Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

[wildmaninal]

Has anybody recovered or attempted to recover any gold in these old computer boards? I have a few old computer parts that have gold on them, I've had them for a while. I have studied on the purifying process or refining process what ever you want to call it. The process I have studied on purifying gold left out one key ingredient, obviously because they didn't want to give away their secret or it might be illegal. I have seen computer components being sold on Ebay for gold refining. I know that any gold on the computer components would not be pure gold, that said this is why you need the purifying process.

I know a few websites that I have studied said that it wouldn't be worth the effort. Well depending on how many computer parts you have that have gold on them and how fast you can separate the gold out with gold going $877 an ounce I think it might be worth a try. I've known about gold in computers for a while but never have been as tempted to retrieve the gold as I am now.

 

[gonefishie]

Re: Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

Did you miss this or something? https://xenforo-prod.iboatsdev.com/threads/233963/

What is the deal? is there an email going around telling people about gold on pcb board or something? The reason I said that is because this is the third times this week I've heard it come up. A guy at work ask me this very same question today.

 

[JB]

Re: Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

Gold hit $930/oz this week. I guess that's what triggered this stampede.

The only way I know to strip pure gold from plated items is by electroplating in reverse, but the chemicals used are deadly dangerous. The process I used back in the 60s used cyanide. We used gold plated and gold "clad" junk as the source of gold to plate it onto copper pennies (they were still copper then) but it would make more sense to plate it onto a gold bar to increase its weight.

Find a book on home electroplating. There may be better electrolytes than the cyanide solution we used.

We got enough plated to make the pennies look like gold, which was our quest, but I gotta warn you. . .a ton of gold plated circuit boards won't even begin to surrender an ounce.

 

[oops!]

Re: Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

......

as jb said......it would take a truckload to get an oz of gold....

however...effin you own a truck.....in all appliances there is copper.....

when i had my big whse...we processed over thirty thousand scrap appliances in one year.....

i hired a kid to strip all the wires from all the stoves....pull all the motors....rip all the aluminium outta the fridges/stoves......

then crushed the appls for tin.....

my weekly cheques for the scrap metal/copper/alum were over two thousand a week.........that was a lot of appls tho.....a lot....

if there is a big department store distrubition center by where you live....they will give you the appliances if you take them away for you......

when you get good at stripping...a fridge will take 15 mins...stove 3. washer/dryer about 5 mins to yank the motors and clip the big 220 volt cord....

on a small scale...doing it part time i could see 250 a week. if you have the acess to scrap
oops

 

[wildmaninal]

Re: Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

Did you miss this or something? https://xenforo-prod.iboatsdev.com/threads/233963/

What is the deal? is there an email going around telling people about gold on pcb board or something? The reason I said that is because this is the third times this week I've heard it come up. A guy at work ask me this very same question today.

I sure did miss it Gonefishie :redface:, I asked the mods to zap this thread because I didn't mean to take SS Mayfloats thread away basically . It's basically the same subject posted twice.

I have been wanting to post a thread on this subject for a while and I obviously had the same timing as SS did lol.


I hear ya JB, that's what I was affraid of.

Oops, I had been into stripping appliances for a little while myself, but I'm not the only one that has this idea. Allot of other local people do the same thing. I came down with Copper fever for a good while . I can't find any old appliances to strip when I look for them because others have beat me to it. Owners of these local appliance stores have basically said it is free game to whoever wants to come and get these old appliances.

One thing I wished I could do is get into gold hunting with my uncle, he goes to south America and has found gold on his trips.

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: Collecting gold off of old computer boards?

because of the responses, i'm closing instead of deleting. which was your wish.