Sold my first batch of ewaste... hope I did ok.

Well, part of what brought me to this site today was searching for better ways to utilize my time and what can be scrapped in what ways. I've been collecting and stripping computers for the last 6 months. I can only get the innards, I have to leave the case for disposal by the company I work for. I planned on doing some gold recovery myself, but 1) I'm still reading Hoke's book and I don't feel I'm ready; 2) I'm not up for dealing the chemical waste it produces, along with the toxic fumes and acids; 3) I needed some cash flow.

I emailed Chris at Boardsort yesterday for a quote on 28# of Gold/Silver/Tin Fingered Memory, 25# of Hard Drive Logic Boards, and 2# of clean gold fingers. Here was the quote:

28 Pounds of Mixed Memory at $14.00 per pound = $392.00
25 Pounds of Hard Drive Boards at $10.00 per pound = $250.00
2 Pounds of Clean Gold Fingers at $75.00 per pound = $150.00
Total Weight: 55 lbs
Total Payout: $792.00



I accepted and have 1 55# box packed and ready for shipping tomorrow using FedEx Ground for $43.60 with $800 declared value (FedEx was the cheapest from FL to OH).

So, should I duck and cover from the barrage of replies on how much I may have lost by doing it through someone else? I would have asked here first but found SMF after accepting. I want to get the most out of ewaste recycling and tried to look at other buyers but didn't see anyone with a better deal. If anyone knows of a better deal, I haven't been paid yet by boardsort and I haven't shipped the box - let me know by 2PM EST today (Friday) and I can possibly cancel with boardsort.

I know I would have had about 1 troy ounce of gold if I processed the fingers and memory myself, but I figure I would have had to put in about $100-$200 in setup costs for refining at home, plus more of my time that I have very little of right now!

Pictures of what I sold:


28 pounds of RAM (Mostly PC100 and PC133, with 4 pounds of 72-pin)


2 pounds Clean cut gold fingers


25 pounds of HD Boards

you should be ok, but don't take my word for it, do your paperwork, you're pretty much on your own there

What did you do with the mother boards? You said you only got the innards, what did you do with the disc drives? OH and the power supplies?

dang, he's got the best deal in the whole wide world and don't even know it!

Wow! Killer score and good gob. Think im ganna press a little harder for more cpu's!

Originally Posted by Bear

dang, he's got the best deal in the whole wide world and don't even know it!

Is that "don't even know it" referring to me? I know I got a good thing going... I'm glad I found SMF because I can make it even better with help, the right knowledge and know-how. I've been working on computers for over 30 years, and to think of all the ewaste that I've discarded over the years just boggles the mind!

Originally Posted by AJR

to think of all the ewaste that I've discarded over the years just boggles the mind!

Don't feel too bad, i gave away several hundred pounds of old boards I had no idea what to do with only 5 or 6 years ago. No processors wanted less than a truck load, nobody else was buying them where i was at, the scrapyard or landfill sure didn't want em, i felt lucky to find a computer recycler who'd let me drop em off there!