Whats happening to scrap yards ? Where can you buy steel offcuts now ?

[Wolfy]

I used to love rummaging in scrap yards, it was up there with all lifes great joys.

 

I recently visited 3 old yards for general bits of steel -

 

 

• First Yard just had rack upon rack of orderly cars.....very boring.
  
• Second yard closed 2 years ago.
  
• Third yard opens occasionally but just had a few cars left.
  

I rang 3 other steel dealers and none of them wanted to sell to the public.

 

WHATS GOING ON????

 

Is this a combination of Health and Safety and Commercial values of steel?

 

Are there any good old scrap yards selling bits of metal in the South East?

 

This is really depressing!

 

grrrr :-|

[airportable]

Hi, sorry to hear of your problem. I must be lucky up here near Stafford!

Worth trying any Agricultural machinery dealers (We always tryed to help folks out) who do repairs and a bit of fabricating.

Any local blacksmiths/ fabricaters.

Good luck with the hunt for a bit of steel.

Andy.

[mike65]

Probably totally wrong but I think this had something to do with EU legislation.

I remember the good old scrap yard days when you went down there and said I want such and such for a so and so.

The bloke said yup got one of those down the back somewhere.

Of you wnet wading through the oily mud and tool of what you wanted.

 

I think the EU legislation meant that they had o have drained oncrete yards. Something to do with pollution.

Then I believe H&S decided it was dangerous to take bits of old cars, you might scrape a knuckle or something. So all parts had to be stripped by the yard.

Then there was some other rule that any part for resale must be fully labelled and stored inside.

 

Hey presto all the fun has gone. The breakers yards now strip parts and sell to trader resellers who have space to store stuff.

 

The majority of people these days seem to have no interest in fixing their cars up properly.

The extent of it seems to be fit a loud stereo, some oversized wheels and a dustbijn on the end of the exhaust.

On top of which modern cars are all computerise and electronic which makes fixing them harder. If it goes wrong you plug a compute in. Half the time toy need to reset the computer if something goes wrong.

 

The future is going to be boring, no more finding a 40-50 year old vehicle in a barn fiddling for half a day and getting it running. Try that on a modern car that has sat for 10 years.

 

Mike

[Ed Batchelor]

I would reccommend Joe Hirsts in St Maryboure, nr andover. They have a yard which is rammed full of steel, a lot of it is still imperial albeit with a coating of surface rust! Also a lot of ex army tools from a lathe to a filing cabinet!

[N.O.S.]

Not just EU legislation - business rates have taken their toll too. The government is catching up with many smaller yards which until recently could fly under the radar. It now costs too much money to store scrap - particularly given the area complete old vehicles take up.

[25 pounder]

.

 

I think the EU legislation meant that they had o have drained oncrete yards. Something to do with pollution.

Then I believe H&S decided it was dangerous to take bits of old cars, you might scrape a knuckle or something. So all parts had to be stripped by the yard.

Then there was some other rule that any part for resale must be fully labelled and stored inside.

 

Hey presto all the fun has gone. The breakers yards now strip parts and sell to trader resellers who have space to store stuff.

 

your absolutely right , EU legislations and restrictions is deadly for our hobby, In Belgium as well , scrap yards are closing down, environmental "terrorists" always find reasons to shut the yards , no concrete floor , oil and grease pollution , etc...

In the newspaper today , a retired car dealer , who still restores oldtimers as a hobby, got prosecuted because his collection of cars and agricultural tractors has grown too big (about 20) and has no facility to store it all in his shed. As the vehicles are stored outside , neighbours made complaints about storing" scrap metal" without any license . Environmental inspectors advise him to get rid of his stuff , to avoid further problems ,

Silly world we're living in -- despite all the tax money we pay -- we work about 6 months a year for our federal state , before earning the first € for ourselves !!!!:-X:-(:-(:-(

Edited June 16, 2010 by Marmite!!
quote tags added

[chevpol]

.

 

 

your absolutely right , EU legislations and restrictions is deadly for our hobby, In Belgium as well , scrap yards are closing down, environmental "terrorists" always find reasons to shut the yards , no concrete floor , oil and grease pollution , etc...

In the newspaper today , a retired car dealer , who still restores oldtimers as a hobby, got prosecuted because his collection of cars and agricultural tractors has grown too big (about 20) and has no facility to store it all in his shed. As the vehicles are stored outside , neighbours made complaints about storing" scrap metal" without any license . Environmental inspectors advise him to get rid of his stuff , to avoid further problems ,

Silly world we're living in -- despite all the tax money we pay -- we work about 6 months a year for our federal state , before earning the first € for ourselves !!!!:-X:-(:-(:-(

 

understand that about Belguim, a few years ago there was a uproar in the british railway press, the belguim national rail company authorised the scrapping of a couple of unrestored steam locos, said nobody wanted them, but they never told anybody about them!! One was a 19th century design!!!)

 

Mark

[25 pounder]

absolutely right , they rather scrap antiques here , instead of giving/ selling to anyone else,

a true shame that we've come that far , I could tell you more about the same subject , ...