Granulator/wire stripper help

Hello -


This is my first official post, sans my intro. (I JUST WENT BACK AND READ THROUGH IT - SORRY. MARK TWAIN ONCE SAID, [B][B][B]"I DIDN'T HAVE TIME TO WRITE YOU A SHORT LETTER, SO I WROTE YOU A LONG ONE.")


I have had relative success in purchasing wire lately (I've been in the business for some time, but I just see more monetary opportunity this way)


Currently, i have a stripping machine. The SDT WRA 40.

I do like it, but some of the problems I'm having is that it's just taking too much time to operate. It's great on the feeding end, but unless you have a person standing by and picking up the ends, separating the good(copper) from the bad (sleeves/plastic/rubber), then it's not the most useful in terms of LBS/Hour.

I've been looking at a granulator for the past year or so. There are quite a few on the market and I've noticed that quite a few members have experience with them.


I typically like the stripped wire better because loss is minimal since you can sweep up the shards that fall, not to mention a drum full of stripped wire is a pretty nice sight.

Anyway - just as I'm ready to pull the trigger and upgrade the company, buy the granulator and blah blah - I start really looking closely and I have a couple of questions:

1 - What size (small to big) wire can be fed into the granulator? It seems these costly systems are saying the machines can handle stuff like communication, vehicle and motorcycle wire. Which, is a pretty small diameter. I do a lot of household wire up to zero gauge wire. Will the machines handle most of this or just the small stuff?

2 - Yesterday, I asked my scrap yard (they're an exporter and the highest prices are paid by them) what granulated copper would be considered? Because I'm wondering if it's worth doing my "bright and shiny", "#1 copper", etc, etc separately or just throwing them all in the granulator at once. He told me he would have to see it, but he said it would be like copper borings. HOW DOES THAT MAKE SENSE? It's just chopped down to size. He said I would get less than #2 pricing. That seems kind of odd.

3 - In anyone's experience, which granulator would be a good choice? I'm not talking about spending 100k - I'm more in the 20-50k range. I will upgrade as I grow. Right now though, I'm drowning in wire and cannot strip quickly enough.


If there is a stripper out there that can handle big loads or something that say a scrap yard or industrial site would use, please, let me know. All my searches have led me to the type that I have now. Or, if anyone has tips in quicker separation methods AFTER the wire has been stripped, please again, let me know. I wondered if you could do it like the granulator separator, but that probably wouldn't work as the lengths are long compared to the pellet sized copper the granulator spits out.

I'm open to any and all suggestions, comments, hate, hazing and whatever else you want to do to the new guy who wrote a really long first post. Also, I sincerely apologize if I'm posting in the wrong section.



Lastly, to cover myself, I did do a lot of searching before writing this post. I am not one who appreciates laziness when on a forum. I always search first to see if I can find the answers I'm looking for.

Tom,

Thanks for the reply. When you say, "Not worth it," what are you saying isn't worth? Don't granulate or don't turn in for borings?

I agree that it's a rip off, but I also don't think my buyer knew exactly what I was talking about. Because he said, something to the extent of copper shavings from a machine shop. I tried to clarify, but there is a language barrier.

I don't expect the granules to be bright and shiny pricing as it seems every scrap yard in California doesn't call thin wire bright and shiny. In fact, they call thin wire (non-coated copper) #2 copper, which is just so bogus. But, fortunately, it's only .10 difference in price.

The problem with bailing and selling on recovery is that I pay high prices for all of the scrap wire I get. I don't get anything for free. I'm just basically stripping it down and creating margins for myself which consist of .45-.65 per pound if I purchase locally. If I can purchase wire from more inland areas at a lower rate, then my margins are as high as $1.25 lb. My whole issue is how much can I process per hour per machine, whether that machine be a stripper or granulator.

I actually have no interest in purchasing wire from guys who already strip their own. I always encourage my sellers that if they want to spend time stripping, I cannot beat the scrap yards price on clean copper. On the other hand, if they don't care to strip, I like to purchase #1 65% wire, beating the local yard's price. It's the easiest for me to strip and it's fairly quick. Especially solid core. If that's all I had all day long, my life would be a lot simpler.

Tom - being that you work for a large recycler, do you guys strip wire?

on the thin wire, i have seen people post links to industry standards for grading, and there is a min wire size for bar bright. I don't know it off the top of my head, but a lot of stranded stuff doesn't make the cut

Originally Posted by MattInTheHat

on the thin wire, i have seen people post links to industry standards for grading, and there is a min wire size for bar bright. I don't know it off the top of my head, but a lot of stranded stuff doesn't make the cut

Correct. I too don't remember the exact thickness, but really, I woudn't mind not getting bare bright prices as long as I got #1 prices after granulation.

BTW I promise you that you will regret spending a dime on a granulater and you'll be selling it like everyone else sooner rather than later.

