Scrap prices are up, and i'm depressed

I work at a large recycler, everyday I walk the line of crushed cars due for the shredder. its like death row

 

You almost have to stand watch at the gates with a pocket full of cash!!! Sad!!

 

same thing is happening around here, the yards are not allowed to sell even parts off the vehicles, perfectly useable rust free vehicles being crushed.

 

scrappers are really starting to annoy me

 

It is sad, but you can't save everything. If some people need the cash to keep food on the table and nobody is buying the stuff otherwise, hard to blame them. Pretty hard to take when actual good stuff gets crushed by fools though.

 

In not depressed or one bit sad im elated!! We just sold 50 batteries this week. 30 cents a pound =$528. All these years Ive have been enduring derogatory remarks and actions from those neighbors & relatives who are pretty police. Now they comment (do you know what all that junk is worth)? When there wasnt a ready high dollar cash market I was considered just Nuts or crazy. Now that Im weathy(At least on paper) I am merely eccentric.Im going to start hauling all the old appliances next. Eventuallly working to cashing it all in before Im 62 in a couple of years. Nobody will have to worry about them sittin and rotting anymore. All the while they have been sitting and rotting they have been growing in worth as scrap. Ive been watching the hoarders channel on TV. Im not quite as bad as them but it could easily happen. Seeing that show made us face reality. We made a big hard decision Heck the wife and I are gonna cash it all in and spend the money. Do our kids a big favor and leave nothing to fight over when we die. Oldwolf

 

The even sadder alternative is when the sheriff calls in a crushing outfit, and crushes them all without the owner getting any money for it. Talk about depressing!

I mean, I spend umpteen dollars to buy 3 future projects and 3 parts cars, the neighbors complain, and the sheriff comes in and does that? I'd be pissed!

But it happened on the other side of the county just recently.

 

cant save them all! i have a lot of scrap copper, left overs from work, i have a good 300 to 400 lbs. at 3.60 to 4.20 a pound thats 1000 buck easy! free money that would have gone in the trash. its sucks that someone would scrap a good old car, but the way things are its no surprise that they are cashing in.

 

if i take one ton of scrap in i get $70

 

Just got word that a local private yard will be crushed out as soon as the road half loads are off. I just don't have time to strip them all....

 

You are being scalped. Here in Pennsylvania $13.00 plus / hundred weight.

 

I know that it will would eventually come to the local county goverment doing that here. In the local city it is already happening. It a catch 22 they need to be licensed& insured& acessed or you need to have a buisness license and be taxed for buisness inventory. They can cite a health hazard or pollution also. Im located at a busy highway intersection and you cant hide from the satelite view. Times are changing. You cant be acessed or taxed for a wad of cash in a fruit jar. Better for me to do it than have it done to me! at least I will get a good price. We plan on loading up every sunday and being first in line every monday morning. starting with the non automitive and precious metals first. OldWolf

 

There are different prices for different .
Yes I hate to see an old car / truck crushed but you have to also understand that most of the people scraping and buying cars are just trying to feed their families . I am sure the take what they can sell off before the scrap yard gets them . Also there is more of a turn around for a salvage yard to sell and keep the newer car and the older ones get axed . It's just management of the property you have to work with to turn over the all mighty dollar to pay your help and bills ! It's a business and that's just the way it is . I am not a big fan of the crusher but it's business.
There was a salvage yard not far from me that I just found out about when winter hit and the crushing started so when were able to go back they were all gone ! Was good parts in there but the crusher is faster than we can pull the parts .
People have to survive the best they can so don't get made at them . They are just trying to feed their families !
If you want to complain , bitch at the people that sell the old cars for nothing !

Retro Jim

 

I was at a model 'a' and 't' collection auction a couple weeks ago and i watched scrappers bid against each other buying pallets full of NOS pistons; gear sets; cranks; blocks; heads etc. I am not exagerating - there were over 130 pallets stacked full of model 'a' and 't' stuff and most of the bidding was from scrappers.

 

I dunno if you get it over there but here in the UK theres been bouts of cars being stolen purely for their scrap value!! its about £130 gbp per tonne atm plus £5 per alloy and £10-£35 if the car has a catalyst. Alot of the pipe smoking flat caping wearing old boys over here would rather see a car scrapped than rodded. I even got told the day after completing the restoration of an austin mini some years back that it should be scrapped!

 

......I heard the reason for the high demand for iron is China.....its a shame to use good America iron, made in America to be sent over there......then they sell back to us some cheap China steel.....ever try to weld that crap?.....Okay America.....bend over a take the proper position again...you all know what comes next...

