I've been doing scrap recycling for a long time, and I'm all out of good ideas on where to find scrap metal. It's slim pickins around here.
Where are you guys getting your scrap?
Printable View
I've been doing scrap recycling for a long time, and I'm all out of good ideas on where to find scrap metal. It's slim pickins around here.
Where are you guys getting your scrap?
Go to some of the auto places and brake places to see if they have engines or car parts throwing them away or something.
Hi metalfab,
welcome to the forum. Have you tried going around to your local business owners. A lot of times they have things in the storage room that they have been meaning the do something with Ask around you never what you might find
Good luck!
Andrew
I think it really depends on location. Are you in a rural, urban or metro area? What works for one would be totally irrelevant to another. Im in a rural area and started by driving many miles; stopping at repair shops (large and small), appliance stores and anything dealing with metal parts/sales/repair. We have many individuals who operate construction and logging equipment. Id check those mainly for junk batteries. Everywhere I stopped, I left a business card and made a note of the stop and what happened. Pretty soon, I could see trends and Id not bother stopping at some and going back to others. Partly, its a "gut feeling". I stopped at one place every month for a year and kept being told he didnt have anything - but stop back". Then, I made a large haul. Didnt hurt anything since Id set up a monthly route and went right by there, anyway. Another good source Ive found is to get in with whoever has your state contract to clean out contents of houses of people going into State care (nursing/rehab care). This will be a varied experience. One place I cleaned out where the refrigerator was full and the electricity had been shut off for two years (think rotten meat). Another, I cleaned out had six refrigerators/freezers (no rotten food), a lot of kitchen pots/pans etc which I sold and more stuff than I could get with the truck and 18' trailer. The rest went in the dump.
I dont just drive around any more and have developed a following of individuals who call me to sell the stuff they get. I go to them and pay cash. I also have several shops I pick up stuff on a monthly basis. New business is mostly word of mouth and some from Craigs List.
I have posted a free haul off service in craigslist, and have gotten several calls from there, my latest being last Friday, in which I got enough to pretty much fill a 16ft flatbed trailer.
A untapped resource in most areas are the local shooting ranges. Try going to a shooting range and picking up the discharged brass shells; near me they fetch contaminated brass! It may be worth while if people shoot all the time at your nearest range without picking up their shells. Maybe you could work it into your route.
Another idea maybe be aluminum from the local baseball sports complex. My son plays little league and we were at the park late one evening cleaning up. The maintence guy said "hey do you want these bats, they have been hear for years" so of course I took all 27 of them. Most of them were junk, but I believe they are all aluminum. I have yet to take them in. But you may call these places and see if they want to get rid of there left/forgotton bats. Just a thought.
i checked out a dumpster behind a pawn shop today and found a huge box full of extension cords and a couple of other scrap items large and small
Construction sites huge $$$$. Just today i racked up more then 10,000lbs can't wait to turn it in!!! :)
Gotta be careful with construction refuse. A few scrap yards around here wont even take it due to the high theft rate
I check out just one complex last night. Found 2 monitors and a about a 10' heavy duty extention cord. Plus two sweepers. I know the monitors and sweeper will take some work, but found money is found money. Also took in some copper, sheet aluminum, and aluminum cans. $161.00
If you score some scrap from a construction site it does'nt hurt to get a bill of sale for the material. Even if you don't buy it, it may save you some grief if the police are investigating a thief ring.
If your out and about swing buy plumbing and hvac supply houses, talk to the manager and see if you can pick up the water heaters,furnaces,disposals,condensers and etc. Most supply houses allow plumbers and hvac techs to dump there since they purchase from them.
The other night I was driving around looking for a couple of new spots and decided to drive through a trailor park. They had 3 large dumpsters. But what I notice the most was the number of air conditioners sitting outside in the snow, on the ground not in there windows, at these places . I mean more then one trailor had multi units. Maybe I should stop and ask if there junk and if they would want me to get them off there hands.
I've been focusing mainly on autos. A couple of well worded and well placed ads...i am swamped! people are calling and chasing me down. I'm running at least a week behind, but worth it. made a little over $560 today. Great too, because christmas is coming and all the kids want a pillow pet!! the **** things are $20 bucks a piece!!
I've just set up to be called in when they have abandoned apts.I come in and take the left items i want saving them trash space and dump fees.people always leave electric scrap items and other machines/appliances
Being a plumber I spend lots of time on top of buildings. It may be difficult to get access but most commercial buildings and resturants have hvac units on the roof. When a hvac tech replaces the compressor or a large fan motor they leave the old parts on the roof. Older buildings are better.
Being a plumber, don't you come across a lot of things anyway? Pipes, furnaces, etc?
Yes, I took in 9 waterheaters and a bucket full of brass. I have a couple of trashcans full of copper I'm taking in the morning along with some compressors,garbage disposals and a few fan motors. I also have a wad of wire to strip tonight.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrap man
I live in a rural area. I was thinking of checking out old ranch dump sites. Just about every ranch and farm has a washout where they tossed all the garbage in or dumped old cars and house items. Has anyone checked out something like this before?
The Farm idea is money the only bad thing is a lot of times they don't want to get rid of anything because they "may need it some day" my family has a farm and i am slowly getting them to get rid of stuff some cars have been there for over 30 years i have about 6 cars, 4-5k pounds of metal fencing and a bulldozer to take in the bulldozer is posing some problems but all said and done it should be a decent haul so if you keep asking you can usually get them to agree, i have been working on another farm for a while now they finally let me take the 30 old batteries they had sitting out back the other day.
