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Hello, New here but have been in the scrap business for over 15 years. I have been doing research for the last year and trying to answer a question I have. Is it possible for a auto dismantler to go straight to a refiner? Seems most dismantlers sell to "middleman" but I dont understand why. Why doesent a dismantler (know of 1) go and get a contract and send his scrap cats straight to the refiner to get refining value instead of "middleman price"?
By refiner, do you mean the steel foundry or the guy who recover precious metals from cats? If it is the steel foundry, it is plausible that they require carcasses to go by a shredder first. For the cats, I don't know. An exclusive regional territory? In both cases, you can always call them directly and ask why. If you have the volume, you never know...
The answer you seek grasshopper first off there's nothing to stop you from dealing with the precious metals refinery direct, if you have 10,000 pounds of materiel and your capable of meeting this quota every couple of months. the refinery's will welcome you as a customer.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
The smaller scrap yards who purchase from walk ins will sell their inventory before meeting the necessary quota to deal with a refinery direct, for the simple reason the precious metals market is very volatile. if you hold your inventory to long and the market craters your screwed.
Removing the precious metals wash coat is relatively easy, I'm sitting on several thousands of dollars worth, the fluctuation in those graphs below show volatility which is the reason I'm unable to find a buyer.
Couldn't even buy a loaf of bread with my inventory of precious metals sponge's, would have been further ahead selling the cats. And I'm not even sure that's a good idea at the moment.
As the dominoes begin to fall, Record China Defaults in Focus as Modern Land Misses Payment
One year graph for rhodium, platinum and palladium.
https://i.postimg.cc/Z55GkZxR/rh.png
https://i.postimg.cc/DZP6y42K/plat.png
https://i.postimg.cc/BnPCPVqp/pall.png
.
Another answer to original question is the "middleman" is just the easier option
He could sell his cats to our resident buyer - APA.Quote:
Originally Posted by mikeinreco
Thank you for that info, So its not possible to find a refiner that will do a 1 off lot? Ive spoken to Legends Smelting and it seemed like they would but I dont know how much trust I shall have recommending them....
You may want to check on goldrefingforum.com
To the best of my knowledge there are only two smelters on the USA than handle the platinum group metals, regardless of their claim Legend is not one of them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
Kennecott has a copper smelter in Utah where they inject scrap e-waste circuit boards into the furnace, boards are ground up into powders assay taken before smelting. Customers is paid on assay.
In the news, Kennecott, https://www.abc4.com/news/local-news...-at-kennecott/
https://www.sibanyestillwater.com/business/americas/pgm-operations-americas/columbus-metallurgical-complex/
https://metallix.com/
For those holding catalytic inventory or having a shipment at the smelter being processed were payments are made at the end of processing based on spot $$$.
The Chinese financial troubles are going to have serious consequences globally.
We've been looking to purchase a new truck and the dealership lots are almost bare.
The demand for these metals is down.
Lithium
How to go from "competing" with Tesla to almost disappearing in less than a year
Appreciate the info, So I take it there is a expectancy of the metals to be dropping in value?
Are there any cat buyers that work with refiners on this forum that would like to chime in?
The "middlemen" should know if a 1 off sale for refining is possible.
My question is if you have one converter why bother
Lets play the numbers game, I'll pay you by the numbers inscribed on your cat.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
That is the biggest scam going, city cats that spend their usable life on asphalt will assay with a higher value than sister cats which spent a lifetime on dusty rural gravel roads,
By the time those cats purchased by the numbers hit the refinery they've had the comb removed, shipped in super sacks. refinery works from assay results not numbers.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/sci...-highway-dirt/
If you try really hard, you can refine gold out of garbage old computer parts. But that's not the weirdest place you can find precious metals, not by a long shot. If you're looking for platinum, for example, you need look no further than the dirt on the side of a major roadway.
We have here a smelter that recover precious metals from e-waste, but not sure if and how they pay. They handle palladium, platinum, gold and silver, but I never heard if they take cats or the typical circuit board stuff.
