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Components and Circuits For discussions about component types, alternatives and availability, circuit configurations and modifications etc. Discussions here should be of a general nature and not about specific sets.

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 8:11 am   #1
Malcolm T
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Default Component recycling mystery.

A question first, what happens to the components on printed circuit boards from old TV,s and radios also the valves and older components from sets made on steel chassis and the bakelite when they are taken to the council tip .
I cannot see people sitting at a bench and hand de-soldering them and for what if they do etc etc, just exactly what happens to them ?. Are perfectly useful components being wiped out of existence !.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 8:19 am   #2
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Default Re: component recycling mystery

Probably mechanically chipped up, then chemical recovery of metals if done in Europe. Then there are likely to be waste exports to third=world countries...

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 10:04 am   #3
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Default Re: component recycling mystery

If there was any value in it I suspect the process would be in place. With resistors at a penny (or thereabouts) apiece I doubt whether any 'western' recovery process could make a profit from it.

Perhaps they need to subsidise the process
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 10:34 am   #4
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Default Re: component recycling mystery

I recall computer PCBs complete with all their components being ground up, simply to reclaim the gold plating on the edge connectors.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 10:40 am   #5
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

David is right, they just undergo materials recovery with no re-use involved. This involves granulating everything with what amounts to a giant garden shredder, then processing the output to extract metals and some other compounds.

Some councils do operate re-use facilities at their recycling centres, but it actually costs them money even when a fee is charged, so there's no incentive to do it when budgets are tight. They're also worried about being sued if somebody injures themselves.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 10:59 am   #6
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Yes, they just get loaded wholesale into the close cousins of the fearsome devices that turn RSJs and engine blocks into metal kibble, and this has some of the more worthwhile content recovered from it. What happens to the rest probably involves shady middle-men and loosely-governed parts of the developing world. I've long been very much in favour of re-use, recover, recycle etc. but the idea of diligently breaking things down into individual reusable components doesn't begin to be remotely economically viable- and it's economics that rules our world. Capacitors are made up of aluminium and copper, and the production of aluminium in particular is largely in the hands of those who haven't exactly been covering themselves in PR glory recently.

Having said that, in the last few days, I removed a fly-tipped washing machine and microwave oven from our local wildlife walks to avoid the costly formality of contractor removal, it was quick work to strip down and remove anything useful (not much, really) and toss the separated metal and plastic into the appropriate hoppers at the civic amenities site. If there was ever to be a modern equivalent of "national service", I'd like to think that a couple of weeks a year clearing and separating rubbish into recyclables wouldn't be a bad idea- but, as I say, our world runs by hard economics rather than worthy morals.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 11:15 am   #7
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Many years ago the caretaker at the computer centre where I worked use to collect dead PCBs that had edge connectors. He chopped the connectors off with an axe and then sold them so one of the big-name gold processing companies for surprisingly large sums.

I can't quite remember what the algorithm was for the money you got, but it was related to the effective concentration of gold by weight of the stuff - so it was never worth nothing, but it took some work to get lots for it.

He eventually started dissolving the gold off in aqua-regia for maximum payout - but I'm not sure that was environmentally very nice!
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 12:09 pm   #8
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Back in the late 1990s, an electronics reclamation dealer I once knew had stuff come in on 40 foot trailer with pallets. He employed around 6 blokes, had 2 forklifts, and a waste compactor for landfill.
All he did was buy it in, get his men to sort it, breaking stuff down where needed, often just a hammer. Then, when he had viable loads, just sell it on.
Sorted outputs from his facility were clean copper, brass, insulated copper wire, pcbs, transformers and iron/steel such as frames or empty chassis. All other electrical/electronic scrap was classed as "refine". This was I think just a breaking up and melting it down process.
Most pcb went out just in the state they were removed. The exception being, the older style "piano key" connectors being chopped off with shears and sold as high gold content. Military stuff was also inspected for high value content and removed where required. The workers knew how to identify precious metal contacts on relays.
I once commented on a wooden crate with about 20kg of new Russian stud mount pa transistors in it. Warning him about the BeO.
His attitude was, "not my problem", the recyclers will know how to deal with them. That's what I pay them for!
As time moved on, any pcb with mercury wetted relays had to be separated out.
He told me that a lot of pcb had the component side "planed off" first.
He certainly knew his business and was not a fool.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 1:03 pm   #9
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

