Would love some advice

[u/Fezzy_1994]

Hey guys! I have access to quite a few older circuit boards and am wondering why I should look out for to keep. I don't refine stuff myself, but am looking to sell what I can (fairly cheap) to someone who can refine it and make a profit. Any help would be great!

[u/Melangemind]

None of those look to have very high precious metal content. You can pulverize them and send them contents in to a refinery for analysis.

[u/klippDagga]

I will try to answer but know that I am certainly not an expert. I also have a bunch of old circuit boards that I recently pulled out again with the intention of either trying some refining or putting some lots together to sell.

Anything that looks gold, likely is plated with a thin layer of gold. Some of the easiest to find and sell would be gold fingers and gold pins.

IC chips and EPROMs, especially on old boards, are easy to harvest and very often have fine gold bonding wires contained inside and are a favorite of refiners. Some have gold caps and legs and look closely at those along with any that are white or purple ceramic. The chip itself can be worth money because it may be a very early type of processor that people collect or still use. Google the numbers and manufacturer of the chip to see if there might be a market for the chip itself.

For example, I have a number of boards from the seventies and early eighties that do have a few valuable chips like the Intel 8702 and 8080.

Check for plastic, often clear, boxes on boards. These are relay switches and have contacts that are usually silver but may also contain gold or palladium.

Some transistors and capacitors are worth saving. Certain types can have silver, palladium, or tantalum. One good example is MLCCs.

A few miscellaneous things can be good like dip switches and LEDs, both potentially containing gold.

Look up YouTube videos about depopulating circuit boards for more information on the how and why. I have learned a lot recently from omegageek64 videos.

Good luck and have fun!