E-waste contains mostly copper, this is mixed in with the main melt where its cast into copper anodes which contain a small amount of precious metals. The anodes are process ( refined ) in an electylitic cell called a copper parting cell.Quote:
Originally Posted by CopperMiner
I do this on a small scale.
https://youtu.be/M2hjv6FS67g
It make a lot of sense. I am glad to learn that. I always thought that copper was more a secondary goal or a by-product of the circuit board recycling process and they were more interested to the silver and tin soldering, brass and the gold fingers.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
Reldan is a refiner of platinum and palladium.
https://reldan.com/solutions/
alloy, first...there are more than two. Hell one of them I live within an hour of. Second, those of you that think metals are going down? Do you think that because China is having a hard time digesting some debt conversions? Lets say thats the case. Most platinum is used in Chemistry anyways, not automotive. Automotive has been a relatively closed system of recycling for decades until very recently. And palladium, well the highest level of use is in modern high frequency multidirectional antennas, both in ground to satellite and tower to cell phone. (also the cell phone has palladium too). In fact the advent of 5g globally means palladium has seen an exponential increase in use. And rhodium? Well, pzev vehicles, tier 4 final emissions in trucks and prime movers, all of that uses rhodium. Gold is always a hedge, so its rise really does seem to stem from economic inflation. All of the above said, if you think anything is going to trend back down, let me know when you want to sell. Look around everybody, this is the only time when exports are much lower than expected worldwide and yet our commodities are still higher than average. Copper should be your biggest indicator of whats on the horizon for everything else.
No shortage of refinery;s that will accept and process the platinum group of metals, the source you provided does not process catalytic converters.Quote:
Originally Posted by jeb1212
This screenshot of from their web site.
https://i.postimg.cc/76XrNGPH/Screen...7-23-52-54.png
The next time you post garbage as above cite your sources or it didn't happen.Quote:
Originally Posted by armygreywolf
To the best of my knowledge there are two smelters in the USA that process catalytic converters, Metallix and Stillwater in Montana
The converter comb that supports the precious metals wash coat is made from alumina, during the high heat of the smelting process the alumina becomes a flux which enhances the smelting process.
During the smelting process base metals report the the flux as oxides, Cupellation base metals report to the cupel.
https://i.postimg.cc/c44gN2vC/Screen...8-00-17-21.png
https://i.postimg.cc/W10xsWFF/Screen...8-00-44-50.png
https://youtu.be/7SD8Nr_CUdc
Were going off topic here guys......
Is there no "Middlemen" here on the forums with some straight answers?
I have delt with middlemen and have spoken to several that gave actual numbers of what they pay and what they get after refining, this is the whole point of this post. Why give up that difference. one example is cat 1432446 was paying $503 by a "Middleman" when at the time of asking was refining for just under $860.... Do you guys get my drift? If you have hundreds of cats thats a big hit to take.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
I gave you my answer, the numbers mean nothing only an assay will reveal the true value and it's not economically feasible to have a $300.00 assay done on a single catalytic converter.
I find it difficult to believe you've been in the scrap business for 15 years and have no concept of the benefits of dealing in large volumes.
You're now coming across as a pissant you insist on being spoon fed.
Below is the ball mill that I use to mill cat comb into powder for shipping to the refinery.
https://i.postimg.cc/6pV93THK/20211028-142748.jpg
That cat number 1432446 comes up as BMW an import. FYI imports are loaded extra heavy with precious metals - the why is because the manufacture finds it more economical to give an extra loading of precious metals to exceed warranty.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
.
While vehicles made in North America manufactures are able to deal with warranty on their own soil.
Cutting out the middle man, de-can the comb, put comb into ultra sonic tank, collect precious metals wash coat then find an honest buyer.
https://i.postimg.cc/yN222Qrv/bricks.png
https://i.postimg.cc/XqsL6XY4/tank.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/TYSjVzy7/41gr.jpg
An assay on precious metals wash coat which informs me of all the elements present.
https://i.postimg.cc/RCfTV9vL/Screen...9-09-10-48.png
I'm not sure why you thought it was a dig on you, but your information was not correct, that's it. There are more than two refiners and our price indexing is not export volume demand right now. A half an hour in front of the google machine looking at indexes and futures can confirm everything I said.
