Cell Tower Amp Board

[AuburnEwaste]

Gold Plated Cell Tower Amp Circuit Board for Gold Precious Metal Recovery | eBay

I was able to purchase a few of these as samples to see how they do on ebay. I have access to a bunch more if they sell. They are from cell phone tower amplifiers, not sure how thick the plating is on them.



I have never done an auction style listing, I always do buy it now, so who knows. Any thoughts or suggestions welcomed.

[Mechanic688]

1 lb and 5 oz. will cost you 8.00 or 9.00 to ship so hope you figured that into your price. Otherwise you will be giving it away.
If you have a few, I'd try one at an auction and see how high it goes. Right now you don't know the market price for it. Plus if you had multiple bidders you could do second chance offers to the other bidders. Might get a bidding war going.

[AuburnEwaste]

I can ship this in a flat rate envelope for 4.95 anywhere in the U.S, I should be ok. I really do not know what to expect in terms of price, but if my calculations are correct these could be very profitable. I only paid for the Copper content so I do not have much into them. I do have it as an auction style listing to test the waters.

[sawmilleng]

Does it make any sense to pull the board from the gold plated chunk of metal? And maybe even sell them separately? I'm assuming the metal is some sort of heat sink--(copper?) plated with gold. The board is probably a high grade telecom board, so you know what to expect for that.

I'm thinking that there are experienced board buyers who can probably tell what to pay for the board but unless you separate the metal piece and give the dimensions of it people are guessing on how much gold plate is on the metal. Is it plated on all sides?

Definitely board porn, though!!
Jon.

[AuburnEwaste]

The dimensions are given in the listing. I left the board on because it has a part number that can be looked up. If people know where it came from they can make a better guess of how thick the plating is. The Copper is completely plated on all sides.

[Jeremiah]

It's an interesting piece. I'm going to forward the link. You say you can get more?

[AuburnEwaste]

I can get about 50-60 of these if I want them. It did not sell and didn't get many bids. I still have it up as a buy it now.

[Jeremiah]

My suggestion is to contact jghilino with this gold-plated board and see if you guys can work something out. With his contacts in mind, I would ask him to run an auction on it and see how it does. This would tell you approximately the market value of this board. After some people run some tests on it you may be able to increase the price.

[wavecrazed]

my buyer said you can trim the gold fingers on a telecom board

[HiTechMike]

Gold Plated Cell Tower Amp Circuit Board for Gold Precious Metal Recovery | eBay

I was able to purchase a few of these as samples to see how they do on ebay. I have access to a bunch more if they sell. They are from cell phone tower amplifiers, not sure how thick the plating is on them.

I have never done an auction style listing, I always do buy it now, so who knows. Any thoughts or suggestions welcomed.

Were you ever able to find an outlet for these kind of gold plated boards?

[AuburnEwaste]

I sold them on ebay. Most buyers want to pay you for the Copper and that that is about it.

[NobleMetalWorks]

Cell phone tower equipment is shielded, depending on the electronics it is protecting. It is usually the heaviest plating. Even at that, the actual value shouldn't be more than about 65 cents per sq inch. I process a lot of this type of material. The shielding used is sometimes copper with gold plating, silver alloy plating or other base metals. By cause gold wears easy, it is also almost always alloyed with other metals when plated so as to prevent excessive wear.

When I am able, I will post the actual thickness with a link to a gold plating calculator so you might better understand the actual value.

Also keep in mind that any chips, proms, eproms etc will also be of the highest quality. If any of this type of material is included with the boards you purchased, you may want to read the number off the top, or bottom of the chip and google it. Also checking eBay may show what individual chips might bring if you were to remove them and sell individually. I have pulled working proms, eproms etc, that brought up to $35 dollars each.

Scott

[sledge]

I agree with Noble.. There are some HARD CORE chip collectors out there.. You find something rare.. they eat it up like Sunday Supper!

[HiTechMike]

Cell phone tower equipment is shielded, depending on the electronics it is protecting. It is usually the heaviest plating. Even at that, the actual value shouldn't be more than about 65 cents per sq inch. I process a lot of this type of material. The shielding used is sometimes copper with gold plating, silver alloy plating or other base metals. By cause gold wears easy, it is also almost always alloyed with other metals when plated so as to prevent excessive wear.

When I am able, I will post the actual thickness with a link to a gold plating calculator so you might better understand the actual value.

Also keep in mind that any chips, proms, eproms etc will also be of the highest quality. If any of this type of material is included with the boards you purchased, you may want to read the number off the top, or bottom of the chip and google it. Also checking eBay may show what individual chips might bring if you were to remove them and sell individually. I have pulled working proms, eproms etc, that brought up to $35 dollars each.

Scott

What are the real light silver boards composed of? Aluminum plated with something? I also have some real light brass looking gold plated board. I would guess aluminum because of the weight.

[HiTechMike]

Here is what the scrap yards analyzer said of the board in the above picture:

[miked]

P and W and S?

[HiTechMike]

P and W and S?

Phosphorus, Tungsten, and Sulfur. I am assuming.

[HiTechMike]

The shielding used is sometimes copper with gold plating, silver alloy plating or other base metals.

What is your take on no gold showing on the analyzer?

[etack]

I disagree with Noble. I have done quite a few cell tower gold plate items. Those plates are low grade with a real thin plating. The 3G systems that have been removed all had junk for plating the connectors.

These are the plates I had. similar to yours.

[IMG][/IMG]

Sample #1 : 147.4g starting weight = 0.016 g Au ( 13 milligrams)
Sample #2 : 217.6g starting weight = 0.025g Au (20 milligrams)

These are the connectors that are also low grade.

[IMG][/IMG]

They have value but its not great.

The Al/Au plated ones are better and will have similar yields but the platting is easier to remove.

I love GP Al

Eric

[NobleMetalWorks]

What is your take on no gold showing on the analyzer?

Its an interesting alloy. Keep in mind that shielding is not only employed for frequency shielding. There is also electrical and heat. Considering this alloy, I would suggest that the copper is for heat and / or frequency shielding, the tungstun, phosphorous and sulphur for electrical and perhaps heat shielding.

There are many different alloys, and many times it is difficult to understand why metals are alloyed in specific ways in specific percentages. Also consider that and XRF analysis only will report what metal is within a few atoms of the surface, unless a specific type of XRF analysis. This means in short that you are only reporting the top layer of metal, which means that their may me another metal or alloy under plating, or not. The only way to be sure is to score or break the metal and analize the internal metals as well.

Gold shielding should look almost dull and buttery, thin plating tends to be very shiny. The thicker the gold plating, the more dull and buttery.

I would also like to note that often, gold and / or silver is plated over Aluminum.

Scott