Hot Water Baseboard / Aluminum Finned Copper Pipe

Separated some aluminum fins from copper pipe today before taking it in...Easy to do and increased the profit by about 1/3.


Used a grinder with a thin cutting disc mounted on it to cut through the fins but being careful to not cut too much into the pipe.





Once cut the fins peeled away easily.



Some of the pipe ends had fittings sweated on them so they were cut off and put in the #2 bucket and the rest of the pipe went #1.

Originally Posted by hobo finds

How much for it as is clean cu/alum raid? Nice job! And I like your sawhorse...

As is $1.35ish pound.

Some will just slide off. I pull and twist first. If that doesn't work, then the grinder makes short work of it.

this is exactly what i do. its easy if you have a fresh disc. the worn ones wont cut deep enough. good job with the pics!

Originally Posted by Filthy

this is exactly what i do. its easy if you have a fresh disc. the worn ones wont cut deep enough. good job with the pics!

I do it just like KZBell has shown with 2 minor changes. I first cut into 14" or so lengths (It seems to make removing the fins easier) I also flaten one side of the fins just by running my hand down it before making the rip cut. (this allows you to get the depth from a worn disc)

KZ I like the Harbor Freight advertisement they get for Free !! I like there tools - I have a reciprocating saw that I paid 19.99 & does the job well.

KZ if you read back on the post -
A Question ? is that a tile diamond blade your using - I know a scrapper who keeps telling me he has a lot of good luck with the diamond blades - I have been skeptical as i figure I'll over heat the blade and the costly blade will be of no use fast. It looks as though your blade did a nice job cutting very clean and dust free

Originally Posted by 1956

Ok this sounds like some thing i need more info on,did you happen to weigh the coil befor you cut it up? how much copper vs aluminum did you recover.and if i may ask what grade of aluminum is the yard giving you for the fins/coils thanks

This is not a coil but a straight section of baseboard heat type radiator. I didn't weigh anything beforehand as they were all random lengths, I suppose I could have cut a one foot section and did a before and after.

The copper pipe on these is thin walled a lot of times, not the denser pipe used for plumbing. I'm guessing at the ratio of about 80% copper to 20% aluminum. Copper went as #2 due to solder joints and aluminum fins went as sheet.


Copperhead...that blade is just a thin cut off blade from Home Depot.