Howdy Mike, I just wet-ashed some BGA tops 2 weeks ago. My gold amount was also less than expected. The only thing I did that differed from you is I did hot water rinses to try to get rid of the gooey stuff. One thought - before you do another wet ashing - you might consider doing a batch of 226 grams your 'old' way. If you get close to the same amount of gold - you'll know it's the chips and not your wet-ashing process. If you get the expected 2+ grams of gold - then you'll know something went wrong with the wet-ashing process. Take Care. Love seeing the glass rods getting used!! Jim
Hi Mike I have enjoyed watching all of your content, thank you for many hours of hard work on your part! It looks like there must be a better way to get the gold from these chips, I agree with others that incineration first might be an easier way to go. We all want you to succeed what ever endeavors you try!
Nice evolution of process Mike. My toes were curling imagining you popping 2kg tops. You came to a similar solution to me. I use a modified plasterers tool. Trowel end is cut to about 20mm wide, sqar3d off and a sharp bevel put on its edge. Similar to your putty knife but less flex. I get it under one corner, then just work my way "round" the square. The other end is about 12mm Wide and a little longer again with a sharp bevel. Handy for plucking mlcc, gold fuses. Lots of things really, i dont depop without it. Great vid. Thanks for sharing.
Great video! I have never done this before but I have been addicted to watching refining videos for a couple years now. One thing I've noticed on these chips is folks don't stir or agitate during or before dissolving the epoxy. It seems like they try to keep bonding wire attached to that center piece. Maybe the wires get mixed up and suspended in that black soup and poured off?. I look forward to watching more of your videos!
From what I see on other videos it was just sulfuric acid until all the plastic is off it. Then hcl to get rid of the base metals. Then aqua Regia to dissolve the gold. No blender
Yes, other videos make it look so simple. I suspect there are a lot of rinsing steps that aren't shown to get rid of the carbon. You see the whole process, warts and all, in my videos.
I think the water may have reached max solubility .. when you get to the point of decanting try using it all in a 5 gallon bucket and stirring it. That should allow it to dissolve in the water column and let your gold sink to the bottom of the bucket.
Good evening Mike I've been doing this for awhile now and I'm gonna give you my experience in this wet ash process the more acid the better I believe you where really light on it should not be thick to the point it can't be Poured when done Secondly once you start the process what ever you do do not Stir or disturb the chips at the bottom of the beaker all you're doing is breaking the gold bonding wires apart and dispersing them you want to try and maintain their integrity so when you pour off liquid later they stay at bottom when you do they should still be hanging from the silicon chips 3rd when ashing is done quickly pour and Dilute acid with water it will act up at first but quickly settle down remember this stuff is drain cleaner and gets dumped in sinks all the time the key to reducing your risk of a violent reaction is a lot of water quickly once you have it diluted Swirl the beaker to mix water and acid Sludge gently then pour through a fine mesh sieve to catch any bond wires that may have been suspended keep rinsing until you can see the dies fiberglass mesh and gold then rinse the remaining stuff in sieve and put back in beaker with the good stuff then go from there I've found this is extremely messy but I believe you recover more this way than heat ashing because the high heat vaporizes some of the fine. Gold wires
my first reaction would have been another run with the sulfuric acid , wet ashing always works for me but i have never had any gooy residue . my guess is you didnt let it cook long enough or have enough acid
That's what I was wondering if adding a little bit of peroxide would help reduce the carbon? I don't know if it would also put in a gold or precious metals into solution if they are present though. I do know that sulfuric acid and peroxide make piranha solution which reduces anything organic to water and CO2. I think it would be worth a small-scale experiment to see if it will reduce everything but the inorganic metals.
I checked the waste bucket. Didn't see any gold in it. I think the chips I bought were just too new. The amount of gold is lower in newer BGA chips. Older stuff is always better for gold.
Hi Mike Ale comparison, please do the same weight only with combustion method, that would certainly interest many users. and great videos keep it up.. greeting
Great work. You lose a bunch of gold with this proces. One kilo of BGA gold corner chips must have yeald-harvesting from 6-12 gr. of gold and it variates from year of production of BGA,manufactorer-company that made them and many other things. Greetings from Serbia!
