So it begins...

Discussions about scrap yards, scrap yard prices, melting, refining, and obtaining metals from scrap or unconventional sources.

So it begins...

Postby mtalbot_ca » Mon Aug 27, 2012 7:19 pm

I am a very small scale scrapper. I usually go to the scrap yard once a year, I empty my minivan early that fatefull morning, fold the seats and take everything in. Feeling the excitement, the night before, the feverish anxiety in the fresh morning air, it is quite a feeling.

Once at the scrap yard, I feel pride, knowing that my metal is sorted, cleaned from foreign material (when possible) and ready for recycling. I chat with the people at the yard and look at those huge piles of metals....

They hand me my bill of sale, I look to make sure that everything is there, go to the cashier and they give me four crisp 50$ bills a year's worth of metal. I feel happy, but then, about an hour after getting back home, a suttle but very real feeling emerges, the feeling of emptiness. I look around, no metal to be found...all gone. As I pounder if it is worth while to pursue such an endeavour one more year, I decide to take a beer and rest of the front porch. My mind goes around in circles, but then I remember the year before.... I reach for my beer, I look at the refreshing mist that comes out of it in the mid-day sun as I open it, and then just like that, I toss the cap in my empty pail, where I put the small stuff, and I say to myself, so it begins....

(I know it is a cheesee sorry at times, but (aside from the mist and the sun part) it is all true. ;) I am sure you'll cut me a break what can you say I speak french.

Cheers,
Common sense should prevail if not, misery will.
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Re: So it begins...

Postby reddirtcoins » Mon Aug 27, 2012 7:37 pm

... and I can hear the narrator saying, "mtalbot_ca, sitting on his front prouch with a newly aquired FREE beer saying, ...this is the life!
"Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold."- Leo Tolstoy
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Re: So it begins...

Postby OneBiteAtATime » Mon Aug 27, 2012 10:01 pm

LOVE IT!!!!
"pray like everything depends on God and prepare like everything depends on you." -shinnosuke
"It does not take a majority to prevail... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."- Sam Adams
"Thanks to God that he gave me stubborness when I know I am right." - John Adams
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Re: So it begins...

Postby silversaddle1 » Tue Aug 28, 2012 3:59 am

Hey buddy, it's not just you. We are a full time, year round scrap operation. When I take in a load of scrap, I get the "start over" blues as well. But it never lasts too long.

Best cure, save one thing, like #1 copper. Save, save, save. Set a goal. Keep saving that #1 copper even when you clean out the store room. Then you will always have some metal around! :D
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Re: So it begins...

Postby mtalbot_ca » Tue Aug 28, 2012 6:46 am

silversaddle1 wrote:Hey buddy, it's not just you. We are a full time, year round scrap operation. When I take in a load of scrap, I get the "start over" blues as well. But it never lasts too long.

Best cure, save one thing, like #1 copper. Save, save, save. Set a goal. Keep saving that #1 copper even when you clean out the store room. Then you will always have some metal around! :D


Good advice. Thanks!
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Re: So it begins...

Postby INTRINSICK » Tue Aug 28, 2012 10:55 pm

silversaddle1 wrote:Hey buddy, it's not just you. We are a full time, year round scrap operation. When I take in a load of scrap, I get the "start over" blues as well. But it never lasts too long.

Best cure, save one thing, like #1 copper. Save, save, save. Set a goal. Keep saving that #1 copper even when you clean out the store room. Then you will always have some metal around! :D

Yes great advice.i too am a small time scrapper. I hoard all my clean #1 and #2 copper... I sell everything else and buy silver so im just trading one metal for another.still feel empty tho
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Re: So it begins...

Postby silversaddle1 » Wed Aug 29, 2012 4:46 am

INTRINSICK wrote:
silversaddle1 wrote:Hey buddy, it's not just you. We are a full time, year round scrap operation. When I take in a load of scrap, I get the "start over" blues as well. But it never lasts too long.

Best cure, save one thing, like #1 copper. Save, save, save. Set a goal. Keep saving that #1 copper even when you clean out the store room. Then you will always have some metal around! :D

Yes great advice.i too am a small time scrapper. I hoard all my clean #1 and #2 copper... I sell everything else and buy silver so im just trading one metal for another.still feel empty tho


That, my friend, is good advice!
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Re: So it begins...

Postby maoguinn » Wed Aug 29, 2012 8:47 pm

I save #1 copper as well. Scrap everything else to buy silver. ;)
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Re: So it begins...

Postby saltydecks » Sun Sep 02, 2012 3:31 pm

Yea empty buckets can be depressing haha.
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Re: So it begins...

Postby Hades12 » Sun Sep 02, 2012 5:50 pm

I save my brass all year and only take it at christmas
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Re: So it begins...

Postby flbandit » Wed Sep 19, 2012 7:50 pm

I don't do too much anymore but I did find a way to always have some metal. As I bring stuff in, I tend to focus on one type for the next run, and let everything else stay. I go about every couple of months, so I always have at least a little metal around.
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Re: So it begins...

Postby TheJonasCollegeFund » Sat Sep 22, 2012 11:09 pm

Story needs girls in it somewhere!!!

Wheels, beer, money.....where's the girls!!!

Now that's some reading!!! :clap:
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Re: So it begins...

Postby mtalbot_ca » Mon Sep 24, 2012 8:47 pm

TheJonasCollegeFund wrote:Story needs girls in it somewhere!!!

Wheels, beer, money.....where's the girls!!!

Now that's some reading!!! :clap:


Believe it or not, but my wife is now helping with the scrap metal. :shifty:

Since my daughter wants to go to Guatemala on a cultural exchange and she needs to raise quite a bit of money, so to help, we are all sorting nickels which we will offer here and we collect scrap metal. :shh:

Cheers,
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