scrap steel $ has me nervous.

been seeing trailers hauling old cars & trucks, all kinds of treasures, rear ends, engines..... transmissions. Trailer loads heading for the crusher. Scrap steel price is high & there are all kinds of hidden treasures coming out of barns, from behind buildings, from out in the woods, all drug out with tractors & crudely loaded onto trailers & heading for the crusher.

Around here right now a guy should be sitting at the entrance of the scrap yard with a stop sign & a check book handy.

it's just got me a bit flustered is all.

is it everywhere or what?

 

yep, $180 a ton!

 

Yes on that. The small local scrap place here processes the stuff the SAME day...meaning it gets cut up that day. I'm on a main drag and see loads going all the time.

 

thats the case around here, but the scrapyard wont crush a thing... so we are lucky....

 

same goin on around here as well , new steel plant opened last year the scrap trucks running back and forth resemble logging trucks , not sure about prices but $180 a ton sounds about right! aint a damn thing one can do when the folks with the old tin have no use for it and its quick cash for them.. i reckon times are tough , scrap prices are good..

 

It's definately going to change the hotrod/old car sport/lifestyle/whateveryouwanttocallit.. Barn finds and cheap cars are going to be even harder to find because the folks that aren't trying to save old cars will unload their cars to the scrap metal dealers. Your "you can have it, just get it out of here" finds will rapidly dry up. Cheap usable "junk" parts will be replaced by high dollar saved parts and new parts. Instead of badmouthing "hoarders", folks will flock to their auctions and pay top dollar for everything there. If you don't think this is right, just look around. It's already happening.
Larry T

 

Watch your yards. I have a mower shop and we were broken into last night. They stole customer machines and stuff off of the scrap pile - but left brand new mowers sitting there.

 

I was quoted $285 and $305 a ton here yesterday for car bodies.

 

I get $215 a ton around here. You also have to remeber there are a lot of people trying to sell the old cars but all people want to do is kick the tires and lowball the hell out of them, so now with scrap being as high they are finally able to get some decent money for it and wash there hands of the whole thing, I just scrapped a 47 olds because nobody wanted to buy it and it was in my way holding up progress so I sold some parts off of it and sent the rest to the shredder, I even stated in my ad that I was going to shred it if I couldn't sell it and people still didn't care but thought I should just keep holding on to it.

 

Yes it is the chinese money behind the high prices.You have to realize that the local scrap buyers are probably making 50% on those cars. And that is in a matter of days too! It is beyond the financial ability of guys like me to be able to compete with the scrap men. We are not going to crush ours for a variety of reasons..In about 3 or four years We plan to have an auction sale. That way hobbist and others will have a chance.All they will have to do is outbid the crusher man. It really does bother me to see those old gems gone forever.OldWolf

 

Wait a minute ,yes there are a lot of people selling and crushing stuff. But didn't this happen during WW1 and WW2? The american fighting boys needed metal to build into tanks and Jeeps and such. Whole cities went on scrap drives.

Well if they raided all the steel then, why is there so many old cars around today?

In a year when we have $4 gas ,$5 hamburger,and housing foreclosuers at all time high levels there will be a lot of Hot ROds for sale at half the prices they are at now. Save your money ,it will buy a lot more next year.

 

same here in Socal, steel prices for manufacturing have gone up 15-20% in the last 30 days, that drives up scrap $. I have seen a shit load of trucks pilled high with scrap. My son and I chased down a guy that had a '56 Chevy truck and a load of crap...........luckily someone else had already stopped him.....
There was a guy on Freecycle even asking for old car batteries.

 

ok i just had an idea
stand at the gate wit a pocket full of money and buy the shit before it goes in
give them $350 a ton and make their day and yours
tk

 

Not that I'm a huge Volkswagon fan, but it did break my heart a little to see a trailer with 4 decent Beetle bodies on it go through the gates into crush land over the weekend. He probably got a couple hundred bucks, but I could just imagine what would have happened if a die hard Volks fan would have seen what was happening.

 

they were late models then, an everyone was still busy driving them...

shit man, its $4 a gallon NOW, no need to wait for next year...

i gotta tell ya, these weekly chicken little threads are gettin old fast. we all know the price of scrap is up. we all know lotta yards are crushing out. we all know that the local vein-jabbers and rock-smokers are stealin every chunk of metal they can lay their hands on... give it a break

 

People aren't exactly lined up to buy the old iron. I've had a 63 Dodge Panel for sale now for a year and can't sell it for $400. I ended up giving my 52 F100 away to 5windowcoupe because nobody wanted to make a deal and I needed to move it. My hope there is that he will use the flathead and other parts on his A bone. I think he is pulling the FH this week and sending it to the machine shop for a look over. I hope it's useable so we can get his car on the road in the future. I was quoted $160 a ton and I'm going to haul my Suburban over there in a couple weeks. 6000 lbs at $180 a ton ain't too bad.