I watched this when it first came out and immediately decided to process the same quantity by the wet ashing method to see what results I got. I took 400 grams of whole gold corner BGAs and processed them without 'shucking' I removed the solder first and then proceeded to wet ashing and AR. The final yield after a second refining was 3.45 gm of pure gold. The whole process took 5 hours from start to finish. I believe you lost gold at each step in your procedure but particularly during the washing and unnecessary blending processes. A final note: Please, pretty please, the word is COLL OID AL there is no 'I' before the 'A', and therefore no such word as colloidial.
Should have done the blender with it dry, real dry, the dryer the better, just like when you make thermite with the aluminum cans... Did I say that out loud? All that water with the black stuff in suspension moves out of the way of the blades no matter what speed you're on to the blades don't interact with the suspended particles near as much as they do with with the water which just pushes them out of the way
Not to sound like Captain Obvious or anything but have you considered incinerating them? Trim the centers out like you did before and just torch them with a propane cylinder until they quit smoking and toss them into a metal Bowl (if that's not what you burnt them in) and use something like a baseball bat and do a mortise and pestle action breaking up any big pieces that are left and all your gold will still be there it just won't look like it. Rinse off all the lightweight materials like ash and that should eliminate the need for a lot of that sulfuric acid and hopefully avoid the black foaming mess.
I have been wanting to try using piranha solution after the sulfuric is done. Dont do any rinses just keep it warm while you prepare the piranha solution on another hotplate then add the piranha solution in small doses to the bga slurry. In theory the piranha solution should eat the carbon and turn it into Co2 and will leave the gold and other metal alone. When complete neutraulize the solution with a sodium bicarbonate solution. Rinsing at this point should be real easy.
@@leehodgson6920 that's what I would try. Just adding small doses of peroxide to the slurry solution as it's digesting and see if it will reduce some of the carbon. In theory, it should reduce everything to water and CO2 except for any Metals present.
I checked the waste bucket. Didn't see any gold in it. I think the chips I bought were just too new. The amount of gold is lower in newer BGA chips. Older stuff is always better for gold.
Need a hell of a lot more sulfuric acid or better yet piranha solution which will inevitably turned all that carbon if that's what it is instead of plastic but it's your turn all the carbon into CO2 gas you just haven't come anywhere close to using as much as you'll need for that if you're not going to incinerate it first
Yeah 1 gram of gold per 100 grams of BGA tops is normal. You should take 100 grams & do your old faithful way of incineration & see what the yield is with that before moving on again to experimental wet ashing, just to see if this low yield is normal or are you loosing some with the pouring of the carbon!!
do two small tests at once with sulfuric acid and ashing choose the same gba for both tests, it will be possible to compare which method is more efficient also in terms of potential gold lost check if there is any in this white bucket it could have been trapped in fiber glass nets when pouring
Howdy Mike, I just wet-ashed some BGA tops 2 weeks ago. My gold amount was also less than expected. The only thing I did that differed from you is I did hot water rinses to try to get rid of the gooey stuff. One thought - before you do another wet ashing - you might consider doing a batch of 226 grams your 'old' way. If you get close to the same amount of gold - you'll know it's the chips and not your wet-ashing process. If you get the expected 2+ grams of gold - then you'll know something went wrong with the wet-ashing process. Take Care. Love seeing the glass rods getting used!! Jim
I soak all the bottoms in HCL to get rid off all the tin first and then cut up. Then dump in some nitric.
Hi Mike
I have enjoyed watching all of your content, thank you for many hours of hard work on your part!
It looks like there must be a better way to get the gold from these chips, I agree with others that incineration first might be an easier way to go.
We all want you to succeed what ever endeavors you try!
Nice evolution of process Mike. My toes were curling imagining you popping 2kg tops.
You came to a similar solution to me.
I use a modified plasterers tool.
Trowel end is cut to about 20mm wide, sqar3d off and a sharp bevel put on its edge. Similar to your putty knife but less flex. I get it under one corner, then just work my way "round" the square.
The other end is about 12mm Wide and a little longer again with a sharp bevel. Handy for plucking mlcc, gold fuses. Lots of things really, i dont depop without it.
Great vid. Thanks for sharing.
I've been using a sharp putty knife to strip cards and tops off of BGA's for years. Welcome to the small club.
once again thanks mate, every time l watch your videos l learn a little more
I hope you can find the missing gold, rather than find out that BGA's don't have the expected gold yield. 😯
Great video!