 

Clean copper (ie; no solder or other bits tagged on ) is bringing almost £5000 per ton..no wonder people are cutting pressurised refrigeration lines and live electricity cables to weigh in... not so long ago you had to pay to get a car scrapped..

 

I just took a 86 Chevey 4X4 1/2 ton in to scrap steel yard,had extra SBC in back, At $230 a ton came out with just over $550 cash in hand. Line ups waiting to get on & off scale!!! These places have more $$$$ than a bank to keep paying out all day!!!!!!

 

[. Im located at a busy highway intersection and you cant hide from the satelite view. thats bullshit!! last county asshole that came by my place showed me a satelite picture and my reply was "is somebody pissed off that lives on the fucking moon"? "damm racoons are are turning me in again"! i have guys stop and leave frustrated when i don't extend any hospitality towards them plus the shotgun makes them kinda nervous!

 

look fellas,don't get all worked up about stuff you can't change.There are still alot of cars out there and most of you will never finish the stuff that you have now.The Peta people don't like us killing animals and eating them ,the preachers don't like us coveting thy neighbors wife,the greenies don't like us useing gasoline.
Just don't have a heart attack over this crap.Work on the stuff you got ,hug the little ones and love the pretty ones,life will go on.

 

I think you need the sign that is in my avitar. oldWolf

 

I say this is bullshit! Why can't we reprocess out own steel?? It might just put some folks back to work!

 

Actually we do reprocess quite a bit. There is a steel mill near Blyteville Ark. that makes bridge beams and other products from scrap. Its named Nucor Yamato. Another At newport ark makes Rail road plates & spikes Also owned by forieghn investors. Al Gore and unions drove all the old big mills out of buisness. The China buyers are what raised the prices. Used to be if you sold any scrap no matter where you sold it a jew was involved in the transaction. They controlled the scrap buisness worldwide and kept the prices low. Now the chinese have bypassed the jew brokers and furnished cash to folks to buy for them. The competition is very good for prices. Those ships that come here full of goods to be sold in the US they wont return back empty. They are loaded with the Raw materials to make more cheap goods to sell in the US. Good or bad right or wrong that is just the way things are. OldWolf

 

i dunno if anyone can answer what im wondering, but if i'd seen an old car before it got crushed, why wouldnt the scrap yard sell it?? Even if i pay more than what the scrap value is worth? Just wondering thanks
damn shame some of these cars went out the way they did.

 

Let's clarify that a bit. Americans aren't willing or able to work for the same prices/hr. that the Chinese and other countries are, so the businesses packed up shipped out. Many because they had no choice and many to keep the max. profits coming in. Not making any judgements, just the actual facts.

When you are personally ready to work for those kind of wages along with the rest of your family, kids and towns, let somebody know. I am sure they will have more than enough work for you. Until you are ready to do it yourself, then not much validity in blaming others for not as well.

And just to be clear, we're talking about $1-2 per hour at best. Let me know when you are ready to sign up to set a good example.

The environmental stuff actually added very little cost to the bottom line, a percent or 2 at most. Small price to pay for having some decently clean air to breath and land to live on.

The fear factors are just convenient excuses and blame deflecting.

 

I beg to differ.The environmental Rules caused the open hearth mills to close. The coutinious casting mills like the bethlehem plant near gary indiana lasted a few years longer. But the mills like the nucor mill at blytheville ark where more competitive. The blytheville plant doesent have a union. However the blytheville ark mill does pay pretty good wages. I have a friend who works there he is a crane operator he earns over $80,000.oo in wages. Of course he puts in overtime. My brother was making $60,000.oo plus benifits for a 40 hour week back in the seventy,s at the gary indiana mill. The burns harbor plant was built buring the sixties and it was ageing and becoming obselete before it closed. Those smaller newer mills are more efficient and its much cheaper to smelt scrap than to make new steel from raw ore. Back in the day coming up I57 driving the semi I could see the pollution cloud from Kankakee Ill. Smelled it just south of Chicago . It smelled like money? OldWolf

 

Why didn't you bid one dollar higher than scrappers and save it from being scrapped? If they were scrapping it, they absolutely would have to pay far less than scrap weight to make a profit and the whole gig worth their effort. So you could have bought the NOS parts for less than scrap value(?)

Unless the scrappers were paying above scrap weight and were planning on reselling to A and T restorers?

 

the last two times scrap prices reached a high, i had to politely escort a dude off my property with the business end of a .357

tweakers hit residential areas pretty quickly around here.

 

I see plenty of stuff for sale that's not being bought. If it were, scrapping it wouldn't be a viable option.

 

you guys know that americas biggest export is scrap metal, its what little left that we make.