A Fast Nickel or a Slow Dime (Metal Scrapping Philosophy)

Whether to separate your metals or not, ti's the question. Well, there are several factors involved in making this decision. I would say the top two factors are time versus money.

An example I will use is a riding lawn mower I recently scrapped. I removed all the plastic off it, such as the lights, gas tank, seat, tires, etc., and as many nuts and bolts as I could.

AREN'T NUTS AND BOLTS WEIGHT?

Yes, nuts, bolts and screws (along with washers) are metal weight and you will encounter these items made from various metals, such as steel, stainless steel, aluminum, brass, maybe even titanium? Never know. So, overall, they are worth taking off, putting them in a bucket and dealing with them later on when the bucket is full.

Plus nuts, bolts and screws always come in handy around the shop or house and there is nothing worse than going to store to buy a pack of 10 for around $2. Plus your gas having to get there. So, I take as many off as I can or have time for, which brings us around to a philosophy I heard from a flea marketer who had all his stuff "priced to sell".

"I'D RATHER MAKE A FAST NICKEL OVER A SLOW DIME"

After stripping the mower of all the non-metals, I eventually got down to the good stuff, the engine and transmission. Aluminum and steel. Here's the problem, how to separate them. When these things are manufactured, some of the aluminum parts have steel parts pressed into them. The aluminum, to save overall engine weight, and the steel parts for strength or high impact function, like an engine crank.

Getting these parts separated takes tools, sometimes special tools, (they're special if you don't have them), and time. This is where you have to evaluate the situation. Do you have both?
If you do not, scrap it as metal and let a shredder sort it out. If you do have both (tools and time) then you can evaluate the final effort you'll make separating the two.

TIME IS MONEY

Time is money, so goes an adage, and is a very precious commodity of life. Aluminum is more valuable than steel, weight for dollar wise, but in some circumstances you can't separate the two, unless one of your tools is a big press! Yes, there is always the BIG sledge hammer and I've tried that. Sometimes the aluminum just bent, other times it busted up into shrapnel. Didn't find all the pieces either. So I lost weight, wound up scrapping the piece as "scrap metal" and in essence, wasted my time. I had scrap metal when I started, an hour later, I STILL had "scrap metal" going across the scales (minus some shrapnel).

So now when I encounter this situation again, I look at it and say: "Should I buy more tools? Or would I just rather make a fast nickel, over a slow dime".

P.S.
I'm saving the tires and rims because I'm starting a welding shop and along with a variety of trailers, I'm going to make hand-trucks also. The big rear tires will go good on a garden trailer.