Scrap Yards: A Love/Hate Tale

[mrbillbus]

I was at the scrap yard Friday getting rid of the latest load of electronics breakdown metals. Copper, aluminum, wire, brass ... $140 = LOVE

There sits a skid of x-ray sheeting. Several of pieces were corner flashing that had no glue or drywall paper. Of course this yard has a no resale rule for lead.

I tell the scale man that I should stand out front with a cardboard sign "will buy your lead for more $$ than these guys".

Grrrrr, stoopid rules = HATE

[osteodoc08]

That's only so they can hoard it and have it go to the owner/employees.

Why wouldn't someone MAKE MONEY on your local patrons and have a good relationship with them and have repeat customers. The policy sounds a little short sighted to me.

[largom]

Several scrap yards I knew of had the same policy. The reason they gave was liability risks for hazardous material. The one yard that did sell scrap sold at a price 5 times over their buying price.

Larry

[bhop]

larry how did you know what their buying price was? were you actually trying to sell some lead *gasps* tell me its not true

[largom]

No I was not selling. I called and asked their buying price and if they would sell to public. I did not ask their selling price at that time.

Larry

[bangerjim]

I was at the scrap yard Friday getting rid of the latest load of electronics breakdown metals. Copper, aluminum, wire, brass ... $140 = LOVE

There sits a skid of x-ray sheeting. Several of pieces were corner flashing that had no glue or drywall paper. Of course this yard has a no resale rule for lead.

I tell the scale man that I should stand out front with a cardboard sign "will buy your lead for more $$ than these guys".

Grrrrr, stoopid rules = HATE

Can you say........."BLUE STATE?" Many lefty states are on the anti-lead EPA bandwagon. Here in AZ we do not have that problem. Scrap yards are my #1 source for pure, lino, alloy, hardball, solder, tin, etc. All at ~$1/#. I do not mess with range lead or WW's anymore. Mix my own alloys.

banger

[Mechanicalmayham]

In PA scrap yards have to post their prices buying and selling. Most people I know do a little horse trading and walk away with out an exchange in money. I also wheel and deal with other patrons. I was scrapping some old steel weights, cleaning out friends garage and they were rust something fierce, so guy at scrap yard offers me $50 bucks for the whole set before we ever drove into yard. Done deal. I also offered a guy $20 for his scrap lead. He had vent flanges and lead pipes from a house he was redoing. I ended up with about 50lbs. usable and 20lbs. unknown alloy. I get lead for free mostly so I tend to pay a little more without concern. I have never seen scrapyards separate any lead in my area. just kinda goes into a huge pile of misc. lead.

[Cherokee]

When my local scrap yard opened up, they couldn't be more helpful and would save lead for me. 18 years later they don't seem to be interested in selling anything to the public; I've even been told to come back another time, they were too busy to sell me anything. On the plus side, I did get a lot of WW, tin and hight tin alloy from them way back then for great prices.

[jsizemore]

My scrapyard treats me great. I keep his lead bin clean and he still charges me the same price I paid the first time I went there. I seperate the zinc and steel from the lead before I pay. I split cable sheathing and save him the cost of doing it and he dropped my price 20%. Saves unfired ammo for me to dispose of and sales me brass at his cost. I pay cash be it 20lbs or 2000lbs. Gotta love it!

[Bjornb]

Several of our local scrap yards are under contract to sell all their metals to Chinese buyers. They don't even have a sales mechanism any more. A few small local guys still exist, but there is rarely any wheel weights or other lead available.

[tbj555]

My local yard will sell me lead but its a cash deal only, and they must know and trust you.

[evan price]

Most of the places I was getting lead have gone under a management change and now won't sell me lead or buy brass casings anymore. Heck, one of them now has the place posted no CCW. And they won't even let you go into the building where they sort and weigh, so you can't see the scale...thye just hand write a ticket and you get what they write.

Luckily I still know a few places where cash is king.

[Hardcast416taylor]

I started building a relationship with the local scrap dealer waaaay back in the early `70`s. I still pay market cost for what I buy from him, but I don`t get the O`bummer two step from him about buying anything. He has a problem feeding an AR-15 of late `60`s vintage, every now and again he finds several boxes of factory ammo in a bag on his sales counter as a token of respect from "The Masked Plumber"!Robert

[Lefty Red]

I guess I am lucky. My local scrap yard sets aside soft lead for me. :)
Of course it helps to know that two of the workers like to shoot LEE REALs in 50 cal, the office manger's husband shoots a 45 cal Maxi Ball, and another guy shoots 54 cal ball. And I just happen to have those molds on hand. :)

Lefty

[mold maker]

All the local scrap yards have been bought by an investment group and wont even discuss selling anything. They're eager to get you unloaded and off the yard.
Its over 30 miles to one that sells and his prices are outrageous.
Sure glad I built a big reserve, a long time ago.