What Do You Do With Your Metal Scrap?

[TGenDS]

Hi All,

I'm a relative newbie to engraving, and I practice *a lot.* I practice mostly on copper and brass (though working with steel is ahead).

As the result of my frequent, rigorous practice sessions, I generate *a lot* of scrap. It's a lot, but it's probably not enough to make it worth my while to take to a refiner. I'm totally fine with milling my own precious metals for the jewelry I make (when it becomes either necessary and/or more cost-effective to do so), but I've never milled any of the base metals. Do any of you melt down your own scrap? If not, what do you do with it? At some point it needs to "go out."

Thanks in advance.

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Hi Tamra and welcome to the forum.

If it is only brass, copper and other non precious metal I would simply throw it all in the rubbish.

However, gold is worth keeping

Cheers
Andrew

 

[Sam]

Hi Tamra. Nice to see you here, and welcome

You can certainly find a scrap buyer for brass and copper. You might weigh a practice plate and then figure out what its scrap value is worth. I suspect it won't be much.

 

[Willem Parel]

If it' not for the money you can do it for the envirement, recycling of all metals is very important today.

 

[Martin Strolz]

For copper, brass etc. the scarp metal dealers offer approx. Euro 7,- per kg.

 

[John P. Anderson]

I don't worry about the little stuff like the saw dust and such with copper or brass. With silver I've tried to capture every little bit but it's a real hassle. Sawing isn't to bad but when I'm carving the chips fly halfway across the room. I have no idea how much I loose.

Someday I'll take all my silver scraps, melt them down and use it for pendants or rings.

My dad was in the scrap metal and junk business for many years. They were the original recyclers long before it was cool to be green. It's more a duty than a money maker.

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

If its Titanium, you can throw that away too.

arnaud

 

[Willem Parel]

As a goldsmith I have a vacuum cleaner that I only use for the workshop.
Together with all the dust fom the polishing machine I send it to a company that gets all the gold and silver out of it.
Recently I did send it to them and in it was 270gram pure gold and a lot of silver.
It was the outcome of about 6 years collecting all the stuff.
So even the tiny chips on the floor are worth to collect with the vacuum cleaner, I am aware that most of the gold came out of the polishing machine but every little part that counts.

 

[rod]

Trivia: What is the source of the phrase: "The whole ball of wax"?

Rod

 

[diandwill]

With the practice plates, date them and you have a visual record of your progress. They don't take up much room, so are easy to store. For the floor sweepings and vacuumings, I have a 5 Gal bucket that we empty the Vac and Polish collecter into, to be sent to the refinery, bench sweepings are a little more concentrated so are put into a quart jar, and precious metal scrap sheet and wire becomes earrings, pendants rings and whatever. Use it all...it all has a use.
Remember too, that graduating from 2"x2" practice plates to 6"x1" in copper, brass etc. makes into a bracelet, 2"x1" nickel money clips are available at Rio Grande pretty cheap. There are usually inexpensive knives at Smoky Mountain online. They all make inexpensive practice plates, but can be given as gifts to friends and family, showing them what you are doing, and creating a market for personalized pieces to sell, as your skill level grows.
As Barry Lee Hands says, "Think outside the box? What box?"
p.s. Remember that hand engraving is something that NOBODY DOES anymore, in most peoples minds. You are embarking on a voyage that is beyond many peoples beliefs, and they don't see the slips and nicks, the mis-cuts that you know are there. They will just be thrilled!

 

[McAhron]

Make some Mokume

 

[mrthe]

A very interesting answer to make to all the folks will be too ....when you work in the vise engraving precious metals wich methods or tips do you use to recupere pe save the lost of the metal?

 

[Andrew Biggs]

I just use my fingertip and scrape the gold into a dish. But then again I'm only an engraver not a manufacturing jeweller so there isn't a lot of gold to recover.

I figure that in about 30 years time I may have enough to get melted down

I was talking to one guy that worked in a jewellery manufacturing shop with a lot of staff and they had about a kilo a month that went back to the refiners.

Cheers
Andrew

 

[mrthe]

Wow a kilo a month is a lot of gold and a lot of money ....around 50,000 $ !!!

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Yip....I just about fainted when he told me that.

And that is only the scrap that they collect............. so goodness knows how much is actually sent out the door made into rings and other jewellery items!!!

