What are keyboard mylars worth a pound?

[silversaddle1]

Just what the title says. What are they worth a pound if you were buying them from a customer? Don't care about what the yield is on them, plenty of topics on that.

Have a guy that has about 50 pounds of mylars he wants to trade for some scrap laptops.

 

[MMFJ]

Just what the title says. What are they worth a pound if you were buying them from a customer? Don't care about what the yield is on them, plenty of topics on that.

Have a guy that has about 50 pounds of mylars he wants to trade for some scrap laptops.

If you know the yield, then it is pretty easy to figure out "worth".....

YIELD
- (Time + Chemical)
- (Time + cost) to gather i.e., delivered to you or pickup
- Time to tear down material
- a bit of profit (nobody SHOULD work for free!)
================
MAXIMUM Offer

Since he's already got the mylars (i.e., you don't have to tear the keyboards apart, etc.), that may eliminate the 'Time to tear down material' part, unless you have to separate them or further process.

Now, you have to look at what he is wanting to trade for.......

Time/Money/Effort to acquire
Time put into getting the material to current state (in this case, you tore down the laptops?)
What you can get for it at the scrap yard as is
What you can get for it from ANY other source
Anything you have taken off the laptops that had value (sometimes, you get a Pentium chip that is worth much more than what you paid for the thing...)

Taking all that into account, you can decide how many scrap laptops it would be worth trading.

Without all that info, though, I'm not sure just how anyone could make that decision for you. To me, though, there is also one other thing to consider, which is just what you think the price of silver will be in the near future vs. the value of the laptops. That, again, is a private thing, though does weigh in this decision.

I would think that, presuming the laptops are still intact (i.e., no work put in to tear down), I'd be looking at only a few laptops anyway (maybe 10 max, I'd start lower.....) as there is some immediate value to be had from the laptop scrap (sell to boardsort, etc.) while the mylars still need processing and can have loss, etc.

The final decision is up to you, though I trust this post gives you a couple ideas to pinpoint some answers.

 

[EpicSilver]

well from what ive seen each Mylar is worth .30 each on average and around what 68 make a pound? or am i wrong?

 

[jimdoc]

well from what ive seen each Mylar is worth .30 each on average and around what 68 make a pound? or am i wrong?

Are you saying that is what the silver content is worth? If so you can't call that their value unless your time and nitric acid are free.

Jim

 

[EpicSilver]

well from what ive seen each Mylar is worth .30 each on average and around what 68 make a pound? or am i wrong?

Are you saying that is what the silver content is worth? If so you can't call that their value unless your time and nitric acid are free.

Jim

so true, my bad. kind of hard to help the original poster in the way he stated it though

 

[Geo]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

 

[CBentre]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using baking soda and borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

That is an interesting post Geo.

 

[EpicSilver]

found the post

Is anyone following this thread? :?

It's so quite you could hear a pin drop.

Anyway, I've slowly melted one mylar from a keyboard. The mylar and silver traces weighed 5 grams after gently melting with a heat gun set to medium. The mylar melted with no fumes and just crumpled into a semitransparent ball in the melting dish.

I then went at it with my Oxy/Act torch on the lowest possible gas flow and with the tip 6-8 inches from the mylar silver mass in the melting dish. After 30 minutes of tedious melting and periodic pouring off of black resins the silver began to group into a nice mash under the black goo. I tried to keep the mylar from igniting and producing a sooty smoke.

When no more melted resin would pour off, I added two teaspoons of borax and stepped up the heat; not full on but hotter and closer. Within five minutes the silver pooled into a BB while the borax flamed up as the last of the mylar residue burnt away in it.

Surprisingly the borax came out clear yellow when the last of the silver BB's joined together.

Here's a photo of the silver from the above process:

I can't weigh the BB on my scales due to it's size , but I estimate it is no more than a quarter of a gram. If it is a quarter gram then a single pair of keyboard mylars should produce approximately 1/2 gram of silver per keyboard.

More to come later.

Steve

 

[Marcel]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using baking soda and borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

He is king.

