Board Grade (missing components)

[PinkFloydEffect]

I am really struggling with weighing the difference between selling my boards as is or processing them as far as I can then selling them (which might be counter productive; process the boards fully or not at all).

What would the grade of the boards be after I remove the heat sinks, transformers, inductors/copper goodies, ICs, gold connectors, fingers and pins, monolithic ceramic capacitors, tantalum capacitors, relays (silver contacts) and transistors?? There are still components left on them including capacitors too small to remove and some copper plating, etc.

From what I can see people are buying monolithic ceramics for around $10-$20/oz on eBay and the tantalum's were going for less than that, ICs obs more. Might even take on one of the many approaches to process those ICs and capacitors myself for gold, silver, and palladium.

[Bear]

you might want to check over on gold refining forum with that question

[Mechanic688]

I think you would have a .50 a lb board left.

[miked]

The best answer for me comes directly form my buyer. Perhaps take good photos of before and after you have removed the material. Send the photos to your buyer and get his answer.

Personally I do remove a lot of the material that tends to lower the value of boards on some boards. This has worked well for me but I tend to hold my boards for a long time and have the time to remove the extra junk. Mike.

[PinkFloydEffect]

I think you would have a .50 a lb board left.

Better then .10-.12 cents which is what I get for completely bare board in light iron.

The best answer for me comes directly form my buyer. Perhaps take good photos of before and after you have removed the material. Send the photos to your buyer and get his answer.

Personally I do remove a lot of the material that tends to lower the value of boards on some boards. This has worked well for me but I tend to hold my boards for a long time and have the time to remove the extra junk. Mike.

I hold my boards for a long time too and have the time to remove most the components I was going to start using a hot sand bath to remove everything. I know things like small transformers etc will downgrade a board quickly because of weight. I just see the fact that I can only sell about half the components on boards the other half is not really valuable so I still need to profit off what I can not process and at .50/lb that is not too bad for what is left.

[PinkFloydEffect]

Basically this is what some of my boards would end up looking like, to me these are worth nothing but light iron I do no think they have silver traces, probably not even copper traces. Nothing I see here is worth anything in bulk besides one transistor, the diodes and resistors are worth nothing more then light iron, the mini oil capacitors are worth nothing, I don't think the switches have silver contacts in them? This is where I think I will have to draw the line with processing down to light iron unless it was a gold traced board or something like that:



These pieces I have like this are another example of drawing the line down to light iron (if your yard accepts electronics in your light iron). The left I see no value in it is ready to throw in light iron for me that is $0.12 where the piece on the right I would pull those orange capacitors because I think they are tantalums...then toss that board into li-iron too.



This is pretty much the same, pull the IC, a few transistors, nothing else is worth anything in bulk except possibly that tan cap I think is a MLC?

[BRASSCATCHER]

Check those switches they should have silver plate over copper.

[Mechanic688]

Void my answer above if your talking about these low grade to begin with. You start with low grade (TV,stereo,vcr,etc) and finish with low grade, price won't go up by depopulating. Bad assumption on my part that you were talking about higher grade ($3.00+) to start. Only thing of value left is in #1 the pushbuttons and the IC in bottom pic.

[PinkFloydEffect]

I will check the switches, I am talking about high end boards too but after I remove their components there is nothing left but these similar components the only difference is the board itself.

[BRASSCATCHER]

You might want to ask to get copper bearing price if you are depopulation higer end boards.

[PinkFloydEffect]

Would you guys say hands down all transistors but gold plated are worthless just like the CAN style capacitors?

This website is very awesome and helpful for what I am trying to do: http://www.scribd.com/doc/20327561/S...Identification

[NHscrapman]

transistors (square) are #2 copper after you hit them with a hammer.
If you mean resistors I believe there is no value. but others who know more may chime in and teach me something as well

[PinkFloydEffect]

I will have to look into this, must be only the square transistors that require a heatsink.

[Mechanic688]

I will have to look into this, must be only the square transistors that require a heatsink.

[ScrappinRed]

check with a tantalum buyer, but I'm pretty sure those orange ones aren't tantalum

[PinkFloydEffect]

check with a tantalum buyer, but I'm pretty sure those orange ones aren't tantalum

I think your right about that; they are just dipped aluminum.

[PinkFloydEffect]

Check those switches they should have silver plate over copper.

I checked them out, here are some pictures for ya maybe they will help someone elses curiosity. These just happened to be on whatever I was taking apart so by no means are these all the push button switches out there:



Each contains a very thin copper plate, the contacts in the base probably contain no silver since the contact plate is not silver plated:



This is what I meant by transformers and small copper coils in plastic (whatever they are?) I throw them in my transformer bucket since they have the same or greater copper density ratio as a transformer, although the yard has recently started telling us not to put the high voltage flyback transformers on the top left in the bucket anymore they will only take them as light iron but they pay $0.20/lb for this stuff minus the large top left that would be $0.12/lb:



These are the copper goodies I smash and pull apart for easy #2 copper:



I removed the cover of a relay box and I can easy see tossing these in the transformer bucket same density ratio, I would pull that small piece of brass takes 1 second @ $1.60/lb. The contacts I am not sure about some people say some are silver, not sure what they would be:



Not sure what the heck these are but I find more of the yellows then these cans, I assume capacitors and resistor?

[Mechanic688]

http://www.scrapmetalforum.com/elect...d-buttons.html

[PinkFloydEffect]

Gold where? The circles in the switches look gold but they are reddish in the light.

[Mechanic688]

Gold where? The circles in the switches look gold but they are reddish in the light.