Scrap Yards

Originally Posted by DevinThaScrapper

I would like to ask just out of curiosity what your scrapyards do? How big are they? What do they look like? Whats there pay out like? Whats unique about them? I'm new to scrapping so I have only been to the same scrapyard 12 times and no-where else... So please leave a post! and I would love to hear about it!

1: They buy n sell scrap.
2: Have at least 5 in a 30 mile radius. They range from very, very small to very, very large.
3: They look like scrapyards. What else?
4: Nothing really unique about any of them. They all do the same thing. Buy and sell scrap.
5: You're new. Give it time. If you stay at this you'll see many, many more as time goes by. In the meantime try Google Images. Not the same as being at a scrapyard in person but it'll give you a better feel for them. Keep at it , kiddo. You'll make a great scrapper with your thirst for knowledge!

At my local yard if you have steel you cross the big truck scale, get weighed then the girls signal you and you drive out back and wait till the crane operator signals you where he wants your stuff unloaded. Sometimes there's a spotter walking around that checks your load to see if it's light or precut or tin. You drop off then go back around and reweigh then park and go inside to the office pay window.

On non ferrous you go to the "inside" scale where they use wheelbarrows or gaylords to unload your stuff if it's big enough load. Everything not steel/tin goes to the inside. The inside scale is a 4x6 platform scale, digital. Then you also go to the pay window to get you moola. They went computer operated a while back so you give them your name and all your info is printed on your ticket.

This a pic of the steel piles out back after a big rainstorm. The cranes sort the stuff as you drop it. I watched the operator pluck a handful of insulated copper out of the scrap pile with that big claw thing, takes a delicate touch to do that.


Processing a big pile;