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I have a chance to buy all the electric motors from my place of work. The cost is 19 cents per Pound. I told them I would give one weeks worth a try and see if I could make any money stripping them. So I purchased 507 lbs. this week. My question is do you think its worth the effort.

CU Baker wrote:I have a chance to buy all the electric motors from my place of work. The cost is 19 cents per Pound. I told them I would give one weeks worth a try and see if I could make any money stripping them. So I purchased 507 lbs. this week. My question is do you think its worth the effort.

Big motors or small motors? Big motors might be worth it, small motors, no way.

CU Baker wrote:I have a chance to buy all the electric motors from my place of work. The cost is 19 cents per Pound. I told them I would give one weeks worth a try and see if I could make any money stripping them. So I purchased 507 lbs. this week. My question is do you think its worth the effort.

Any type of processing effort will kill it. Your place of work already knows this.

Your margin will be really tight.

What kind of motors are they? Do they work?

Think beyond scrap.

The scrap yard by me pays .16 cent a pound.

I get $.25 a pound for them can be copper or aluminum wound. Are yours all copper? You would not want to break down aluminum wound ones. Are you going to break down the ones you have, to see how much copper? You may make some on this but its going to take some time. What were they doing with the motors before you started buying them?

The motors were going to the scrap yard at the same price. I can get twenty five from another one and they will pick up over a thousand pounds. The plant is switching over to all stainless housing on the motors, and thought I could make a little more on that. This load has one in it, small motors up to one that weighs 125 lbs. But the volume could be huge. We have four plants within a six block radius, Barrel of Fun, Tuffys dog food, Nut head, and Kenny's Candy. I just got the ones from BOF for the week.

If you have the right tools and work on your method, cutting up large motors can be an effective use of your time.

I know a guy who works at a yard and cuts up compressors and large motors all day long. He prefers Metabo brand grinders as they last a lot longer. However, usually they are buying the compressors at or just above steel price, and the motors for between $0.15 and $0.20/lb.

I think I can get $0.30/lb right now for electric motors, but that's dealer price and I haven't sold any lately.

What I would do: save up enough for the other company to pick up for $0.25/lb, while experimenting with cutting up the larger pieces. Find the minimum size that is worth separating, and keep everything else intact.

If these are functional industrial motors you mght consider listing them by make and model # in the commercial side of Ebay.

I just got $.32 for em's in West Virginia
you are wasting time taking them apart id find all your local scrap yards and call each one and ask to talk to the person in charge of pricing and work out a deal for a lot of weight. I did it just this past weekend and it got me from $.25 to $.32 just for electric motors on thousands of pounds that is a lot of money

What type of motors are these? HP? voltage and phase?

Can you burn the motors? Life is better if you can burn them. That's how we do motors and dry type transformers.

silversaddle1 wrote:Can you burn the motors? Life is better if you can burn them. That's how we do motors and dry type transformers.

What does this mean? "Burn the motors"?

Do you mean, burn off the plastic?

Thogey wrote:

silversaddle1 wrote:Can you burn the motors? Life is better if you can burn them. That's how we do motors and dry type transformers.

What does this mean? "Burn the motors"?

Do you mean, burn off the plastic?

Yes, as in toss then in a fire. We strip them down and burn them to make it quicker to recover the copper. We only do this with larger motors/transformers. It's worth the time.

I cut up med sized motor. mostly fans from AC equipment. I get Winding price for the copper or Varnished #2 depends on which is higher that day. I use an air hammer to cut and get the windings out. The ends are al also.