Turning a bad thing into a good...

Just a few years ago, we all desired the biggest, brightest, high resolution CRT monitor money could buy. While they consumed most of our desk top, we covered them in post-it notes and learned the exact spot on the side to 'whack' when the picture wasn't quite right...

Then along came the CRT's greatest nemesis, the LCD flat screen. Suddenly, perfectly good working CRT monitors found themselves gathering dust in some forgotten part of the basement. Then there were more. And more. You get the picture (no pun intended) right?

In the 9 years we have been recycling electronics, we have seen the surplus monitor problem go from bad to extremely bad. In fact, you might be shocked to know how many of these have been made their way to the landfills already. Plus there are a LOT more in hiding.

So what's the solution? A dismantling facility just for computer monitors and television sets. In assembly line fashion the units are taken apart with plastic, boards, wire, steel and CRT tube all separated for recycling. There is not much scrap value- maybe a couple of bucks at best for the wire, steel and pc boards. The CRT tube has no scrap value. In fact it must be sent to an approved smelting facility to properly extract the silica glass and lead. Cost to do this averages around $2 for each CRT plus shipping, which adds an additional couple of dollars. Did I mention that you also need to pay your employees to take them apart?


As you can see the proper disposal of a CRT monitor or TV set is not just hazardous but expensive. Most legitimate recyclers charge around .35 cents per pound to process them which equates to about $10 for your average monitor. All things considered, its not a bad price to pay to keep them out of the landfills!

The Gold Rush-more ways to cash in?

Late night TV is littered with commercials encouraging you to trade your unwanted gold for cash, which I find a little amusing. First, I don't completely trust my $400 worth of gold to the US Postal Service- plus the price paid must certainly be a wholesale price...

In the electronics recycling business we are constantly searching for this precious metal in many forms as shown in the pic. Usually we sell the gold left on the part as  you see here; with gold prices high, you still make pretty good money doing it this way. However, most profitable way to sell the gold would be to remove it from the part, melt it down and sell it in it's purest form.

I toyed with doing this a few years ago and found that there are some serious tradeoffs in terms of safety and complexity. Gold is held in place one of two ways on the parts- it is either plated on another metal surface, or it is glued on a plastic or fiberglass (pc board) surface.  Before we go any further take note that removing gold in either case requires the use of some caustic chemicals. These chemicals cannot always be simply shipped to you without a permit and the local EPA might come snooping around to make sure you properly dispose of the chemicals when you're done with them.

With that said, you still stand to make more money from gold if you remove it from the part. Its a matter of setting up a properly ventilated facility, getting the proper equipment and alas, permits.

There is no question in my mind that that a gold refining operation will greatly boost your bottom line. We purchased needed chemicals and supplies from Shore International in New York and also found their web site to be chock full of needed information. Please read their Precious Metal Recovery pages completely before getting started. You 'll be glad you did!

Electric Cars - The Future is Now?

I continue to have mixed emotions about electric cars-hybrids are too expensive and conversions don't get the miles per watt I would need. My daily commute is 48 miles one way, so gas seems to be the safest bet since most 'affordable' electric car conversions struggle to make it to the 50 mile-per-charge mark. While I keep saving for my future electron powered cruiser, I occasionally find something like the video below that totally intrigues me. It showcases a 1972 Datsun (remember before Nissan?) coupe electric conversion. A plain jane ride with the exception of a trade of gas tank for batteries; gas engine for an electric motor; dash gauges replaced with volt and amp meters....

SO? This vintage hobby car is a destroyer at the drag strip. Corvettes, Porsches and nitrous boosted street racers are no match for this inconspicuous import. Check it out:



That's just neat. My interest in the electrics is renewed and of course I start thinking about how I could do this with, uh, yes, recycled batteries and motors (dream cloud)...and SHAZAM! I stumbled across this video:




Ok, I'm off to the junkyard to find the perfect ride for my electric conversion. Convertible Fiat? Covair? Maybe I'll keep it simple and find a nice '71 Ford Pinto. With the gas tank removed it should be safe.

A real conversation piece

Being in the recycling business, we get all kinds of weird things. Some are so weird they're cool. So cool in fact, you just hate to scrap them......

Case in point, this is a table made from part of a jet engine. We're sure that the super strong, lightweight alloy would fetch a dandy price at the scrapyard but the table concept is just totally rad!

