Strippng wire

Hope this is not a repeat, but I don't remember anyone using this way of stripping wire. I know it won't work on new wire but old wire works good for me. I have an old railroad iron as an anvil ( use what you want) and I lay the wire on the anvil and tap it with a hammer. The insulation then comes off by hand and at todays prices in my area turns $1 a lb. wire into $2.50 a lb. wire. Could be nonsense, but may help out someone sometime.
Happy Scrapping....

Try this for newer wire. Lay the wire over your anvil or vice hold a utility knife on the wire at an angel so it cuts into the insolation and pull the wire while holding the knife still. Strips the wire nice and easy. My .02

Theres a way of stripping wire that I haven't seen yet.

It uses two rollers, about 4 inch dia with a thin gap between them, slighty less that the dia of the wire itself.
They turn & grip the wires you feed into it & squash it flat & that forces the insulation to become removed from the wire. I guess the rollers are as wide as you want.

You have to pick most of the insulation off the wire afterwards but its easyer than doing it by hand & easyer to make than a megabux chopper & cyclone. But not as clean.

Originally Posted by happyscraper

Try this for newer wire. Lay the wire over your anvil or vice hold a utility knife on the wire at an angel so it cuts into the insolation and pull the wire while holding the knife still. Strips the wire nice and easy. My .02

HS that is almost the technique I use. I put one end of the wire in the vice, pull the wire tight, and then cut it with a utility knife (I prefer a carpet blade, they are a little thinner/sharper, and cut a little better).

Melray: good idea on smashing the old wire. I have gotten some old wire in the past that I could of tried that on.


I often wonder how profitable stripping wire is. For the heavy gauge wire it seems like a no-brainer but, for the smaller wire it seems that it isnt worth it because you lose a lot of weight by throwing away the insulation. I want to do an experiment sometime soon showing the numbers on not stripping wire and then the numbers on stripping wire. I will share my result when the experiment is done.

Originally Posted by Mechanic688

Already been done; search back thru.

I checked a couple of threads and it seems that stripping small wire isnt worth it. One saying you get 25-30% copper once you strip it.

Really it all comes down to is the juice worth the squeeze. If you have the free time its profitable to strip any wire, however, it might not be worth it. I have a large business where I'm working on larger wire. People sell it to me because I pay very well and they have things better to do than sit around and strip wire.

Originally Posted by mrsamsonite

I checked a couple of threads and it seems that stripping small wire isnt worth it. One saying you get 25-30% copper once you strip it.

After a good copper wire burn off, I get about a 66% return. That means the insulation is less than 1/3rd of the pre weight.
The stuff I burn off is normal appliance copper wire, like whats in power cords & I strip off the outer coverings leaving it with only one layer of plastic insulation.

ie after burning off 21 Kgs of copper wire, I get 14 Kg of copper to sell.

Thats after a good burnoff, a bad burnoff can return only 50%, but the rest of the copper is in the crud & mud that washes off the burn wire.
I save this & will electroplate it all back into one piece of copper one day......