 

[kjavanb123]

Can dilute oxalic acid heated to 95c be used here to drop the pure silver? I assume the gelatin used in x-ray films are the same as the ones in mylars.

Thanks
Kevin

 

[resabed01]

There doesn't appear to be any gelatins used in keyboard mylars. The traces look to be silk screened on the sheet.

 

[Anonymous]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using baking soda and borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

I was reading the thread because I have over 40 lbs of mylars I'm going to process, but where in the post does Steve mention using baking soda?

Kevin

 

[MMFJ]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using baking soda and borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

I was reading the thread because I have over 40 lbs of mylars I'm going to process, but where in the post does Steve mention using baking soda?

Kevin

He doesn't (and, actually, moderators, what should be done on this mis-quote???) - a quick SEARCH of +baking +soda +lasersteve shows he never said anything about baking soda - only melting it down - see http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=6388#6388

 

[Anonymous]

lazersteve has outlined a process to recover the silver without using nitric acid. he used a heat gun to reduce the mylar to a solid mass. one mylar at a time making small plastic balls with silver. then using baking soda and borax to reclaim the elemental silver by melting the silver directly without the need of dissolving the silver first.

I was reading the thread because I have over 40 lbs of mylars I'm going to process, but where in the post does Steve mention using baking soda?

Kevin

He doesn't (and, actually, moderators, what should be done on this mis-quote???) - a quick SEARCH of +baking +soda +lasersteve shows he never said anything about baking soda - only melting it down - see http://goldrefiningforum.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=6388#6388

That's the thread I was speaking about that I've read and never saw baking soda mentioned.

Kevin

 

[Geo]

i apologize about the misquote. i read the post a long time ago and was quoting from memory (which isnt that good sometimes). im just now re-reading this post and will edit out the misquote.

 

[Anonymous]

i apologize about the misquote. i read the post a long time ago and was quoting from memory (which isnt that good sometimes). im just now re-reading this post and will edit out the misquote.

No problem...I just don't want to have myself or anyone else corrupt the processing and recovery of the goods!!

We all make mistakes (I do it everyday), but in this field, just one mistake can cost you and your values.

Kevin

 

[Geo]

MMFJ, really? is that something it takes a moderator to address? ive have never been argumentative or combative, wouldnt it be better to just ask me to fix the misquote which i would have done eventually anyway because i try to read each response.i usually take great care not to offend anyone on the forum because its the human thing to do and i just cant understand why you would think it would take a moderator to have it fixed.

theres no hard feelings on my end and this doesnt upset me. it takes much more than something like that to ruffle me up but it just doesnt seem too friendly.

 

[Anonymous]

MMFJ, really? is that something it takes a moderator to address? ive have never been argumentative or combative, wouldnt it be better to just ask me to fix the misquote which i would have done eventually anyway because i try to read each response.i usually take great care not to offend anyone on the forum because its the human thing to do and i just cant understand why you would think it would take a moderator to have it fixed.

theres no hard feelings on my end and this doesnt upset me. it takes much more than something like that to ruffle me up but it just doesnt seem too friendly.

Geo, don't get worked up on it. I know now that you made a misquote and you understand it. No problem at all. Actually a moderator isn't normally needed for this typo, but after a certain period of time (seconds, minutes, days, weeks and months...etc,.), the actual poster can NOT change/edit anything of that post, which would mean it would need a moderator to do. I'm a webmaster myself and I know how it is.

It's all good.. I just was wanting to point out that I didn't read any baking soda in the thread. One thing for sure though.... I'm learning and I'm seeming to retain quite a bit from what I'm reading here on this forum.

Much Love to all of you!!!

Kevin

 

[jimdoc]

I don't think there is a time limit on editing a post. Just with deleting a post, that must be done before anyone responds to it.

Jim

 

[Anonymous]

I don't think there is a time limit on editing a post. Just with deleting a post, that must be done before anyone responds to it.

Jim

That depends on how the admin setup the forum.... There are forums that once you post, and even make a mistake..... it's there, and a moderator will have to fix it. Ask any moderator here.... they'll surely agree that forums can be setup that way.

In other-words, review before posting. That's how some forums keep people from editing posts.

Kevin