Keep your creative juices flowing. Who knows, maybe something like this would make big money on ebay? Thanks to John Baer Metal Art for the photo. See his work at  www.johnbaermetalart.com

If you are looking for a more practical use of recycled items around your house, we suggest you look here for some excellent advice on keeping it Green around your home!

MAKE BIG MONEY RECYCLING ELECTRONIC JUNK!


√ Currently only about 15% of all electronic junk is recycled-which means the other 85% is there for the asking!
√ Millions of pounds of electronic junk go into the landfills every year. This equates to millions of dollars just rotting away in the landfills.
√ Electronic scrap is worth more than 10 TIMES that of automotive scrap, making it the #1 best paid scrap in the world!
√ You can work this business on YOUR schedule in your garage, basement or anywhere!



You can get electronic junk for FREE and you make money from it. Over the last 9 years we have learned all the tips & tricks, made it profitable and have written a book that explains every detail on dismantling, sorting and selling electronic junk!


*Make money by Going Green! Click here to get your $19 ebook today-start recycling today!

MONITORing the problem

My favorite scene from the movie Die Hard is where Bruce Willis tosses a computer monitor down the elevator shaft. Why? Because I really hate computer monitors. From a recycling perspective, they are a toxic liability mainly because of the heavy lead content and the rest of the parts aren't worth much. As more and more people switch over to LCD flat screens the amount of monitors going to the landfills will grow at an ever increasing rate.

So I scratch my head wondering what else can we do with them? Is there some other use for a working computer monitor besides its original intended purpose? The biggest problem is that a standard monitor uses a VGA type of input, where your TV, VCR, DVR, etc. commonly use a composite type. To use a computer monitor as a standard video display you will need to use a composite to VGA adaptor. The cheapest one of these I have found is around $60, which is way too much.

So, lets open the discussion about other uses for old, working computer monitors. Maybe a really nice boat anchor? Better yet, keep one around to scare off terrorists!

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Recycled heat to make cold?

My grandmother had a classic 1950's Kelvinator 'fridge with the rounded look and a large chrome door handle. After she passed away, my uncle put it in his garage where it continued to work faithfully until about its 30th birthday. I bring this up because I remember grandma telling be about her first refrigerator-a unit that worked by burning white gasoline.

Gas refrigerators really aren't a lot different than compressor types. The burning fuel heated brine or ammonia in a tube until it got hot enough to be pushed through an expansion valve under its own pressure. This process would not generate enough cold to make ice, but did a pretty good job otherwise.

So I'm thinking, with this method all you need is a heat source. I have always thought that the 'leftover' heat generated by a car engine just gets wasted, so why not use it to make refrigeration like we did in the old days? No doubt it would not get icy cold like you might be used to, but definitely could work well on those not so hot days. Considering the average automobile air conditioning compressor robs a substantial amount of horsepower, this method might surely pay for itself in MPG savings in short order.

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Solar water heater video

This reinforces my thoughts about the possibility of using old satellite dishes to make hot water...

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Lead acid battery reconditioning video

I promised more info on battery reconditioning - this is by Walt Barrett and is very informational. Enjoy!

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You can't eat a muffin fan but....

We process thousands of these muffin fans in our recycling facility every year. Just about every computer, power supply and piece of network gear has at least one inside. Some are sold but most get scrapped, or at least they did, before my 7 year old gave me an idea.

For show and tell at school, he was determined to show the other kids how to harness wind energy with a muffin fan like this one. Connect a flashlight bulb to the fan's power wires, catch a breeze and shazam! the light glows as long as the fan is turning.

My son's idea got me going. I measured just under a half an amp out of the 4 inch fan I tested. I left it running in a good breeze for over a week and it worked just dandy, providing power to a load (which was actually another fan).  If you built a windmill array of 4 inch fans in four rows of five, the array size would be about 20" wide and 16" tall. Total output from the array would conceivably be around 8 amps at 12 vdc. Not a bad afterlife for the otherwise ill fated muffin fan!

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Solar reflector made from old satellite dish?

I was sitting in line at our local metal recycling center when I noticed a large pile of aluminum satellite dishes waiting for certain doom when I had a moment of clarity...........could these be used as solar water heaters?

The surface of the dish would need to be sprayed with some type of super reflective coating for maximum heat transmission. A coil for the recirculated water could be placed in an insulated housing at the end of the arm, at the focal point of the suns rays.