Clearly you arent looking because there is a pgm refiner in Chicago, another in Ohio, another in New york and yes they are all on google to be found. I dont deal with them directly, volume reasons, since at any given time the most I have on hand is half a gaylord, they want trucks full of converters, not lowly me. But one of them I do use for boards as well. Heck you have a pgm company based out of japan that operates in California as well, and they have youtube videos, again easily searchable.
Im not derailing this any further.
@armygreywolf, So it seems you may have gone thru the same thing as I am trying to figure out. Did you reach out to the refiners and they turned you down? What do you do with the converters? Sell them to middlemen?
@alloy2 not trying to step on any feet but the answer went over my head. You keep mentioning 1 catalytic, I am not sure where I ever said we are talking about 1. The person I am trying to help has a business and does not have time to take hundreds of cats and do the process you speak of. I am trying to see if anyone who is a cat buyer/collector or whatever has went down the path of getting them refined to get full potential value.
I'll keep it simple, sell your cats to APA a long standing forum member with a positive buyers reputation that others will vouch for.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
I deal with a refiner for by board scrap, it still takes me a while to accrue the weights they require but thats what we do. Cats are no different. Except it takes me much MUCH longer to acquire enough weight. It's not my specialty, our primary source for PGMs is industrial catalysts and we deal with that a few times a year, so when we do our regular outbound I send my partial gaylord box of cats along with it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
Its a matter of math, and the big players that buy cats here will tell you the same thing, the refiner wants 40,000lbs of combs to give you the best possible prices and the most accurate returns. It can be labor intensive and machine intensive at scale too so more weight is better for everyone.
Please don't do what Alloy is doing if those are his pictures. This forum is supposed to ban advocacy of using chemical processing for safety reasons and because of the venue, people at random can see and search this with no experience in staying safe. We just had a lung scarring case at my wife's hospital trying to home game with chemical refining. I dont know what he was doing outside of home gamer caustics.
If your person has a high level of confidence in what they are buying, such as pricing from available catalogs, then yes, you can enhance your returns decanning and sending the combs out to a known refiner. Most have a 10,000lb minimum for PGMs, some will do 80 or 85% of assay value down to 2500lbs or so. It depends on who your dealing with. But ask the pertinent questions, note Alloy's assay, (although the presence of gold might mean he had other things in the assay material?) the point is make sure you get a clear answer on what materials they will recover and what they agree to pay by percent OR what the per lb charge is. Its not going to be like PCBs where high weights usually get you below the one dollar a pound refining cost...so you really need an answer to those questions on paper.
Anyways, he missed some major refiners, BASF is out in South Carolina, up until recently they only really did filter cake and industrial catalysts, but they can process combs too. Another option if you would rather the refiner do the decanning and provide you with assays by group (They have done it for us on oil refinery catalysts) GRG West is in north los vegas, they are also owned by a company that does cat buying, so lots of their work is already known value. Same as before though, you need to produce material quantity they are looking for, which is A LOT.
I'm not hear to step on toes or make people mad, there's enough of that to go around already. My goal is to do as much domestically as we can get away with. Foreign exchange of commodities always detracts.
Think on the following statment long enough the light will come on, eh maybe - maybe not.Quote:
Originally Posted by armygreywolf
Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
I appreciate that sir. Thank you.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
Legends will only talk to you if you have a massive bulk lot and they are a “middleman” not a refiner.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Porsche993
Metallix is just a snake oil side show.
Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
I appreciate that. Thank you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
There are no refineries in Chicago, Ohio, or NY. They are middlemen just as I am.
Quote:
Originally Posted by armygreywolf
I'm not talking about elemetal. All of us know what kind of service they sell. Same **** they were doing in Texas.
Quote:
Originally Posted by armygreywolf
U.S. Gold Refinery Pleads Guilty to Charge of Failure to Maintain Adequate Anti-Money Laundering Program