Brass door knobs really made of brass?

Are brass door knobs really brass?

Some are all brass and others are nothing but cheap steel made to look brass like. Knobs are made of everything one can imagine, brass, copper, steel (both magnetic & nonmagnetic SS), nickel plated, glass, porcelain, wood, plastic .......). I'm sure I missed some and others can fill those end. When I first started scraping, my lack of experience let me cut-up and scrap a beautiful door lock & knob engraved copper assembly. This was for a couple of dollars in scrap copper. I realized my mistake at the scrap yard, when an older gentleman behind me, "asked do you know what you just cutup?". He told me to pull it out of the bucket and he would explain it to me after we sold our scrap. I actually pulled all of my scrap copper and brass that day and that turned into one of my best scrap educations to this day. The man and I spent about an hour going through my two brass and copper buckets. He taught me about door knobs and much more that day. The parts that I had not destroyed were worth way more than scrap and the copper knobs that I cutup were worth more than $100 (now were indeed scrap worth maybe a $1). Lots of lessons that day have since replaced that $100 and I reminded how much I have to keep learning. When I get my act together today I'll try and load some pictures of a nice solid brass pull/lock/knob assembly I found just last month. A perfect example of what not to scrap.

yes, most are brass. I'm sitting on prob 300 pounds of them at the moment. Steel, die cast zinc, and brass.

Originally Posted by gravygrabber

Are brass door knobs really brass?

Well partly anyway. The new Kwikset and Schlage lockset that are brass finished like polished, Antique, Bronze have thin layer of sheet brass pressed over a steel backing to give them strength. This holds true for the knob, backplate and deadbolts.
I cut them in half with a thin cutoff blade to separate them.
For the most part if you put a magnet to the brass part it will stick because it’s grabbing the steel behind the brass sheet.

Does a bear poop in the woods?

what I love are the old school fire doors with the big brass handles and brass plates on each side that are used to push down to open the door not like the steel ones today but the good old ones those plates at times I have weighed them out to almost 5lbs

I replied to this post back on New Years and said I would post a picture of a "better than scrap" example of door hardware. Well I was a "little" hung over and forgot, so here it is a few weeks later.