Db,
The terms that the scrapyards use for the different kinds of metal can be a little challenging for a guy that's never scrapped anything in his life before. To add to the confusion ... different yards use different terms. The two yards that i use aren't very sophisticated so their grading system is a bit easier for a new guy to wrap his head around. This is the way it was explained to me when i was first starting out with aluminum.
Category 1: Extruded aluminum. ( You probably won't find that in your light fixtures so don't worry about it till later on. )
Category 2: Cast aluminum. It's an aluminum piece that was cast in a mold to make a shape like a box or whatever. The main thing about cast is that it's brittle. It breaks into pieces when you hit it with a hammer.
Category 3: Sheet aluminum. If you look at the light domes you can see that they were stamped out of a sheet to make that shape. Hit the dome with a hammer. You can see that it dents but it's not brittle like cast.
Category 4: Irony aluminum. Some people call it breakage. Others have different terms. The basic idea is that it's aluminum that's contaminated with another kind of metal -or- non metal. (This is the lowest paying grade of aluminum.)
The yard that you use might have a different way of grading the scrap but this is the basic idea. It will get you in the ballpark for sorting purposes. Now you have to bear in mind that aluminum prices aren't what they were years ago. It may / may not be a great payoff. I've been talking with the local scrappers in my area and it's come to a point where most don't want to be bothered with it anymore. On the other hand ... i was talking with one fulla last week that was fully satisfied with the price and felt that he did well on his last trip to the yard. This will probably be one of those things where you will have to try it out for yourself and decide if the juice was worth the squeeze or not.
Best of luck !
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