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I'm not really a scrapper, but recently bought a pickup truck and have a ton of car parts lying around from my previous car.
I have a fair amount of copper wire that will take quite some time to strip.
My question is, is it worth it to spend the time stripping it??
I would like to get a little more serious about scrapping metals now that I have the ability to do so, but I have a lot to learn :)
Welcome to the forum. Yes you do have a lot to learn fortunatly you have found the fountain of knowledge. First a freeby, it depends on how big the wire is, how much time you have, the price difference between insulated and #2 copper(Cu). Much has been written on this subject but in the end it depends on you. I suggest you weigh up some and strip it and compare the results. That will be the best.
Next read the sticky threads and then read what interests you the most. Seriously there is a ton of great stuff on this forum but you have to take the time to read to get the most out of it. Mike.
Welcome to the forum from Indiana...
I have found stripping solid wire to be fairly easy and worth the extra effort, where as strand wire is a PITA and not stripped.
Good Luck...
far as the car parts go, most of those(if you're talking about heads, manifolds, starters, flywheels etc) will likely go as short iron, a better price than light metals/shred/tin price. You'll need to talk with your local yards(no two seem to be exactly alike, although in some places they're very similar) as to the separation points from light steel to heavy metal
And as miked said, you'll learn a lot by reading the top stickies in the forums different categories
I usually strip 12 ga and larger and smaller goes as insulated.
definitely worth it, depending on the size off the wire and quantity of it
Well, with plugs and insulation I must have close to 50lbs of wire or more. but it's automotive and a lot of it is fairly small, I think 16ga or so.
I have aluminum heads, aluminum condenser cores, a rear end sub-frame assembly including pumpkin, and other random copper pipes, and scrap steel.
Only auto wire I would strip is battery cables.
sometimes i strip wire while watching tv, then some of the smaller wire is more worth it, because its not "work hours" its just busy hands.
I do plan on getting a wire stripper on ebay soon, one of the $50-100 ones that is eather manual or drill powered
Of course, it is worth doing so. If you directly sell the wires to scrap yard, you only get the price of wire scrap, but if you have been able to get pure metal core, the value will be added.
Or build one of the many do-it-yourself strippers from youtube.Quote:
Originally Posted by MattInTheHat
http://www.scrapmetalforum.com/scrap...bought-up.html
http://www.scrapmetalforum.com/tools...-stripper.html
I called the yard.
$1.15 per pound unstripped, bright copper.
about $3.20 per pound stripped, bright copper.
Now I just need a faster way to strip it.
I'm also considering building a small foundry in my dads backyard because after he had a stroke we need to clean up his garage and stuff, and he has a ton of scrap metal....probably quite literally.
So I think it may be better to be storing ingots instead of random steel everywhere.
that stripper is genius. I've seen the video but that isn't entirely practical for me because I have so many different sizes of wires most of them being very small.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mechanic688
You will discover that smaller than 18ga stranded is nearly impossible to strip. I have found a few of the smaller ones will work with my striper but it depends on the insulation. Mostly not worth it for me. So I strip the larger stranded and and even small solid wire but I have lots of time available. Mike.Quote:
Originally Posted by GRNDPNDR
http://www.scrapmetalforum.com/tools...-stripper.html
12 gage or larger dia.for me.Had a bunch of 14 gage Romex and some of it was near impossible to completely strip.Just not worth the labor to me.Sold the remaining wire for 2$ a pound(I believe)
Strip a few pieces of your number two wire and get an idea of what the % recovery is and represent your #2 ICW at a fair % and you will get paid a little better than the board price.
None of it is worth stripping unless its MCM wire but then if you have a 85-92% recovery wire you will get paid not much under a #2 copper price. You have to bulk though. If you have a couple pieces it would be worth stripping to get Bare Brite if its not tin plated.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GRNDPNDR