Has anyone separated the metal from the metal topped green fiber CPU?

I did this last night just to see what's underneath. Now I have a green fiber CPU and a piece of metal I am not sure of.

Scratch test shows copper-ish color but it could be brass too. Is it nickel plated copper? silver plated copper? silver plated brass? nickel plated brass?

Anyone know what metals are used?

I am hoping these are nickel plated copper.

Thanks!

I've separated the metal top off a Pentium 4 CPU, but in the process, the chip that sits under the metal top went with the metal, so I doubt I'll get full price for selling what's left that contains the pins. The underside has some gold on it, but I don't know if it's actual gold plating or if it's just a paint that it's using.

_________________
kgryczan
Forum Moderator

Thanks for the tip. I was lucky. In my case, the chip was not damaged at all. I have a small vice station with rubberized grips. It was able to hold the thin edge of the fiber well enough to do the following:

I used a thin, sharp wood chisel and hammer placing the sharp edge of the chisel in between where the metal meets the fiber. It takes a few gentle taps to get enough of a space all around the top edges. Then I flipped the chip around to the other side and repeated the process. When I had enough room, like the width of a finger nail, I gave it a good whack and CLING! The metal fell to the floor, the cpu and pins were undamaged.

But now I need to find out the metal, metal alloy, the coating... etc.

Any chemists out there? Its non-magnetic, has a silvery coating (so it could be silver or nickel), and a copper-like color in a scratch test. Its solid and feels like its hard to bend. Brass is sturdier than copper. But the color looks like its not an alloy.

... BTW there was no gold color on the inside/underside of the metal. Just had that nasty thermal glue stuff.

There is a general concencus that the heat spreader you are talking about is a tungsten alloy, probably with copper, but i have never verified it.

A note of caution though if you are going to seperate the halves... wear some sort of particulate mask because when the silicon chip breaks, it splinters into thousand of tiny shards. breathing these in is similar to breathing in asbestos... look up 'silicosis' in google.

good luck and stay safe!

Holy smokes! Thanks for the health tip!
The spreaders that were difficult to separate were left alone. I saw the tiny particles you mentioned and decided not to force them off if they did not come apart with a few taps. I was able to take most apart without any of the chips falling apart.

I once separated one chip as a test where the metal top is almost as big and the green fiber base and it was not worth it. I have a jewelers scale to weigh items by the milligram and when I calculated the price for the green fiber with no metal and the local price for copper I was at a minimal loss.

I've separated some as well, waste of time. Those small p4 chips when selling to bs is what, $6 a pound? No metal is $12 or so. The larger fiber chips w no metal it takes 50 to a pound, and 20 about for for p4s w metal tops. Thats the simplest math, and if your time is worth money to you then it a loss for sure!

Then what, it probablt takes 80 or 100 without tops for a pound of the small p4s I'd guess. For $12? I hope I'm understanding this convo right, bc it seems to be a no brainer.