Maybe we should apply for the floor sweeping job in the factory!!

Cheers
Andrew

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

mrthe, I have to check the gold price now, over here Kitko says 41.000 euro, let me know if I can sell a kilo for 50.000 in Spain.

arnaud

 

[TGenDS]

Holy cannoli! Thanks for the responses! --And for the welcome greetings! [Hi Sam! ::waves hello:: --I haven't forgotten--still working through planning/logistics. ;-D and ;-S]

Good ideas everyone--very much appreciated.

Yeah, it's pretty much as I figured. --Not really worth it from a monetary standpoint perhaps, but for the environment, recycle anyway--absolutely. [Like many other resources, we've got to hit "Peak Copper (or name-your-resource/metal)" at some point--in which case, we *all* might want to hang on to our scrap and let it accumulate for later. I read somewhere that, at some point, copper might be more valuable than gold (but what hasn't been already--salt, tulips, egret feathers...). ;-D]

Anyway, I think I'm going to be grabbing a five-gallon bucket--I'll just toss them in there for now. --I will indeed keep select ones to show progress (or to document my plate-maulings which result from the occasional bench-tantrum when you KNOW the graver shouldn't have slipped and swearing just doesn't feel good enough...)--awesome ideas, Diandwill--thank you!

McAhron--My mokume-billet-making days are O-VER. --I have obsessively-compulsively scrubbed my last (and gazillionth) plate!

Andrew--That manufacturer probably sends in EVERYTHING--sandpaper from sanding, carpet under bench stations, etc. For that kind of return for gold, platinum, etc., heck yeah!

Thanks again, All. --I absolutely love Engraver's Cafe--incredibly-awesome project, Sam--and kudos to the other mods who help out as well.

 

[mrthe]

Arnaud you can sell all the kilos that you want heare in Spain for 50,000$.......but Maybe you will lose some money,like i had Say a kilo heare cost around 50,000$
41.000€ is the same price that i buy gold heare if you make the exchange today 41.000€ are 50,360$

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Ok mrthe, I wasn't thinking in dollars, you are right.

arnaud

 

[rod]

Andrew wrote: "I just use my fingertip and scrape the gold into a dish. But then again I'm only an engraver not a manufacturing jeweler, so there isn't a lot of gold to recover". I figure that in about 30 years time I may have enough to get melted down "

Andrew, 'the whole ball of wax' originated, so I am told, thusly:

You can see in Diderot's 18th century encyclopedia some very nice prints of various craftspeople at work (Dover reprints are worth owning, and not expensive). The silver and goldsmith's shops had wood gratings on top of the regular wood floor. These were lifted periodically, and the sweeping refined for precious metals. Of course each worker had their "skin" hanging in front of the bench to catch metals, just as they do today. When work finished for the day, each worker washed their hands, the water draining into an S bend catchment with was drained out and refined periodically. Finally, a ball of beeswax was rolled over the workplace and tiny metal filings stuck into the wax. The 'whole ball of wax' was periodically melted and the sweeps refined for metals. So go get your ball of wax, Andrew?

When silver was at $5 per ounce, spot, scrap was only $2.50 an ounce. My silver workings were mostly chips and turnings from my lathes, hence mixed up in other things, and not quite worth my labor to sort things out. Now silver is through the roof, even after recent reduced prices, spot is $27 approximately, so scrap silver is a must to save. I finally weighed up my scrap sterling stash of many years and sent it to Hoover and Strong last week. It was pretty clean. I had 146 troy ounces (4.3 kg) of silver scrap! That is my weighing, the refiner's pure silver weight is what counts, I will hear soon what it is.

I do have to take a deep breath now when buying sterling at today's prices.

When turning solid gold ornamental rings for flutes, I put a clear plastic bag over my work on the lathe, puncture through the bag with my turning tool, and cut while looking through the clear bag. All gold chips fall within the plastic bag, hence are saved, and free from other mixed swarf around the lathe. I melt the gold chips in a scooped out charcoal block, reducing oxygen in the molten gold by stirring it with a freshly cut small green twig from a tree. Why, ... the green twig wants to burn, but underneath the surface of the molten gold, it can only draw oxygen from the gold, and helps to purify the gold. I then cast flute keys with the gold, using cuttle fish bone as the mold.

Rod