And how do they explain reclaiming the fiberglass boards , just like the plastic fantastic boats and yachts either burnt or land fill, i find all this incredibly wasteful , makes me wanna weep when i think of all those diodes and transistors IF coils valves and cans etc etc gone forever when they could have been put to good use but as you say its all economics , truth is i reckon its burnt at night or land filled out of our sight, it just disappears / spirited away.
I made a Jacobs ladder from an MOT oven , i was impressed, i save all the fasteners in anything i find
heat sinks, components etc etc. Still just think the Americans burnt all they're . but a few, PT boats in the pacific after WW II, all made from mahogany wood inches thick ! Those that survived and restored are worth a fortune now, sad very sad .
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 1:26 pm   #10
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

PCBs contain gold, silver, platinum, palladium, rhodium, tin, and copper. Gold in the highest value. Three methods are widely employed to reclaim gold from electronic scrap: 1) Chemical leaching, 2) Grinding and pulverizing, followed by gravity separation or leaching, and 3) Incineration and smelting.

The Royal Mint have a recent initiative which claims to be able to recover 99% of the gold in PCBs:

https://www.circularonline.co.uk/new...ctronic-waste/

From the EMEW Blog (Environmental sustainability, Metal recovery, Energy – renewable and efficiency, and Water treatment from industrial waste).

Categories of electronic waste:

Quote:

WEE falls into four categories when it comes to recycling. The majority of metal value lies in the Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) of the electronic equipment and metal content varies depending on the type of the e-waste. E-waste is classified into 4 categories – Cat1, Cat2, Cat3, Cat4.

Cat1 includes large household appliances like fridges, washing machines, air conditioners, stoves, etc. Cat2 represents smaller appliances like vacuum cleaners, toasters, microwave ovens, and such. Cat3 WEEEs include computers, phones, and other IT and telecommunication devices like phones, personal computers, and tablets. And Cat4 represents mass electronics like TVs, monitors, audio equipment and speakers, video cameras, etc.

These categories help us to classify PCBs according to their grade and calculate value based on the metals content.
For example. Cat1 and Cat2 are known to embed low-grade PCBs while Cat3 and Cat4 WEEEs embed high-grade PCBs.

End quote.

https://blog.emew.com/precious-metal...y-from-e-waste

Apart from the technical challenges, economics and logistics, recycling WEEE is by no means straightforward:

Environmental Agency 'Classification and Handling of Electronic Waste' in the UK:

Quote:

You must classify any waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) that leaves your premises.
In your waste transfer note or consignment note you must:

• give the WEEE a List of Waste (LoW) code
• describe it

It is the chemical makeup of waste that determines the LoW code and waste status. WEEE can be:

• hazardous waste – if it contains hazardous chemicals above certain concentration limits.

• persistent organic pollutant (POP) waste – if the chemicals are POPs and above certain concentration limits.

Read the guidance Classify different types of waste to find LoW codes for WEEE types known to include:

• hazardous chemicals
• POPs

Components such as printed circuit boards and plastic parts can contain hazardous chemicals and POPs. To assess the WEEE you must first identify if hazardous chemicals and POPs are present and then the quantity present. To do this you compare the concentration of the chemical in the whole item with the legal concentration limit(s) that apply.

End quote.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/classify...heir-treatment

On the matter of re-using serviceable equipment rather than scrapping and recycling the materials, at our local Waste Disposal Site in East Riding to the west of Hull, there is a ‘re-use’ shop operated by volunteers from a major Hospice which serves Hull and East Riding residents. The Hospice has a board of trustees which includes a barrister, so when it comes to any legal or safety concerns, (PAT testing etc), no doubt they operate well within the law.

The re-use shop sells used furniture and items ranging from snooker tables to TV’s, golf clubs, computers, laptops, bikes, toys, and small electrical appliances, to ‘collectibles’, all of which local residents had taken to waste and recycling sites across the region and donated for resale instead of sending them to be recycled or to landfill.

A second Re-Use Shop sells fully working and safety tested large domestic appliances (LDA’s) which have been donated in working order and good condition such as fridges, cookers and washing machines. Delivery is free of charge in the local are. Residents visiting any of the waste sites in the region can donate to the shop by placing items which are in a saleable condition, into a container marked 'Re-Use'.

It seems to work well.

Ironically perhaps, the one category of item for which there's little or no demand, which end up being scrapped, is children's bikes. Apparently that's because they're often given as presents at Birthdays and Christmas, and few parents will give their kids a second-hand bike.

