Has anyone ever scraped large industrial circuit breakers? Seems as though there should be a good amount of copper or even silver in them. Anybody have any ideas what and how much is in them?
Before scrapping any large breakers, check out the web and see if they still have value. We scrapped a huge UPS that had 1000 amp breakers in it. We sold the breakers for over $1000.00 each. Check E-Bay too, as they sell good there as well.
Yeah, I've had some luck selling circuit breakers too, though never quite THAT good. But some of the stuff I have is just junk. And there's just no market for certain breakers. I've broken open some smaller circuit breakers and there's copper in there. I can't help but wonder if some breakers might have some silver hidden in there.
I scrapped a bunch of breakers when we replaced the old panel in our house. (It was a 1970s or 1980s Federal Pacific panel...scary stuff). It was a lot of work for a little metal, but swinging that hammer can be good therapy...
Almost all breakers will have silver contact points brazed onto the copper. Almost all I said. Even some of the small ones from houses will have the silver contact points on them. I cut the point off and sell them on e-bay.
Circuit breakers
Forum Locked
Posted - 04/08/2010 : 21:48:03
