Lets close this deal! Induction motor stator

I am in process of working with my employer to buy the core from used motors. They have been pretty good about working with me to buy all there scrap copper wire. The first motor weighs in a 767lbs! I removed both ends and removed the rotor. Was hoping to just chop one end of copper off and pull it through from other side but it was not as fast as I'd hoped. New plan is to just buy the stator whole. Cracked the cast iron casing open and removed the stator. Weighed in at 277lbs! My initial guess is that is 50% copper, which puts it right in the ballpark of 15% of total weight. I offered to pay employer the difference of what he would get if he sold the motor whole, hopefully he is ok with that. He keeps and scraps the motor housing. This will easily double my monthly copper weight, very exciting. Here is a pic of the stator and "deconstructed housing" Ha!

You have an interesting deal.

No photo yet....

Isn't the copper very hard to remove in the big industrial motors? At least all the ones I've seen are heavily impregnated with varnish and even epoxy. They aren't coming out without a fight. I guess if you pull the stator out of the motor frame you can cut off the ends of the windings and get copper coil price for it.

Is you employer in the motor rewinding business? Cause they will have an oven to burn off the guck out of the windings so they can remove the old wire. Maybe you can get use of it...

Don't forget to have a good look at the rotors. The big motors sometimes have copper bars in them, or big chunks of aluminum that can be broken off the rotor.

Good luck!!

Jon.