A sign of the times.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 1:39 pm   #11
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Quote:
Originally Posted by David G4EBT View Post
Ironically perhaps, the one category of item for which there's little or no demand, which end up being scrapped, is children's bikes. Apparently that's because they're often given as presents at Birthdays and Christmas, and few parents will give their kids a second-hand bike.
ALL our children's bikes are secondhand, either from the charity shops, or hand-me-downs. My 12 year-old son is currently riding the bike his aunt had when she was about 15, which is 25 years old but has done virtually no mileage.

We tell them that they're "eco" bikes, and explain why, and they accept them.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 2:01 pm   #12
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

On this topic, I've noticed a curious thing in the vintage electronics world. I have a passing interest in electronics and test equipment from the former eastern bloc. It's very hard to find examples of equipment in good, or indeed any, condition these days, because a lot of it was manufactured using large quantities of precious metals and so it's worth a lot more as scrap than as working equipment.

In particular I have a couple of plugin oscilloscopes (C1-91 and C1-122) which were developed in Vilnius, Lithuania, in the 1970s and clearly heavily inspired by Tektronix's 7000 series scopes. The plugins for them are really hard to find, because they're worth £50-100 each just for the precious metals used in their components, so you have to really want to save them if you want to collect them. A complete working scope has a scrap value of about £400! No wonder few of them survive. Their Tektronix equivalents were much more plentiful in the first place and thus easier to find, but their scrap value is low enough that they can be bought for just a few pounds.

I suspect the economics of using precious metals during the cold war were very different on either side of the iron curtain, and western manufacturers worked hard to keep costs down by avoiding precious metals, but eastern ones had no alternative or incentive to do so.

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 2:22 pm   #13
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Malcolm T View Post
... PT boats in the pacific after WW II ... Those that survived and restored are worth a fortune now ...
Some of that value will come from their rarity. If there were fifty times as many now, they wouldn't all be worth what the few are.

Cheers,

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 2:40 pm   #14
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

it goes without saying that had the items originally been designed for longevity and/or repairability there would be a lot less of them in landfill to begin with.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 2:51 pm   #15
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Quote:
Originally Posted by kellys_eye View Post
it goes without saying that had the items originally been designed for longevity and/or repairability there would be a lot less of them in landfill to begin with.
Money talks.

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 2:54 pm   #16
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Copper wire gets nibbled up into tiny pieces, then the copper is chemically dissolved for reclaim. The short, hollow plastic nibbles are washed and baled and sold as topping material for horse-riding arenas. Someone bought cheap stuff and found it also contained sharp nibbles of what had once been armouring. Oh the vets bills!

It's amazing where recycled stuff turns up. Doubtful if this will continue given the current view of plastics getting into the environment

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Old 9th Mar 2023, 3:03 pm   #17
Malcolm T
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

10 / 10 for the re use shop .
The front end of a child's bike can be re-used and modified with a bit of thought to be a soil cultivator, for vegetable allotment use.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 3:05 pm   #18
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Some PCBs, and appliances containing PCBs are exported to developing countries. Even in a low wage economy, component recovery is unlikely to be a business proposition, but can be worthwhile as a source of almost free components for schools etc.

Washing machines are particularly prized, some can be repaired and put to use, and those that are beyond repair contain many useful parts.

Old TV sets are a useful source of cheap valves.

Dead grid tied PV inverters are a useful source of high power semiconductors and large heatsinks.
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 3:25 pm   #19
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

Stuff like ground-up, chemically-de-metalled PCB material, ground-glass 'cullet' etc. is a significant ingredient in some kinds of runway/road-surfacing material. I guess the crushed bodies of old resistors etc. could add a small bit of bulk.

[Remember the supposedly-apocryphal story of scrap transistors from one of Plessey's fabs being sold as landfill/aggregate but Clive Sinclair intercepted them, tested them, and sold the not-quite-good-enough-for-Plessey-but-good-enough-for-Sinclair ones to hobbyists]

Given what *we* know about the reliability of old components, and the issues some of us have had with 're-marked' recycled parts being passed-off as new, I'm not sure I would want there to be any growth in recovering parts for re-use. You never know where they may end up!

https://www.timesaerospace.aero/feat...-a-real-threat

https://www.aerospacemanufacturingan...rving-reality/
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Old 9th Mar 2023, 3:51 pm   #20
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Default Re: Component recycling mystery.

I was in the area of electronic repair in the famous market in Istanbul a few years ago, little boys were removing resistor/ transistors using soldering irons, more know legible boys who knew the colour code were putting items into plastic trays and when full, took them up the road to men who were fixing what ever ??. So organised, scan coil wire went to motor repair and rewinders, recycling at its best and good to see.
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