[richtronix]

Hello all,
 
Total newbie with zero experience but on the fast track to learn and do by summer (hopefully)

I have been watching videos and studying how to reclaim gold, palladium, and a few other metals from electronics by using acids.  I want to do things slightly different with a lot less "sorting and separation" of metals before using acid.

In other words, I want to grind and pulverize the entire computer to dust, soak that in acid, then precipitate (I think that is the correct word) each of the metals back out. Not sure if it is possible. If so, is there a specific order that each one would need done, gold first, then palladium, copper, silver aluminum, etc??

Any ideas and information is greatly appreciated just don't beat me up too bad for not knowing much. Thanks.

[Enthalpy]

Welcome, Richtronix!

Answers to questions you didn't ask, sorry for that:

This recycling is done in poor countries like Bengladesh because it brings little money from much work. I suggest to check how much gold a typical card carries (consider 5µm thickness on a Ram module or video card) and how much value it has.

The operation is very polluting. Any possible in a developed country?

It involves cyanides, bad acids or mercury in big amounts. Knowing little chemistry, you'd likely kill yourself.

Copper and aluminium aren't worth it. Silver is very uncommon in electronic boards. Palladium exists on SMD components for radio frequencies, so you may find some in portable phones, but not in computers. No need hence to precipitate the metals successively, unless you have dissolved undesired ones.

Instead of acids, which will corrode first the unwanted compounds like epoxy, but gold as the very last, why shouldn't you burn the cards in oxygen? This might leave the metals together with glass and silica, which you could separate by their density or conductivity.

[richtronix]

True a lot of recycling does occur in 3rd world poor countries as you describe but much is done in advance countries even here in the US  that uses more modern, safer technology. I shortened my message to try and be brief but maybe wasn't too clear so I will try a slighter longer description but still omitting details so please understand that just because i have a list of chemicals doesn't mean I would mix all of them at once but only a combination of some but just different mixes.

The chances of me killing myself from this are very slim. I am not jumping into this on a whim or by watching a youtube video. Yes I do watch them but I view many different ones and many different ways that people are doing this. I read technical books and information and I ask tons of questions. I see how others do it and I try to find ways to improve upon it or which will work better in my situation.

Currently, I am removing all of the copper and aluminum from the boards by hand which is very time consuming and if was paying laborers it would not be worth it. Palladium is in MCC's which are on almost all electronic circuit boards.

I have been seeing methods for recovering each of these individual metals from using combinations of Hydrochloric acid, bleach, hydrogen peroxide, etc, also by shredding, crushing, pulverizing and more. I have seen shaker tables with water separation, air, and all sorts. I was just kicking around the idea of cutting out all of the time consuming labor of removing the copper, aluminum, MCC chips, tantalum chips, gold bearing parts, etc and just throw the whole electronic device into a shredder, then into a pulverizer and turn everything into powder then give it the aqua regia bath and reclaim everything from there.

I hope some of this makes sense.

[Enthalpy]

Palladium is in MCC's which are on almost all electronic circuit boards.

That's what amateur recycling sites claim. But up to now, I've heard of palladium as a replacement for nickel only at radiofrequency ceramic chips (because ferromagnetic nickel has a much worse skin effect). Even as a thin layer at the contact ends, it makes the capacitors more expensive, so they're used only when needed: not for computers, not for low frequencies. Do you have differing data about it, for instance from capacitor manufacturers?

Aluminium: I've seen very little of it on electronic boards, only as aluminium capacitors - except as casings, for instance in satellites. Not worth a recovery anyway, and certainly not once dissolved; tantalum and niobium maybe, in electrolytic capacitors too.

Safety: a friend of friend killed himself accidentally with cyanide (and a solvent). He studied chemistry at one of the best universities, afters years of home experiments.

My feeling, from the limited amount of text here, is that you grossly over-value the metals that can be recovered, and under-value the dangers. Apparently, many Internet sites make unsubstantiated claims about the value of electronic garbage. Do not believe them, and believe even less what you hope. Make your estimates based on real cases and manufacturer datasheets.

Take the favourable case of a Dram memory module: it has gold on 120mm*3mm*5µm*twofaces, or 70mg, worth 3 euros when pure. A graphics card carries about as little.