Gold Recovery/Refining of ICs (Integrated Circuits) - looking for reputable Refinery, please help

Feb 09, 2007 5 Replies

Does anyone know of an honest reputable Gold Refinery that has much expertise/proficiency in processing Electronic Integrated Circuits (IC) chips/components for Gold Recovery/Reclamation? Or does anyone know how to find such information.



Why would you expect to find gold in ICs ?

Graham

The tiny little wires that conned the circuits ons the chips to the pins are made of pure gold. They are extremely small. You'd need to open up a heck of a lot of chips to get just one gram of gold. OMU

Most of the old ICs have gold bond wires in addition to the Au/Si die attach material. Many of them used a Gold/Tin solder to attach the metal lid. There are tons of these old ICs out there that are heading for land fills.

It has been a few years s> Does anyone know of an honest reputable Gold Refinery that has much

For a lot of plastic packaged ICs they are gold bondwires. I was surprised to find that this is especially true for a lot of high pin-count ICs used in consumer products.

Chris

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