Shred

[Copper Head]

I was watching a video of the yard I frequent and they have a shredder so you can see the stuff that i always see in the mountain pile turned into the the pile of shred . So what become of this stuff, is it sold as is & if so , is there assays performed with the shred to make sure the content stays within parameters .

[PistoneScrapProcessing]

as long as there is .0017 percent copper in the railcar or truckload then its considered #2 shredd which is what the majority of mills buy. There is no assay done on it they have downstream systems to take all the copper, aluminum, stainless and trash out of it. Trust me the yard wants to recover as much non ferrous as possible. If you shredd 600 to 1000 ton of material in a day and you can recover all the material out of the fluff you can then you are maximizing your shredders potential. Scrap yards spend 100,000s of thousands of dollars just so they can recover 1 to 2 percent more of the non ferrous material out of there fluff. Why send it to the landfill when you can recover it and get paid for it. Think about what 1 to 2 percent of 600 tons is its an extra 2 grand or more of material a day.

[mikeinreco]

I process as much as possible........I always wondered what happens when the yard tells me to throw my low grade boards in with shred....How do they process that?

[jghilino]

yea i bet the shredder dosent separate out transformers and electric motors as they are ferrous

[Gravitar]

yea i bet the shredder dosent separate out transformers and electric motors as they are ferrous

They probably use a Eddie-current system to separate out the non-ferrous.

[Copper Head]

So there are 2 ways shred is worked sold as is , or sold with some non ferris removed by the very yard that shreds .What I have seen is smaller yards if they can pull copper wire by hand they will but the yard with shredder lets it ride. Some times I'll see some really nice copper items but they seem to want it in the mix for shred the .0017 percent copper must be.

[mikeinreco]

Well I know that copper makes steel weak so why would they want any copper or is just a little required?

[Jonniebrass]

Here it gets shredded. And loaded directly into rail cars and moves on to somewhere. They buy steel here as either light iron or heavy iron the stuff in the rail car is shredded heavy.

[Copper Head]

Well I know that copper makes steel weak so why would they want any copper or is just a little required?

From what PistoneScrapProcessing said " as long as the schred mix has .0017 percent copper in the railcar or truckload then its considered #2 shredd " They don't mix ( melt) copper with steel it is separated . The .0017 percent copper just makes the load a better gamble for the purchase .
Like in my small fry situations - some one has metal to sell me so i see steel and all the stuff you can imagine and i have to figure a price well more times then not a higher value metal is there ( Copper - Al - Brass - wire ) once I see that i can gauge my price on those items as there the sure thing . The other metals can become free to purchase as people are often more then happy with the money i can offer on the sure thing naturally I don't explain the way I figure it . Any way thats a good rule to follow Always base your price on the sure thing item

[PistoneScrapProcessing]

The shredder does separate transformers and electric motors. I can't tell you there specific grade off hand but I have always heard of them referred to as meatballs or something similar to that. They just look like smashed up motors that you would never ever be able to get the windings out of. Heck I am not even sure how they do it after its gone through the shredder. I have also seen gaylords of shredded boards that were picked out of the fluff. Like I said its almost 99.99 percent ferrous material when its shipped out if its not the yard is throwing away money it could recover. Name me one scrap yard owner who has a shredder and doesn't have a decent or great downsteam recovery system for there non-ferrous and fluff. I have even heard of yards running the fluff twice through the downstream to see if they can recover more non-ferrous out of it before they send it to the trash dump or incinerator. Remember this used to all be done by hand back in the day if you have been doing this for a long time and have ever worked around a shredder you can remember the old dog houses they had built and there would 20 guys in there picking through the fluff as it came out of the shredder. That is all done by x-rays and specialized magnets and drums now.

[Climber34]

You are correct about the meatballs when referring to motors and transformers. Once the shred goes through, the fluff goes one way and all the ferrous goes the other way. Often times red metals and meatballs get through with the ferrous metals. The shredders I have been to have a line of guys hand picking through the ferrous to get as much red metals and meatballs out of it before it goes to the mills. Then they run their fluff through the downstream sorting to get all the non-ferrous out to maximize profits. They have x-rays and eddy currents and other high tech stuff to get the non-ferrous out. It is all automated and sorted to go into their respective piles. This is just what I have seen a the 3 shredders I have been through.

[mikeinreco]

Kewl

[Gravitar]

Meatball Separation:

[Copper Head]

copper melts just slightly over 1,900 degrees F
steel melts at around 2500°F
it would seem the way to get copper off the meat balls -
Melt it off at 600 degrees lower then steel

[BarrenRealms007]

They probably use a Eddie-current system to separate out the non-ferrous.

As far as I know an eddie current system is only good for the aluminum part of the material.

[BarrenRealms007]

copper melts just slightly over 1,900 degrees F
steel melts at around 2500°F
it would seem the way to get copper off the meat balls -
Melt it off at 600 degrees lower then steel

Sorry but it will not work that way. When you combine the metals and start melting them the melting points change and the metals combine into one if they can.

[Copper Head]

Sorry but it will not work that way. When you combine the metals and start melting them the melting points change and the metals combine into one if they can.

But if steel melts at around 2500°F that means at 1900 steel is still inert & the copper becomes liquid
unless there are other facts ??

[Gravitar]

As far as I know an eddie current system is only good for the aluminum part of the material.

Well, at least it may separate out aluminum motors and transformers.

[PistoneScrapProcessing]

To add more to what barren said a majority of the steel used in those motors and transformers is not pure steel at all. There is going to be a lot of silicone steel.

[landmine]

Here it gets shredded. And loaded directly into rail cars and moves on to somewhere. They buy steel here as either light iron or heavy iron the stuff in the rail car is shredded heavy.

When i go into everett/Chelsea, you can see the boat getting loaded. There is a huge pile of unprocessed shed, i am guessing they shred it right onto the boat.

I know scrap it and second street iron ship out dump trailers full of unprocessed shred. Not many people have shredders in the city i think.