Scrap Metal Buying Guide

Non-Ferrous Metals

Non-ferrous metals, including copper, aluminum, brass, nickel, lead, and zinc, are known for their tensile strength and present characteristics that hold an advantage over ferrous metals, mainly by their malleability, lighter weight, and corrosion resistivity.

As such, non-ferrous metals have a higher value than ferrous metals.

There are also other factors that determine a non-ferrous metal price:

• Non-ferrous metals make up a small percentage of the scrap metal recycling industry but, by value, they make up more than half of the industry. Nonferrous metals are harder to come by making the supply low and the demand high.
• This drives the prices up. Aluminum tends to remain steady due to general recycling efforts (ex. soda cans) but other types of non-ferrous metals, such
  as copper and brass, can fluctuate widely in prices.

Employees should consider that all of these factors serve to make non-ferrous metals the most lucrative opportunity at Wall Recycling.

Copper #1

• This term refers to tubing, piping, or wire-free of fittings, insulation, paint, solder, heavy mud, grease/oil residue, and other materials. Wall Recycling will often accept Copper #1 even with trace amounts of visible oxidation on the tubing.
• If there is a trace of burnt wire it CANNOT be classified as Copper #1.

Sheet Copper

• As the name states, this form of copper is typically thin, flat molded sheets of copper.

Used Beverage Cans

• Self explanatory. This is used soda or beer cans free of excessive moisture over 2%.
• Be sure to keep an eye out for steel cans.

Turnings

• Shavings as a by-product of the manufacturing process including boring or grinding.
• Must be free of excessive oil, steel, and moisture.

Cast Aluminum

• Aluminum that has been involved in the casting or mold after having been heated past the melting point.

Old Sheet Aluminum

• Old sheet is a self-explanatory term to describe the appearance of thin, flat pieces.
• OS should only contain steel attachments less than or equal to 5% and must be clean and free from iron, plastic, rubber or other attachments.

Aluminum Painted Siding

• Clean, low copper aluminum siding scrap. This includes but is not limited to painted sidings, gutters, downspouts, leaders, and trim coils.
• Any siding must be free of steel, glue/adhesive, plastic coating, iron, fibers, foam or fiberglass.

Aluminum Extrusion

• A process by which aluminum alloy material is forced through a die with a specific cross-sectional profile. Most extruded shapes: angles, channels, and round tubes. No excess felt, rubber, plastic, zinc, or cast aluminum allowed.
• 6063 aluminum is the most common choice for extrusion with its excellent extrudability, high corrosion resistance, and ability to be formed into complex shapes.

Aluminum Rims

• Clean rims – No wheel weights or valve stems, no steel. Paid out at market value.
• Dirty rims – Contains wheel weights, valve stems, steel. Paid out at 1 cent (￠) less than market value.
• Chrome rims –Contains chrome cover. Paid 13 cents (￠) less than dirty rims.
• Truck rims (6061 cast) – Paid 13 cents (￠) less than dirty rims.
• CLAD rims – Contains plastic adhesive on the front. Paid 24 cents (￠) less than dirty rims. Can be bought as Aluminum breakage.

EC Wire

• 99.9% aluminum that is free of insulation, burnt or corroded wire

Aluminum Breakage

• Aluminum with contaminants such as steel, rubber, plastic, excess dirt.
• For purchasing purposes, a load of at least 50% aluminum is most desirable.

Aluminum Conductor Steel Reinforced

• Aluminum conductor steel-reinforced cable is a type of high-capacity, high-strength-stranded conductor typically used in overhead power lines.
• The outer strands are high purity aluminum, chosen for its good conductivity, low weight, low cost, resistance to corrosion,
  and decent mechanical stress resistance.

Starters

• Copper core surrounded with a casing of either steel (less value) or aluminum (more value)
• Identifiable by the unique star piece found at one end of the starter called a pinion

Electric Motors

• Small motors generally about the size of a basketball
• Large motors generally are larger than a basketball but less than 2,000 pounds
• Over-sized motors weigh excess of 2,000 pounds and can vary in value depending on application

Aluminum vs Steel Flex Wire

• Flex wire is a metal encasing that provides protection for conductors, cables, and wires.
• Both have high mechanical strength and flexibility.
• Flexible metal conduit is often referred to as “Greenfield”

Die Cast

• Die casting refers to a metal casting process that is characterized by forcing molten metal under high pressure into a mold cavity.

Power Supply

• A power supply is a hardware component used to supply power and provide cooling to a computer.
• It can contain wires and circuit boards attached to it. It may also consist of capacitors, transformers and aluminum heat sink and steel screws.

Motherboard

• A motherboard (also called mainboard, main circuit board, system board, baseboard, planar board, logic board, or mobo) is the main printed circuit board in general-purpose computers.
• It holds and allows communication between many of the crucial electronic components of a system, such as the central processing unit (CPU) and memory and provides connectors for other peripherals.

Mid grade boards

• Appearance is typically blue/green board.
• Each board holds some silver or gold.

Disk Drives

• In computing, an optical disc drive (ODD) is a disc drive that uses laser light or electromagnetic waves within or near the visible light spectrum as part of the process of reading or writing data to or from optical discs.

Heat Sinks

• A heat sink is a passive heat exchanger that transfers the heat generated by an electronic or a mechanical device to a fluid medium, often air or a liquid coolant, where it is dissipated away from the device, thereby allowing regulation of the device’s temperature.
• At a basic level, a heat sink is a form of extruded aluminum.

Prepared vs. Unprepared Steel

• Prepared steel must be no larger than 2 feet by 3 feet in size. Prepared steel is single dimensional steel that is in 3-foot sections or smaller.
• Unprepared steel can include materials larger in size than prepared materials and will need to be cut by shear or torch in order to create a prepared material.
• #1 vs. #2
  • #1 Steel is any piece of steel 1/4 quarter inch thick or more.
  • #2 Steel includes materials thicker than 1/8 inch, or any galvanized / blackened steel.

Heavy Torch Steel

• Heavy torch steel is any steel that cannot be cut by any means except from a torch, exceeding ½ inch in thickness.
• Heavy torch steel cannot be run through a shredder, nor can an industrial shear head shear it.
• The only way to prepare heavy torch steel for a steel mill is to physically cut it with cutting torches.

Heavy Breakable Cast

Heavy breakable cast is a grade of cast iron. The weight specifications of this metals grade must measure more than 500 pounds.

Clean Auto Cast

• Clean automobile cast, better known as “auto cast” is a specially processed grade of scrap.
• Free of all steel parts, except camshafts, valves, valve springs, and studs.

Appliances, White Goods, SHRED

• Recycling appliances involves destruction of the equipment to recover materials, generally by shredding, sorting and grading.
• Main types of appliances that are recycled are televisions, refrigerators, air conditioners, washing machines, and computers.