I have never done this before but I have been addicted to watching refining videos for a couple years now.
One thing I've noticed on these chips is folks don't stir or agitate during or before dissolving the epoxy.
It seems like they try to keep bonding wire attached to that center piece.
Maybe the wires get mixed up and suspended in that black soup and poured off?.
I look forward to watching more of your videos!
From what I see on other videos it was just sulfuric acid until all the plastic is off it. Then hcl to get rid of the base metals. Then aqua Regia to dissolve the gold. No blender
Yes, other videos make it look so simple. I suspect there are a lot of rinsing steps that aren't shown to get rid of the carbon. You see the whole process, warts and all, in my videos.
Stay at 176• Fahrenheit and i sieve through fine plastic mesh every time I dump.
Interesting as always Mike!
Good day, if you dont stir it at all will the gold bond wire not stay attached to the die and the acid can be filtered
I think the water may have reached max solubility .. when you get to the point of decanting try using it all in a 5 gallon bucket and stirring it. That should allow it to dissolve in the water column and let your gold sink to the bottom of the bucket.
M8 I watched a prickly plans video on these worth watching!
I just put the BGA bottoms in AP solution. Works fine just like fingers.
Mike:
Look at your gloved index finger in your video. ET has a earthly cousin.
Love the Gold corner BGA. Its my favourite type of Ewaste
And yes. I was expecting the ~1% yield as well 🤔
1:57 when you incinerate the chips, why don’t you just leave the bottoms on ???
Good evening Mike I've been doing this for awhile now and I'm gonna give you my experience in this wet ash process
the more acid the better I believe you where really light on it should not be thick to the point it can't be Poured when done
Secondly once you start the process what ever you do do not Stir or disturb the chips at the bottom of the beaker all you're doing is breaking the gold bonding wires apart and dispersing them you want to try and maintain their integrity so when you pour off liquid later they stay at bottom when you do they should still be hanging from the silicon chips
3rd when ashing is done quickly pour and Dilute acid with water it will act up at first but quickly settle down remember this stuff is drain cleaner and gets dumped in sinks all the time the key to reducing your risk of a violent reaction is a lot of water quickly once you have it diluted Swirl the beaker to mix water and acid Sludge gently then pour through a fine mesh sieve to catch any bond wires that may have been suspended keep rinsing until you can see the dies fiberglass mesh and gold then rinse the remaining stuff in sieve and put back in beaker with the good stuff then go from there I've found this is extremely messy but I believe you recover more this way than heat ashing because the high heat vaporizes some of the fine. Gold wires
Thanks for the advice. I'll try it that way next time.
For cutting those chips, maybe it would be faster to make punch from metal sharpened pipeand cut midles at once?
Ingento hardwood heavy duty paper shear will do it fast, but there are stationary metal shears that would also do the trick.
my first reaction would have been another run with the sulfuric acid , wet ashing always works for me but i have never had any gooy residue . my guess is you didnt let it cook long enough or have enough acid
Once the majority of the wet ashing is complete, dilute with hydrogen peroxide. the extra oxygen will turn the carbon sludge into CO2.
That's what I was wondering if adding a little bit of peroxide would help reduce the carbon? I don't know if it would also put in a gold or precious metals into solution if they are present though. I do know that sulfuric acid and peroxide make piranha solution which reduces anything organic to water and CO2.
I think it would be worth a small-scale experiment to see if it will reduce everything but the inorganic metals.
3% peroxide would probably work, but you can get stronger peroxide from hair salons for bleaching hair.
Yea a ton would be nice. You could do 220 grams the incineration way and check the yield. But that would be a lot of work
I have been using a pocket knife while sitting on the couch. I have also used a razor knife but you have to be more careful:)
Dry ash, wet ash, it's still a pain in the ash, getting rid of the ash!
My guess, check the bucket. I was expecting 2 grams too lol. great video Mike.
I checked the waste bucket. Didn't see any gold in it. I think the chips I bought were just too new. The amount of gold is lower in newer BGA chips. Older stuff is always better for gold.
Hi Mike
Ale comparison, please do the same weight only with combustion method, that would certainly interest many users.
and great videos keep it up..
greeting
I bet there's gold in the sludge bucket. Would it be worthwhile to run your cut down bottoms through a caustic bath to remove mask before processing ?
