How to make more money scrapping metal

How does one make more money scarpping metal...well, the answer is that knowlege is money....and power.....but for scrapping it means more money.  Lots of people scrap metal by picking up washers, dryers, refridgerators etc and selling them to scrap yards as it.  You can get steel price which is just a few cents per lb and try to get a lot of volume to make some good money.  At my local scrap yard, this is what you need to do to make $200 per day.... you can sell them:

3,334lbs of steel at $0.06 per lb.....thats a lot of lifting....
833lbs of car or lead acid batteries or copper bearing motors at about $0.24/lb..sounds easier to me..
400lbs of aluminum at $0.50/lb.....now we are talking...
223 lbs of insulated copper wire at about $0.90 per lb.  My back is feeling better already.
125lbs of brass at $1.60/lb  WOW thats better
83lbs of NO2 Copper (71lbs of bare bright) WOO HOO!!!

Now, is there anything worng with scrapping loads and loads of iron and steel for money?  Absolutely not!  The problem that a lot of scrappers have is that they just don't always know what is inside what they are scrapping!  You can make more money by doing just one simple thing, cut the cord.   BOOM you are getting paid 10x more per lb for that.  Scrapping a water heater?  Take the two minutes to remove the brass and copper fittings on the top and side and POW!!  You are making 20X more money for the same weight! 

I've been scrapping for a few years now and still, every time I go to the scrap yard I see people driving in with trailers of things like dryers that still have the motors on them, breaker boxes with wires hanging out, and a lot more.  I can make more money with my little Chevy Malibu than some folks make with a truck and trailer. 

What is your time worth?  Is it worth it for you to rip out motors from appliances?  Ultimately that is your call, but if you have just a few small power tools it is really easy to pull out the more valuable parts and bring them back home for when you don't have any scrap to pick up.  Use down time to remove that copper out of the washing machine motors or to cut the copper off of aluminum radiators. 

If you feel it would be worth your while, learn about how much copper there is inside of a furnace or boiler so the next time you pick one up, you will have a better idea of how much it is really worth.  Here are just a few common things and the more valuable metals they contain:

microwave:  Some have stainless steel.  Inside there is a huge transformer, 1-2 copper motors, aluminum, wire, silver mylar, power cord, brass in the plug and on the magnetron

Hot water heater:  brass and copper fittings on the top and side.  not usually anything on the inside.

Washing machine: insulated wire, brass plug, huge motor with copper and aluminum, transformer

Dryer:  thick insulated wire that is easy to strip down to bare bright copper, large brass prongs on plug, insulated wire inside, electric motor with copper and aluminum, transformer

Fridge:  power cable with copper and brass, compressor with copper (must be drained of freon first) copper tubing, electric motor, transformer.

Go online and look on YouTube for scrapping videos, there are tons of them that can really help you make much more money scrapping metal.