Heat Gun Salvaging/Scrounging
Posted by aonomus on May 12, 2008
Well, I recently got a shiny new heat gun, and decided to take it to a old Bay Networks token ring hub – a really old 1.5U paperweight^W boat anchor.
The basis of heat gun salvaging can be found here, but to sum it up in a few words, take a heat gun set to 450degC – 500 degC, apply heat gently until solder melts, and remove part with pliers. In some cases the part can be heavy enough to fall out under its own weight or if the board is shaken enough, but in general pliers seem to work the best.
Out of the whole mess I got:
- A small pile of SMD 74HC(T)00s, EPROMs circa 1991, some GAL’s
- 7 Assorted small inductors, 6 SMD relays (pins bent for through-hole use)
- 25 Optoisolators (MOC8020)
- 5 Oscillators (8mhz, 2x 20mhz, 25mhz, 32mhz)
- 11 SMD tantalum caps, 47 electrolytic SMD caps
- A Dallas DS1245-100 Non-volatile SRAM package (1024k, priced at $20-30 on digikey!)
- Unknown ‘Valor SF1161’ packages (anyone know what these are? or Valor FL1144’s, comment!)
- A large modular Cherokee power supply for 5V at 18A, 12V at 4A, and -12V at 1A with integral heatsink
- An odd CDM102 LED display which doesn’t have any datasheet, 5×12 (if you have a datasheet for this, let me know please!)
- 3x 50mm brushless fans
- Various connectors, headers, a few switches.
And I didn’t even salvage *all* the components, I just got lazy and salvaged most of the useful ones and avoided the ASICs or obsolete controllers for token ring, although I *do* have a large stack of token ring controllers which may make good 20kv capacitor bank fodder.
Pictures within (warning not 56k friendly!)
Procrastinatus 
Chris said
Hey I was wondering if you ever found out anything about that LED module. I actually just scrounged one out of an old network switch i think was made by the same company given away by the fact that the plastic overlay looks similar. I was thinking about trying to use this LED module for a project but your entry here seems to be the only mention of this on the internet.
aonomus said
Sorry Chris, I haven’t actually figured anything out about this unfortunately. I was an electronics noob when I scrounged the device, otherwise I would have stuck a scope and logic probe on the pins. Good luck trying to figure anything out, if you do let me know what protocol it uses.