Hey, just a few images of what’s around the yard. Apple blossoms always nice to see but I missed the best by a day ( no phone on me at the time).
I just finished putting on the mower deck. I treated the bottom with old candle stubs found in dumpsters. I used a heat gun and melted the candles onto the exposed metal surfaces. Hopefully this will keep grass from sticking and rusting the underside or the mower
Will Facebook ever die? No, not when there are groups such as “Dumpster Diving in Canada Eh!!!”
Dumpster diving: Its not just for hobos and people living under bridges. Real heroes save useful items from the trash every day. People with careers, investments and a desire to reduce waste poke their noses into garbage bins to scrutinize what businesses and individuals are throwing out.
As Kayla on the above mentioned group shares, stores don’t usually like people diving in their bins. However, I have had some success with this route. it takes some practice to “sell” your request/idea to get a favourable response. My friends and I sometimes go “Day Binning”, but be prepared to talk and schmooze the backdoor workers. It can be even more rewarding! Many people have guilt when ordered to throw out good/useful commodities and your “recycling effort” alleviates their guilt, and you are golden: you now have permission to be there!
Just a little picture of how I’m processing these discarded transformers.
After crushing you separate the copper windings similar to getting the peanut out of the shell to eat – while drinking beer of course!
The end result of 28 transformers in about 3 hours. The steel weight is 45lbs. The copper 9lbs. Using today’s unusually high prices here is the result:
| Before Value | After Processing |
|---|---|
| Steel: 45lbs x $0.12/lbs = $5.72 | |
| Copper: 9.0 lbs x $4.43/lbs = $39.87 | |
| 55 lbs x $0.25/lbs = $13.75 | Net gain: $45.59 – $13.75 =$31.84 |
| Time spent = 2hrs |
The last line represents the question: What is your time worth?
You have to recognize that I was “working” for minimum wage – or worse. (Scrap metal prices are quite high in 2nd Q 2022, inflated almost 50% over averages ). I would call it working in the loosest terms since I was doing it my own way [beer / no beer, music loud / music soft ]. I was listening to my favourite show from Twit Networks and having fun. Work? No.
If you plan on doing this for a living, there are much faster ways to process scrap transformers, and these transformers are some of the smallest I have ever broken down. Too small for a full time scrapper to bother with.
No pictures wer taken of the huge window coming out, or the new windows going in. It would have made a great blog post, however it would have been too long. It took most of an afternoon. I thought the old windw would be around 350lbs but it was more like 450 lbs. In order to make the window, measuring 10′ x 5′, fit into my trailer I had to chop it up.
I found that the sill was made of really good fir. I decided to trim off the bad parts and save what little I could.