Great work.
You lose a bunch of gold with this proces.
One kilo of BGA gold corner chips must have yeald-harvesting from 6-12 gr. of gold and it variates from year of production of BGA,manufactorer-company that made them and many other things.
Greetings from Serbia!
Just needed to rinse off the sulfuric acid and put aqua rega on the solid and filter.
You never answered my question what kind of vacuum pump your useing
I watched this when it first came out and immediately decided to process the same quantity by the wet ashing method to see what results I got.
I took 400 grams of whole gold corner BGAs and processed them without 'shucking' I removed the solder first and then proceeded to wet ashing and AR.
The final yield after a second refining was 3.45 gm of pure gold. The whole process took 5 hours from start to finish.
I believe you lost gold at each step in your procedure but particularly during the washing and unnecessary blending processes.
A final note: Please, pretty please, the word is COLL OID AL there is no 'I' before the 'A', and therefore no such word as colloidial.
no dought you poured off quite a bit of gold the first few time you added water
Should have done the blender with it dry, real dry, the dryer the better, just like when you make thermite with the aluminum cans...
Did I say that out loud?
All that water with the black stuff in suspension moves out of the way of the blades no matter what speed you're on to the blades don't interact with the suspended particles near as much as they do with with the water which just pushes them out of the way
Some maybe went off with the nitric acid? Maybe?
Not to sound like Captain Obvious or anything but have you considered incinerating them? Trim the centers out like you did before and just torch them with a propane cylinder until they quit smoking and toss them into a metal Bowl (if that's not what you burnt them in) and use something like a baseball bat and do a mortise and pestle action breaking up any big pieces that are left and all your gold will still be there it just won't look like it. Rinse off all the lightweight materials like ash and that should eliminate the need for a lot of that sulfuric acid and hopefully avoid the black foaming mess.
Do you think an old garbage disposal would work to crush my ashed chips?
سلام استاد
استاد درصد دو اسید نیتریک وکلریدریک اکولوژیا را لطف
می فرمائید متشکرم
I watched the guy in the white coat, test, move to a different beaker and test again. 😶
I have been wanting to try using piranha solution after the sulfuric is done. Dont do any rinses just keep it warm while you prepare the piranha solution on another hotplate then add the piranha solution in small doses to the bga slurry. In theory the piranha solution should eat the carbon and turn it into Co2 and will leave the gold and other metal alone. When complete neutraulize the solution with a sodium bicarbonate solution. Rinsing at this point should be real easy.
Worth a try.
I was thinking this the whole time. Nice call! Or just add high concentration peroxide to the slurry.
@@leehodgson6920 that's what I would try. Just adding small doses of peroxide to the slurry solution as it's digesting and see if it will reduce some of the carbon. In theory, it should reduce everything to water and CO2 except for any Metals present.
you will find that after each bath in nitric you would have been able to pour off more and more carbon
Check your waste bucket. It looked like you might have poured out too much when it was really thick. Just a guess.
I checked the waste bucket. Didn't see any gold in it. I think the chips I bought were just too new. The amount of gold is lower in newer BGA chips. Older stuff is always better for gold.
Need a hell of a lot more sulfuric acid or better yet piranha solution which will inevitably turned all that carbon if that's what it is instead of plastic but it's your turn all the carbon into CO2 gas you just haven't come anywhere close to using as much as you'll need for that if you're not going to incinerate it first
PAN it out
I was wondering why those chips went for so much $$$$ lol.
Im running mine through a blue bowl
Yeah 1 gram of gold per 100 grams of BGA tops is normal.
You should take 100 grams & do your old faithful way of incineration & see what the yield is with that before moving on again to experimental wet ashing, just to see if this low yield is normal or are you loosing some with the pouring of the carbon!!
do two small tests at once with sulfuric acid and ashing choose the same gba for both tests, it will be possible to compare which method is more efficient also in terms of potential gold lost check if there is any in this white bucket it could have been trapped in fiber glass nets when pouring
No no no. ,done gold 10 gram
Rinse it real good and go straight to aqwareaga< spelling lol
I think you lost some get you a blue bowl gold constrator save your self on chemical
Chinese bga chips doesn't hv gold bro. 🤣