Scrap Metal guidelines for Beginners

I've written guidelines for taking scrap metal for sale. These are not intended for experienced people. I didn't include some metals as they are not common for the beginner; nor cars. If you are hauling cars, you should already know the difference between Cars, Complete Cars and Incomplete Cars.

Local yards may have different terminology, but the general guides should be valid as crushers are mostly the same everywhere. I suggest asking your local yard. Feel free to add, modify or dispute anything I put here.

Credit for this is to Smorgon Steel Recycling from which I "borrowed" heavily. Blame for mistakes is to me.

General guidelines for taking scrap metal for sale to a scrap yard

Ferrous (magnetic)
#1 iron ( prepared) iron or steel scrap ¼" or thicker and 2’ x 5’ or less
#1 iron (unprepared) same as above except over 5’ to 18’
#2 iron (prepared) 1/8 inch to ¼" and 2’ x 5’ or less
#2 iron (unprepared) 1/8" and 5’ to 18’
Torch material is any iron over 18’ long and 10’ wide
Cast-iron is the same as Breakable Iron. Guidelines are that they should be 2’ x 2‘6” or under and weigh less than 150 pounds.

Light iron is less than 1/8". Examples include sheet-metal and bicycle frames.


Non-Ferrous Metals

#1 Copper - stripped wire strands there are bigger than a number two pencil lead. May be called “Bright and Shiny”.
#2 Copper - does not meet criteria for #1 Copper. Is free of any alloy such as soldering.
Light Copper - miscellaneous Copper scrap.
Brass - Not have any attachments (non-brass). Not more than 12” or 100#.
Radiators - generally means other than aluminum radiators which go with sheet aluminum. Iron is removed.
Heater cores - steel and hoses should be removed.
Extrusion - this includes such things as door and window castings. Die cast and iron is removed and should be 2’ x 4’ or under.
Cast aluminum should not have any iron or brass attachments.
Sheet aluminum should be 2’ x 4’ or under. This would include radiators from which the plastic has been removed

Stainless steel - no steel, brass or copper attachments. 2’ x 3’ or under. Note - some Stainless Steel is Ferrous (magnetic).

Thanks for the compliment. A little story related to my signature - A neighbor was talking to me the other day about my scrap metal business. He said "But you don't really need the money". (I'm retired). I was kind of taken by surprise and didn't manage a comeback. I wish I'd recovered enough to tell him he could tell me how to run my life when he started paying my bills.

I watched that TV show once. I can't believe that's anywhere near accurate even for NYC scrappers. Bunch of BS.

In the past couple of weeks, I've come across a lot of bed rails and I'll be taking them in this week. Just to make sure, these would be classified as #2 iron, correct? Picture attached not my picture but the same thing, they're about all 6' long.



I also got some steel headboards as well, and those would be light iron / tin?

Yards where I go classify bed rails as Light Iron.

There are a couple sites on the web of catalytic converter identification - Search "catalytic converters". Relative value is best determined by going to your scrap yard and get a price list for cats, specifically. There are a couple sites that list value, as far as that goes. If you send them pictures, they will identify and make an offer. Send the pictures to two or three different ones to compare their identifications and offers. Beware of scams.

You can compare pictures to what you've got and still misidentify them. This is an area where nothing beats experience.

Try poking around on this site. There's a tab for pictures that might help you ID what you've got and a tab for pricing:

http://www.adccatalytic.com/

Steel is iron alloyed with various % of carbon. They're concerned with size because of the shredder.