[kragen]

In recent decades it has become much harder in most countries to get access to the red fuming nitric acid necessary to decap epoxy-encapsulated chips; it's considered a "drug precursor" and/or "explosives precursor". I hear that a few years ago someone figured out that boiling the chip in colophony for a few hours also works? At the boiling point of the colophony, that is, not water. I haven't tried it myself.