Here in Springfield,Ohio, Ive tried posting on craigslist but always get flagged off, I think its the Greed of fellow scrappers here...I really think SCRAPPERS should hang together in some cases, but to never disregard others in the same line...just my thought tho...I would never move in on another mans way of living and think some of the idiots here in Springfield need to be a little more thoughtful
Do repair techs really drag stuff back to the shop/supply warehouse? Figured most would set them out at the customers trash for pickup.Quote:
Originally Posted by Phithy McNasty
Quote:
Originally Posted by lady scrapper
Care to share what is working for you? I've placed ads on craigslist and it's not long before they're flagged.
Alot of customers don't want a furnace or water heater setting in their yard for a week if the trash just ran. We haul everything off and actuallt charge 10 dollars to do it. I have all the guys dropping everything off a the shop when they finish a job or clean their trucks out. All of my suppliers allow us to dump old water heaters and hvac equipment at there location.Quote:
Originally Posted by IdahoScrapper
I would be rich if I could find someone that bought porcelain and china. Lots of sinks and toilets go in the dumpster. I was on my way home tonight and spotted a old furnace by the dumpster of one of my supply houses. It's not worth much. A little wire and about 100 or so pounds of tin. It's free money.
I checked with all the tech guys in town. They take their stuff to the scrap yard.
What part of craigslist do you post? If you post in the free section, it will get flagged. I post in the labor/move part of the services section. I never get flagged there, and have gotten a few calls from it.Quote:
Originally Posted by junkdude1959
If you are posting in the free section you will get flagged. Try posting in the labor/move part of the services section. That is where I post and I never get flagged there, and have received calls from it.Quote:
Originally Posted by IdahoScrapper
thanks, ill try that
I tried posting in the Wanted section and had a few flagged.
That happens everywhere. It's like a competition to see how fast the "junk metal wanted" ads can get flagged. Try the Small Business Ads under Services.Quote:
Originally Posted by tjlock
Yeah man. I just did my first site like this (a small one) and it was 1960lbs of mixed metal, so $206. A buddy of mine almost exclusively does dump sites like this. He has given me some pointers and, from what it sounds like, you can make a good bit of extra cash. I would strongly recommend a metal detector if you can find one (or have one already). Without the metal detector I would have never found 30% or more of my haul. I dug up probably 50% of everything with a rake, and some parts were protruding and some were not.Quote:
Originally Posted by j&jscrap
Important Note: Heavier (more valuable) items will sink under the dirt and leaves faster than the lighter items. The great thing about these "ranch" dump sites is that the farmers usually threw their oil cans, steel buckets, and other light-weight items in with the heavier stuff. These lighter items "float" above the heavier items and allow you to find them easier. In the few sites I'm working on I do it like this: I see a bucket or something and go to it, move it, and then rake all around. I pull out whatever is just sitting beneath the leaves, and then run over it with the metal detector. More times than not there is a stovetop, furnace top, broken driveshaft, bearing, cam shaft, or something heavy that has sunken into the leaves and roots. I pull it out and start a pile or wheelbarrow it to the truck. Look around the site, too, because these guys seem to avoid dumping in the exact same spot. One I saw the other week was literally 50yds long and of scattered metal. Who does that to their property? (my old relatives... hehe).
These sites can also be deceiving. I found one the other day and raved about the "tons of metal" I had just stumbled into. When I took my truck down to haul it out, I realized that some idiot had covered the stuff with fill dirt and it was virtually impossible to move. Why would you ever cover a bunch of junk halfway with fill dirt and then leave it forever????
Got a friend who owns an oil and HVAC company. They bring back almost all of their old stuff. Some of it sits out back for a few years and then someone throws it in the scrap yard for a few bucks. It's really disorganized, but I have a feeling that one of the guys is making loot on the copper out of the old units.Quote:
Originally Posted by IdahoScrapper
I Do HVAC with a friend. He gets the job we do the change out and I get all the scrap.Quote:
Originally Posted by HGWells
At first I sold the compressors as is for $3.00 each. Then I cut one open removed the core as I do with motors.
The windings came out to about 5 lbs. @ 3.45 for # 2 copper here. And the steel left over was about 75 lbs. @ $.08.
So for about 45 minutes of labor I am able to convert $3.00 into $23.25 less the two beers it takes to do the job.
what i do is ride around 4 wheeler trails looking for old junk cars and other metal stuff.. go back at night with my snowmobile trailer and pick it up and load it onto my big trailer and then pile er up! not stealing, i call it cleaning up the town! if it has weight, i pick it up, no matter what type of metal.
Thats my problem i guess i am not wording stuff the best way i can.Could you help.Quote:
Originally Posted by lady scrapper
Yeah that isnt a bad idea.I know where there are some cars in woods and such.But dont know how to get them out of there lol.Metal though thats great.Woods here i comeQuote:
Originally Posted by vamped400
How about getting a "bumper" winch? Do you have a pickup you can drive in part way and pull them out? Put the wheels on sheets of aluminum and they'll pull easier.Quote:
Originally Posted by Focker
My problem too. some are sunk in and there is no way my fourwheeler could pull them out. I was hoping to get some cutting torches and some oxy/acetylene but no cash right now. ill find a way to get them out someday somehow.. there is about 4 around my town i have my eye onQuote:
Originally Posted by Focker
Are you talking about compressors in AC units? I have cut a couple of them open and found that the windings and the string holding the windings have some sort of heavy varnish coating, which makes them a royal pain to remove. Do you remove the coating, and if not, how do you go about removing the windings? I remove the windings off of the motors inside compressors from refrigerators easily because they do not have the heavy varnish coating, but have found the AC units to be difficult.Quote:
Originally Posted by injunjoe
Yeah i may have to go investigate somemore.My uncle has a kawasaki mule i may try it.Quote:
Originally Posted by vamped400