What type of wire is this and how to scrap?

**pjost** · 12-10-2014, 09:39 PM

Originally Posted by turtlejuice

I want to ensure I'm optimizing my return.

I think it is olddude that says: "Anyone who thinks scrapping is easy ain't doing it right"

Forgive me olddude if this is not your quote.

**mthomasdev** · 12-10-2014, 10:06 PM

What you have is one of the types of BX cable. As others have said, this can come in either a steel jacketed configuration or aluminum jacketed configuration. The grading will depend on your yard and the prices vary considerably. For Steel BX, I have one yard that makes you thow it in with light iron / shred at less than 6 cents right know. I have another speciality yard that pays 29 cents for it.

One thing that I've noticed nobody has mentioned, and this should answer your question on the 3rd wire, is that there are 2 different types of steel and aluminum BX. These types are AC ans MC. AC has the thin wire that you are talking about and it is bonded to the metal jacket which then acts as a ground. The MC wire has a seperate insulated copper ground wire. Here is a link to another forum with a discussion on these wire types. Please note that the electric code (NEC) that they are refering to is from 2002 or before, so don't assume that the allowable uses are still the same.

http://www.mikeholt.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/002081.html

**mthomasdev** · 12-10-2014, 10:19 PM

Originally Posted by mthomasdev

What you have is one of the types of BX cable. As others have said, this can come in either a steel jacketed configuration or aluminum jacketed configuration. The grading will depend on your yard and the prices vary considerably. For Steel BX, I have one yard that makes you thow it in with light iron / shred at less than 6 cents right know. I have another speciality yard that pays 29 cents for it.

One thing that I've noticed nobody has mentioned, and this should answer your question on the 3rd wire, is that there are 2 different types of steel and aluminum BX. These types are AC ans MC. AC has the thin wire that you are talking about and it is bonded to the metal jacket which then acts as a ground. The MC wire has a seperate insulated copper ground wire. Here is a link to another forum with a discussion on these wire types. Please note that the electric code (NEC) that they are refering to is from 2002 or before, so don't assume that the allowable uses are still the same.

http://www.mikeholt.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/002081.html

One more link to clarify my last post a little more:

http://www.afcweb.com/media/afc-1001...stallation.pdf

**turtlejuice** · 12-14-2014, 08:59 AM

I finished stripping all the wire and it wasn't as much as it seemed but I have 6.5 lbs of copper wire, .5 lbs of the ground wire, and 26lbs I believe it was of the casing which I take to be steel since a magnet sticks to it. It was a lot of work but I'm learning a thing or two!