One problem is that the dish is not made to swivel and follow the sun. Some older dishes, like the eight or ten footers had a motor actuated mechanism to allow the user to select a different satellite-but they are getting hard to find. To overcome this problem, I theorize that an array of these recycled water heaters could be set up with each pointing to a slightly different position along the sun's arc.

In rough numbers, the gain of these antennas is typically around 2 or 3. Not regarding losses, this means that water could be heated to between 80 and 120 degrees on a 40 degree day.

If you would like to learn more about Do-it-Yourself solar projects, we high recommend clicking HERE!

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Electric bicycle concept using recycled materials

I have been a bicycle rider for about 40 years and always liked the idea of adding some type of power assist, like a motor. I did in fact put a 3 HP Briggs gasoline engine on my mountain bike a few years ago but it was not an enjoyable ride........there was a lot of vibration, it was heavy and wanted to go way too fast due to improper ratios. In fact, the way it was geared, I calculated it would go over 70 MPH with the engine running maxed at 3600 rpm. Whew!

With traces of my skin on the road and this idea behind me, I am now thinking about building an electric motor powered bike-one with the motor built into the existing wheels using magnets removed from computer hard drives. Why hard drive magnets? Because they are VERY strong. Plus, they are shaped in a way that they could easily be mounted on the spokes near the rim, for max torque. Then mount a wire wound 'stator' on the bike frame so that the magnets pass closely by it. Passing current through the coil at the correct interval (pulse) would push each magnet past it, making the wheel an electric motor.......

It may take several of the coils correctly positioned and pulsed strategically, but it looks to me like this would make a very inexpensive, efficient electric bicycle. Maybe the coils used could come from recycled items such as solenoids or transformers.

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Does battery reconditioning work?

The short answer is yes, providing the battery is still in pretty good shape internally. Note that there are a lot of different battery types available-Lithium Ion, lead acid, NiMh and so on. Well have a discussion later about other types, but today we'll focus on the typical AA battery like this one. The label clearly says its not rechargeable, and that is correct. Put this battery in a typical battery charger and you might need to call the fire department. With this in mind, I will show you how to get a little more life out of this type of battery:

First, measure the battery voltage with a voltmeter. Let's say it reads 1.1 volts (a new battery should read 1.5 vdc). Using your 12V car battery charger, hold the black lead (negative) on the bottom of the AA battery. Quickly tap the red lead (positive) on the top of the battery a few times. DO NOT hold the red lead on the battery. It will get hot quickly and could rupture. Check the voltage again and you should see that it has come up a little. Repeat the tapping process, check voltage, etc. until you see the battery voltage come up as close as possible to 1.5. Chances are, it may be difficult to get voltage to 1.5 but even 1.4 or 1.3 is enough to run your digital camera or TV remote for awhile! I did this with two Duracell batteries and got about two months out of them through this type of 'recharging'. Normally, I would get about two weeks out of them in my digital camera.

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Bad economy good for used parts?

Sure, you can scrap it and make a buck. But realize that most things still have some value in it's original form. Take for example this 20 GB hard drive. Why would you want it when you can buy a 160 GB drive for $130 or less? Here's why:  This drive can typically be purchased for less than $10, including shipping. You can't easily install a 160 GB drive on older computers anyway, so adding one like this (in addition to the drive already there) makes perfect sense. Install it and presto! You've got plenty more space in just a few minutes. You've probably realized its about time to upgrade that old computer anyway-but now you can prolong it's useful life just a little bit. Click here to find some deals on used hard drives like this one.

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Computer UPS recycling idea

Since we are an electronics recycler, I am always trying to think of things that can be done with old electronic junk, like this UPS power supply. So what's inside? A couple of Gel Cell lead acid batteries; a big power transformer; a large circuit board and some miscellaneous wiring. If you wanted to scrap it, there are a few dollars worth of stuff inside.

Or you can fix them...... most of the time it is dead batteries. Sometimes the main circuit board is toast or a fuse is blown.

So here is my idea. Start with a unit that can be fixed easily (replace fuse, etc.). Connect several of these units together so they can supply enough power to run some appliances in your house. Use a wind generator and/or solar panels to keep their internal batteries charged.

The end result it a new life for something that would otherwise be tossed in a landfill plus it could greatly reduce your electric bill. Most importantly, this could come at a very low cost.

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