules and memory analysis report

[Platdigger]

oops, ok I see that now.
Man, that is low.

 

[butcher]

Please advise if the following procedure is assuring to get me a good estimation on assay,
1- Take one kilogram of same model and type RAM module, log every one of their models or ID number,
2- incinerate them
3- Ball mill the result
4- Pass it through a sieve of 10 mesh
5- Melt the metals on top of the sieve into a bar
6- Drill the bar.
7- Send the drilled piece, and ashes that pass through the sieve to lab
8- fire assay both samples for gold and palladium, ICP them for the rest of elements.

This sounds good to me, but I am not skilled in sampling and assay.

The melt of the bar would be important, to get a good mix of alloy, the melt would need to be hot enough and stirred well to mix all of the metals involved ,you want these mixed together well, you do not want to be left with a bar with gold on the bottom and the lighter base metals on top of the bar.

I think the assay of the ash is also a good idea, as it would most likely contain some of the value.

4Metals and a few others have written some good posts on sampling your materials for tests.

 

[Anonymous]

oops, ok I see that now.
Man, that is low.

Don't worry Plat. I had to read it about 6 times before I had the numbers nailed!

 

[kjavanb123]

All

I have incinerated these memory sticks just to confirm if this is correct. Please advise


Thanks
Kj

 

[Anonymous]

Nope those are cooked not incinerated. It was pointed out in one of your other threads by someone (might have been Butcher) that to be incinerated they should be a grey powder. Not half formed memory chips.

 

[kjavanb123]

Isnt incineration use heat and oxygen? That is what is used and picture may not do a good justice but the color is greyish.

Regards,
Kevin

 

[philddreamer]

Kevin, I agree with Jon. Your material should look more like this. I used a propane torch to finish incinerating the chips in order to get them that color.

Take care!
Phil

 

[kjavanb123]

What temprature needed to incinerate? This waster incinerator unit I have tested produce 900c plus heat and oxygen and burns most of the smokes, so should I increase the heat to certain number?

 

[9kuuby9]

What temperature needed to incinerate? This waster incinerator unit I have tested produce 900c plus heat and oxygen and burns most of the smokes, so should I increase the heat to certain number?

Your setup is fine as it is, You should examine the time frame you are attempting to successfully accomplish the process.

I'd suggest you let it continue until its color has become light grey to white-ish. as suggested above.

If it takes too long then decrease the batch size.

And a general checkup is also advised, like for instance is their sufficient oxygen supplied or has it truly reached that exact temperature instead om maybe assumptions and guesswork?

 

[sagar96]

There has been talk lately of having to sort RAM in the near future when selling to the board buyers. The newer DDR2 and DDR3 have very thin chips and (possibly) less PM's.

Or more, thin chips mean more units in weighted sample. More chips mean more wires.

I just broke a DDR2 chip into tiny pieces. Finally I found the bond wires, they were tiny!

wait what, there are gold bond wires in the actual green plastic of the board?

 

[g_axelsson]

wait what, there are gold bond wires in the actual green plastic of the board?

No, in the chips mounted on the board.

Göran

 

[Alentia]

What temprature needed to incinerate? This waster incinerator unit I have tested produce 900c plus heat and oxygen and burns most of the smokes, so should I increase the heat to certain number?

Your temperature is accurate, but most likely there is no oxygen in between the boards (they stuck together) and therefore, they remain "black". When I incinerate chips I add them in small numbers just to cover the base of the vessel, when they are "cooked" and I add next layer. When vessel is half full, I empty it.

The problem in your list of procedures is ball mill. That is why assay shows low values. When you ball mill (half or fully) incinerated boards gold will be "lost" in ball mill, it would stick to the walls almost as plating.

When boards/ram are fully incinerated, you should be able to crash them with mortar and pestle very easy and than melt with excess borax and soda ash at around 1200-1300C.

You should be able to get single ball of mix metals. Scrape borax from crucible walls with rounded scraped while its hot and liquid. You probably will not be able to scrap all in a single pass. Once borax cools when you scrape, add more borax and some kryolite and put it back in the furnace. Let it melt and scrape again. Dissolve borax in dilute H2SO4, may take 1-2 days at room temperature, if you loose some metals in reaction with H2SO4, not so big of an issue, you final analysis will not be materially affected by much. You will recover small balls from borax. Remelt big ball with small balls. Now, you final alloy piece will be clean enough for chemical analysis.

You can either do chemical assay yourself or give the lab actual ball. Drilling the hole and giving a sample will be inaccurate as you have mix of metals with various consistency across the ball. The center will consist of mostly non precious metals except at the bottom. There is Pt in old 30pin ram sticks and absence of it in your lab report would mean it has been lost in the process.

Running 2Kg of old mixed ram (gold and tin plated) EDO (Extended Data Output) and SIMM (Single Inline Memory Module) yielded for me 1gr of gold and 0.05gr of Pt. That was my first ever try on chips incineration and I made many mistakes. I would have probably recovered more now.

 

[kjavanb123]

Alentia,

Thanks for your post, I used induction furnace, and according to induction that should mix the metals at thier atoms level, so there should be a mix.

Regards,
Kj

 

[Alentia]

And one more thing...

I have noticed you have a step to sieve. Even it is #10 sieve, you still can loose micron size gold wires through your sieve. Just melt everything together.

Even though induction melts metals at their atom level, Au, Pt, Pd will settle at the bottom as being heavy when you cast them. You may try to utilize cone mold, it will be easier to see even with the naked eye when you have PMs at the needle of the cone.