copper yeilds more than gold???

The title says it all. Strangly enough it is true here in my area of centrel arkansas. Up untill now I loved the heavy ends on the computer cords as I would save them and put them in my gold connector ends. Today that all stoped. I have overlooked that gold ends are now at .50 cents a pound and after calling my contact at my yard of choice he informed me that my #2 insulated price was .60 lb. So as the title states now for me in this case. Copper is outweighing the pay off for the gold. Sobb sniff sniff. This economy is getting harder and I'm just hoping I can educate myself enough to keep on going. I love this stuff (escrap) and hope that I can experiance some of the sweet payouts I read about in the older threads from a few years back.

Ok thats my sob story. Thanks to all of you for all the information that the SMF puts out there. As bad as things are I would not be in the place I am without the shared knowledge of this forum...

Originally Posted by GoldMetalRecyclers

It's based on the recoveries. There is more #2 copper in the cable then there is in the connector ends. Gold still far outweighs copper.
As of today copper 2.28 / lb, Gold 18358.40 / lb

Proof is in the pudding. By the way may need to look for another yard as they #2 ICW price is about 0.18 low.

As far as the weight and the toatal value of the base metal that I cannot argue. but I cannot see cutting off cable ends now when #2 insulated copper is at .60 lbs and the gold plated connector ends are fetching .50 lbs. maybe I'll sit on the stash till it goes back up to 65 or 75 cents. dunno yet still sad cause I loved to old heavy printer cables now eh' they just get tossed into the #2.

Originally Posted by Mechanic688

Prices in $ USD
Gold -0.67% 1,147.40

gold connectors===.50 lbs
#2 insulated---------.62 lbs

just never thought a "gold plated" catagory of material would be worth less than a classification like #2 insulated copper. To me untill the connectors climb in value im not saving any more of them.

One of the yards here requires that all ends must be cut off wire or they won't take it. Needless to say, I don't take my wire there. I still cut gold ends off though and toss them in a bucket. If their value increases I'll sell them as gold ends. If not and I have to clean house and get rid of them then I'll toss them into the wire bin. It still only takes a second to clip them off. As far as the pipe smasher goes, put them in the freezer for a day or two first. When I was crazy save everything and break down as far as possible guy I Had an old really heavy duty paper shredder that I would run the ends through and it worked pretty well. Even the printer ends got chewed up. Don't do that anymore though.

Originally Posted by NobleMetalWorks

If the gold plated connectors are the type that are encased in plastic then yes, they are going to pay less for them, of course. Think about it from a business point of view.

Copper wire still sheathed is easy enough to deal with, you just simply run it through a stripper, or you incinerate it so that you burn off the shielding. The end connectors cannot be processed in the same way. End connectors cost more to process, and produce different types of by products or gas. As well, part of the end connectors weight is that same plastic. So far as separating the gold from the copper if they are plated, that's fairly simple. They are melted into a bar and then processed via an electrolytic cell. Even still though, they must be clean. If any plastics are transferred to the copper cell, they may interfere with the refining process.

So much more labor intensive, thus the price difference.


Scott

I get there is a process difference and the ease of processing the wire. As a fairly new escrapper I was really shocked in the begining to learn about the "gold connectors" I woud hit yard sales and load up on those old school printer cables where the end weighted in a about a pound for .10-.25 cents. Its not much but if im making 12-15 bucks going out and doing what I enjoy it was just as you say "icing on the cake." There are some ends that I save still as there are some I break down. But for most usd and phone ends that I run across I now no longer save them as my yard will take them as is for more than the gold ends catagory is paying me at the moment. Hope the price goes up sometime as im horde is sitting there gathering dust.