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Tantalum and MLCC Capacitors have value!
I have searched the forum here, GRF and eBay, on the subject of Silver Mica Capacitors. Unless I'm blind, dumb and stupid (maybe I am) there is no reason to take the silver mica capacitors off the board. Anyone want to add anything to that conclusion.
I don't think Ali can capacitors are worth anything. Too many metals, insulation, Ali oxide and ferrous metal and oil.
Tanti caps often look just like Ali caps, ouch. Look for the + plus sign.
MLC capacitors, are they the little brown blocks SMD'd onto the boards with solder at each end? They have Silver and Platinium I think, in them. (My 'spell check' suggested ' plutonium' .....)
Where is the value in MLCC's, "Multilayer Ceramic Capacitors (MLCC's)"
Basically for silver and palladium recovery and they seem to sell for about $2.00 per ounce on ebay. I'm not even going to try it though, for me they will stay on the board. They are by far the largest (by volume made) amount of capacitors made. Consuming about 5% of the palladium used in all commercial applications. There can't be that much palladium in a single MLCC capacitor for the average scrapper to be messing with, unless you have a process and a lot of circuit boards. I will stick to the tantalum capacitors and leave the rest of them on the boards. (you should take the large aluminum electrolytic caps off, only when it will upgrade your board). Just my $0.02 for what it's worth!
Actually quite a few Caps are worth pulling and saving or refining for PM's:
1) Ceramic Disc Caps each have a silver disc on each side that the leads connect too. Some of them also have Titanium Dioxide
2) As noted earlier, MLCC's can contain have palladium, silver, iridium and even gold
3) Wet & Dry Aluminum Electrolytic Caps can be saved and sold for aluminum breakage. Some Wet & Dry Aluminum caps have silver leads. if your the enterprising type you can build a cheap home foundry for under $30.00 and melt them down to eliminate the contaminates and, if done correctly, come up with some almost pure aluminum bricks
4) Wet Tantalum Electrolytic Caps contain tantalum and are housed in a silver or silver plated container
5) Dry tantalum electrolytic caps contain tantalum and silver. they may also contain iridium and/or niobium
6) Tantalum Foil caps contain tantalum
7) Niobium electrolytic capacitors contain niobium
8) Silver Mica Caps have silver and certain ones are sought after as collectibles
9) Glass Caps are very expensive and have value as used parts resale and are sought after as collectibles
10) Supercapacitors can contain tantalum, ruthenium and iridium
11) Polystyrene film capacitors have value as used parts resale and are also sought after as collectibles
12) Polypropylene have value as used parts resale
These are just a few of the caps that are worth scrapping, saving and either selling as used parts or to a refiner.