Where to get foam for ICs?

seventhson said:

Hi, I have a lot of ICs, like thousands, and am looking for a place to buy some foam to stick them in. I got some on Amazon where a lot of the reviews mentioned using it to store ICs, but it is very expensive, and also it seems to be too thin for the chips.

Does anyone know where I can buy foam of sufficient quality (from reading some reviews on other listings people were complaining their chips were corroded while in the foam), and which also is as cheap as possible?

Any help is much appreciated!

Thanks

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ZipZapOuch said:

Some of the cheap foams start to decompose and stick to the leads of the IC. If you have "thousands", most will never be used in your lifetime. Definitely not worth a big investment to store them. Simple logic chips will not likely get used as you will soon get bored with making large boards with many connections and ICs will be replaced with a single microcontroller, smaller board, and simpler design.

If they are op amps, bipolar op amps aren't so sensitive.

If the chips have been stored for years like this, not much point to revive them with better storage conditions. Either they are already dead or they are quite durable. I wouldn't waste my time or money on foam.

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ZipZapOuch said:

Some of the cheap foams start to decompose and stick to the leads of the IC. If you have "thousands", most will never be used in your lifetime. Definitely not worth a big investment to store them. Simple logic chips will not likely get used as you will soon get bored with making large boards with many connections and ICs will be replaced with a single microcontroller, smaller board, and simpler design.

If they are op amps, bipolar op amps aren't so sensitive.

If the chips have been stored for years like this, not much point to revive them with better storage conditions. Either they are already dead or they are quite durable. I wouldn't waste my time or money on foam.

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Papabravo said:

I second this. I just threw away large numbers of MSI IC's that were stuck to the foam having sat idle for 25-30 years. The foam is just a big mess when it decomposes. Store them in A-channel tube and replace the rubber stoppers every 5-7 years.

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seventhson said:

Yeah, I'm planning to sell these, but figured it will take quite a while, so wanted a safe way to store them (and ship them).

They have quite a bit of value.

As far as how they've been stored, some of them were in plastic tubes, and some just in antistatic baggies, a few just in foam. I don't see any corrosion or other damage from the inspection I did.

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ZipZapOuch said:

How do you plan to sell them? One by one, tube by tube or would you consider a bulk sale? Are they just standard logic gates or unusual but valuable chips or odd-ball chips?

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ZipZapOuch said:

How do you plan to sell them? One by one, tube by tube or would you consider a bulk sale? Are they just standard logic gates or unusual but valuable chips or odd-ball chips?

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