 

yeah I guess that's what you'd have to do if you spotted a gem heading for china.

the thing that has me so flustered is the stuff that is coming out of the woodwork, stuff that has been in my area aparently for years sitting behind the barn or out in the brush that has found it's way onto a trailer & on the way to the yard.

Just makes you think, maybe "barn finds" are more of a rare occurence than they should be.

Makes me think i should probably be looking harder

which would make the wife very happy.

I like what Old Wolf said about having an auction, give the rodders a chance to out bid the scrap guy. That's cool.

that's a good way to really sort it out, that way the stuff that has value/potential above simple scrap weight can be saved & the stuff that's simply old & not necessarily apealing to any builders can be recycled & nobody's feelings will be for the worse.

ND

 

Some crack head broke in to my house last week and made off with all my copper plumbing. It's going to cost me a couple of grand to replace it and I bet they didn't even get $100 for it at the yard. You can bet I won't be replacing it with copper though. I will be installing plastic and I will post a sign in the window stating this fact so it isn't broken in to again!

Had there been a "Nuke Detroit" button in my basement when I discovered the missing pipe I would have depressed it. I have calmed down since then.

 

the same it's happening on this side of the pond...

 

We're getting $300 a ton for heavy, and 11.75 for a hundred for full car. Ive been scraping everything for the last month....

Damn economy

 

Went to our "old car" junkyard here in Indy last saturday.

Oddly enough, got to noticing that most all the cars in the yard no longer had frames under them. Bodies are just setting on the ground.
owner said that it was a long winter and with the price of steel like it is it was a good time to get rid of the frames.

Also, the yard is up for sale

 

saw a guy drive in a 2wheel drive Chevy truck a to the scrap yard. He dove it onto the scale, got his check and a ride home. It was flatted in less than an hour.

 

I been cleaning out here. I have about 2 1/2 tons IM getting ready to trailer up.

 

It amazes me how much this topic comes up on this board, yet how so many have spelling issues with the conjugation of the word. Scrap, not scrape. Scrapping not scraping.

 

I hear you. Sad as it may be, we are to blame as well. If we weren't all tripping over ourselves to buy landfill from China, they wouldn't have an economy slowing to 10% growth this year and the prices would be where they should be.

Between the environmental movement, cities expanding to rural areas and insurance costs it's hard to hang onto "junk" these days. The cost of plating and restoration work these days scares people away as well. The plater here wanted $900 to rechrome my '51 bumper and he was less than the $2500 the first guy quoted. Who's going to attempt to rod/restore/kustomize that project in your yard when it's going to cost $3K to do the bumpers and grille, let alone fix the body.

BTW, premium is already at $4.90 gallon and diesel is $4.60. Yeah, I feel it, especially in food prices and delivery charges.

 

I could make a Volks fan cry. My neighbor just cleaned out his ravine. There were 23 beetles down there. All went to the crusher in one day.

So sad, most had been there for over fifteen years, but there were still some that were usable.

The same junk man is coming to get the old appliances out of my ravine later this week. I already fished the car out myself. My house came with about 15% of a 1929 model A. No fixable sheet metal on it, but the quarters and doors look good covering my garage walls. I couldn't figure out how to hang the cowl, so it's still in my way for awhile.
Maybe next winter I will use the old metal as templates for making new panels.

 

best said

 

Got a complete flathead Merc motor the other day for $100. The guy was haulin' the truck off for scrap and asked me if I wanted the motor. Probably could have gotten it for less, but the dude could use the money. He's been haulin' old rides off of their farm 'cause the price is up. Motor still had the Allstate rebuild tag on it with all the info. (Sears and Roebuck Company) Gotta keep your eyes open.

 

i fixed it . i wouldnt want to cause you any harmfull stress over misspelled words thanks for taking the time to point this out..

 

The store fixture company I work for does most of our business with China. Lots of steel fixtures. We can get them made for 1/4 or less what the American guys quote us... guess who we go to? Meanwhile, we have 20+ year old relationships with local metal guys practically bagging us for work, but business makes more sense to deal with China. Times have changed. Nothing lasts forever.