Originally Posted by miked

We have couple members who do granulate wire and thats how they make a living. My experience is your priority is to make as much money per hour possible, thats true for all. So I would take advice from others with a grain of solt. On a small scale like me I can strip any wire I want and since I consider my time nearly worthless its always an increase in money in my pocket. It seems that you are in a different ball park than I so there are people who will tend to guide you into a direction that may benefit them. Having said that if I was considering that large of a purchase I would take a substaintial representative load to the sellers location and check your recovery rate for real. One individual who is a wire granulator told me that how the machine is adjusted determines how effective it operates and determines the rate of recovery. I believe there are many buyers of the output from the granulators but I would expect you to have to contract to delivery certain amounts.

Volume should talk so you may need to find another buyer while you get more info on the granulators and potientional buyers of the granulated Cu. I know the videos on youtube would make you believe that the copper just drops out all the same size and clean and the insulation side only drops out insulation. If it works that way why are others using seperation tables with water and vibration? Best of luck, Mike.

Thanks, Mike.

I was hoping those members would hop on and give me some insight.

The funny thing is, there is all this granulator talk and it's all over the web, yet, I haven't ever seen one in my area. But, maybe because I only deal with exporters. I have no idea.

I'm just trying to gain some wisdom here.

Originally Posted by miked

We have couple members who do granulate wire and thats how they make a living. My experience is your priority is to make as much money per hour possible, thats true for all. So I would take advice from others with a grain of solt. On a small scale like me I can strip any wire I want and since I consider my time nearly worthless its always an increase in money in my pocket. It seems that you are in a different ball park than I so there are people who will tend to guide you into a direction that may benefit them. Having said that if I was considering that large of a purchase I would take a substaintial representative load to the sellers location and check your recovery rate for real. One individual who is a wire granulator told me that how the machine is adjusted determines how effective it operates and determines the rate of recovery. I believe there are many buyers of the output from the granulators but I would expect you to have to contract to delivery certain amounts.

Volume should talk so you may need to find another buyer while you get more info on the granulators and potientional buyers of the granulated Cu. I know the videos on youtube would make you believe that the copper just drops out all the same size and clean and the insulation side only drops out insulation. If it works that way why are others using seperation tables with water and vibration? Best of luck, Mike.

Mike is dead on. If you granulate and they reach in for a handful and find contamination you're screwed. By no means am I trying to misguide you. We're the largest recycler in the world and can't get the pricing to buy granulated copper from larger yards to make it profitable. But the bottom line is if your doing the volume you should be making the money, enough to buy from the small guy who strips even if it's at a nickle or dime a lb profit

Originally Posted by tombuysscrap

Mike is dead on. If you granulate and they reach in for a handful and find contamination you're screwed. By no means am I trying to misguide you. We're the largest recycler in the world and can't get the pricing to buy granulated copper from larger yards to make it profitable. But the bottom line is if your doing the volume you should be making the money, enough to buy from the small guy who strips even if it's at a nickle or dime a lb profit

Tom,

I don't do enough volume to make enough profit (and I mean a decent living) at a nickle or dime a lb profit. So, I must come up with an alternative to just buying, bailing, selling.

As I said, I've been stripping. Not by hand, not manually. With a machine. Now, my machine is nothing too fancy. It cost about $2k and does a good job. The problem is, I need to speed up the process, otherwise, I'm not making a whole lot per hour of work. If I could work 24 hours a day, I guess it wouldn't matter. But, I do have a family and a life and I would rather not be working all day long.

Can you tell me exactly why you guys can't make money on granulated copper as opposed to #1 copper? I'm not trying to start a debate, I'm just really curious now.

For example, if I come in and sell you 1 ton of copper #1 - you would buy it and profit, right?
But if I come in a sell you 1 ton of granulated copper - you can't buy it because there is no margin for you?

WHat I can't figure out is how there is no margin for you after granulation? What does consistency have to do with exporting it? I'm just confused.

When I say a nickel or dime a pound profit I mean for the people that already strip wire. There's no reason to turn away that business. You should get better than joe price at your yard. If not go elsewhere. As for granulation you should be able to get number 1 copper price. But most large scale granulators are expecting near bare bright price, which is my fault for categorizing you that way You should definitely be able to get number 1 price for clean chops.

Originally Posted by tombuysscrap

When I say a nickel or dime a pound profit I mean for the people that already strip wire. There's no reason to turn away that business. You should get better than joe price at your yard. If not go elsewhere. As for granulation you should be able to get number 1 copper price. But most large scale granulators are expecting near bare bright price, which is my fault for categorizing you that way You should definitely be able to get number 1 price for clean chops.

Well now I feel a bit better

I was never expecting bare bright after granulation. I was just hoping for #1 and I'd be happy. Because my margins are fairly good (even if I match the big yards pricing for unstripped) I don't care if I don't get bright and shiny price. As long as I'm getting #1, I'm okay because the machine would do a lot more product than any number of strippers and save me from hiring a lot of people.

Originally Posted by NWOdrudge

wonder if that machine would work for you?

THanks drudge

That type of wire, solid core, is the easiest stuff for me to strip. I wish I could buy that ALL day long. Now, if that machine did that to stranded wire, that would be something else.

If you find something that does that with stranded (10-14 gauge) let me know.