Tell me, why do you scrap?

This is a great idea for a thread.

Since I am not a tree hugger, do not believe in global warming, and love the outdoors scrapping allows me to contribute to the environment. I love challenges and most of my scrapping involves new challenges and learning opportunities. I took early retirement and wanted to start my own business that I could do what I wanted, when I wanted to do it, and still be outside.

The ferrous money made from scrapping is reinvested into the business allowing for bigger/better equipment and the non-ferrous is being saved as a retirement gift for my wife.

The real reason I scrap is to be able to control my lifestyle.

Originally Posted by Patriot76

This is a great idea for a thread.

Since I am not a tree hugger, do not believe in global warming, and love the outdoors scrapping allows me to contribute to the environment. I love challenges and most of my scrapping involves new challenges and learning opportunities. I took early retirement and wanted to start my own business that I could do what I wanted, when I wanted to do it, and still be outside.

The ferrous money made from scrapping is reinvested into the business allowing for bigger/better equipment and the non-ferrous is being saved as a retirement gift for my wife.

The real reason I scrap is to be able to control my lifestyle.

Ditto on Patroit76's post. Also I started out as a "rehab" to help recover from kidney disease side effects. I stayed for brain activity needed to succeed in this business, even on a small scale. 73, Mike

The why do I do it is a pretty simple answer: found money.

The how did I get started, and why do I enjoy it so much is probably more to the point of your question.

First off, the "real" job I have is pretty much the dream job for a curbco scrapper: I go to 35-50 residences every day Monday through Friday, and scoop up the dog poop from my customers' yards. I make a bit more than you might think at this endeavor, but who isn't looking for more income?!?

So, basically, all day every day I drive a pickup around through neighborhoods where people by definition have disposable income and are not frugal with it.

I had been doing this for a while, and one morning several years ago I was sipping coffee & surfing the net before work and I found this article about copper. Copper prices were on a meteoric rise at the time, pushing $4 per pound and some folks were saying they were going to $10 a pound. I filed the info away & went on about my day.

As I was heading up the alley to one of my stops that day, I saw a beat up, taped up, frayed orange 100' extension cord sitting on someone's trash can awaiting the trash dudes to come & haul it away. My mind flashed back to that article, and then I kinda realized that I was always driving past heaps of thrown away stuff like that. I stopped & grabbed the cord, not having ANY IDEA what to do with it, only knowing that there HAD TO be a few bucks worth of copper in that thing, and SOMEONE SOMEWHERE would probably pay me for it.

So I came home at the end of my route, and a few internet searches later I found this forum, and set to reading. Then, as now, there were a brazillion threads about "is it worth it to...." one of which was "strip extension cords". It didn't seem that there was a clear answer, so I tied one end of the cord to the trailer hitch on my truck, stretched the other end down the street, and set to scoring the orange insulation with a utility knife. Once I (FINALLY) had the black, green, & white strands freed, I tied one to the trailer hitch & set about trying to score it. I went back in the house I read a little more on the forum. I went out to the garage, cut a block off the end of a scrap 2x4, drilled a hole through it for the wire to run through, screwed a sharp pointed drywall screw into it & went back out to my wire to assert my dominance!! ..... not so fast. It didn't exactly work very well, kept binding and tearing and catching on the strands of copper. Many cusswords were uttered!

Yeah, other than the easy find, my introduction to scrap was not peaches & roses. I finally got that extension cord stripped to bare copper... it probably took me 4 hours or so of researching cussing & working.

Over the next several years, I've branched into many other arenas of scrapping. I've scrapped hundreds of tube TVs, but now I won't touch them unless, maaaaybe it's a Sony Trinitron. I've made some very unprofitable auction purchases, I've made some lucrative ones. I've put together a booth for attending earth days, community garage sales, etc handing out business cards & recycling peoples' old computers. I've injured myself so bad I'll feel it for the rest of my life while being careless with a loaded server rack. But bottom line, I've gained a skillset and knowledge base that will provide at least the basics for me for the rest of my life if worst comes to worst.

One other thing that doesn't get much mention is re-use of scrap-found things. I've quit even picking up lightbulbs since I have a 18 gallon bin on a shelf out in the garage FULL of used but working lightbulbs. A few months back our fridge/freezer in the kitchen quit working. I had three (yes, THREE) mini fridges in the garage that I'd found left in alleys for trash. WHY anyone would throw one of these away is beyond me!! I bleached the insides of those three fridges & moved all our stuff into them, then I fixed the fridge, which necessitated laying it over on its side. For three days, we used those mini fridges and the only thing we 'lost' was one of them was set too cold & froze/cracked a couple of eggs. After three days I plugged in the big fridge & (knock wood) it's working fine. I can't imagine how much food we'd have lost without those minifridges. The faucet in our master bath came from a curbco find. Apparently, these rich folks like to remodel a lot! And they throw away their old fixtures when they do. (Actually, they hire it done & I'm boggled the contractors don't scrap/resale some of the stuff they haul out!)

I really enjoy branching out & learning knew things. I think that America is a VERY wasteful nation. That's a bad thing on the whole, but it does provide a lot of opportunity for someone with some gumption & hustle to turn some of that wastefulness of others into a pretty decent revenue stream for themselves.

OK... enough jabber from me. Today is the day I bust out the sawzall & take care of that bin of pipes that have some soldered joints but also have decent chunks of #1 on either side of the joints... and cut the headers off those 2 pool heater heat exchangers. I love those things!

So... I better quit writing books & get on with it.

well my story may be the same as many..........I was an alcoholic and drug addict for approx 20 years........This ended up landing me in some trouble including prison time........This may have been the best thing that ever happened to me.........I met many great people there and was introduced to a LONG TERM RECOVERY PROGRAM within the prison walls......It was there that I vowed to change my life and have not taken a drink or drug for over EIGHT years now......When I was released work was not exactly easy to find for a "convict" with sporadic work history........I went back to the Labor Pool "LABOR READY" and worked fairly frequently...........Unfortunately because of my previous lifestyle I owed so much money to past debts I would work an 8 hour day and they would garnish my check leaving me with approx $20 a day after taxes..........There was a guy there who had an old beat up pick up truck and after getting to know him he made me a deal...........Take the truck and make him money........After expenses we would split all profits 50/50.........It took me a few weeks but I landed a job cleaning up construction out of an old mall..........In one day we cashed in over $800 worth of metal.......At this point we took all our profits and went "ALL IN"...........Many jobs and 1000's of miles later I no longer have a partner and currently deal in mainly Ewaste........This is a lucrative business for someone willing to do the work.......Sure I care about the environment and recycling but at the end of the day if this did not support my family and give me financial freedom I probably wouldn't look twice at things going into a landfill..........So to make a long story short I SCRAP for financial reward and to have a freedom of lifestyle that would not be available at any other regular job

Can't stand the corporate structure. Also I feel better about my failures and accomplishments if they are truly mine. I started in 2013 because I was still recovering from an autoimmune disorder that was killing my large intestine. It's been a long road to semi-health since and that's what prompted striking out on my own. Prior to that I had worked for p&g and the army before that none of which I was too fond of lol.