Real Canadian Scrapers

[nat_ster]

At one time I used to drive tow truck, and have always liked to bring a Junker home for parts, and / or fix. As long as I drove tow truck for local law enforcement, they turned a blind eye to 11 vehicles in my back yard in town. Current bylaw at that time ( three years ago) stated that I was only allowed 2.

After I quit operating tow truck, things were fine until they transferred out the bylaw officer for a new one. With that change, my back yard also had to. The problem is I had no equipment to haul, or tow vehicles.

So my solution was to cut up any vehicle that had to go as cheap as possible, so I could load the pieces by hand. With that in mind, I fashioned a ax to cut the steel, out of half the flat bottom spring from the dodge truck it would cut up. For a handle a 2.5 foot chunk of 1” pipe. No grip, just the pipe to hang onto.



To follow you will find the pics of the last 3 years of scrapping, and how I’ve gone from having almost nothing, just needing to clean my yard, to now having a 38 foot Cummins powered school bus converted to a roll off tow truck, and making more than 50% of my living from scrap. Please enjoy, and thank you for looking.

Nat

[nat_ster]

Now for the pics. They may not be in perfect order as the old ones are from 3 years ago.







The ax laying on the truck bed.















Nat

[nat_ster]

Nat

[nat_ster]

Sometimes a 1” cold chisel and a 4 pound hammer was needed to brake the spot welds.

















Nat

[mini]

that looks like way too much work...

[Boons]

Its called a sawsall dude...

[nat_ster]

Nat

[nat_ster]

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[nat_ster]

Nat

[wahlstrom1]

Originally Posted by mini

that looks like way too much work...

This....

I see your mini battle ax, and raise you a torch! Fire works quicker.....

[nat_ster]

Just to see what would happen, I set the truck seat on the fire pit, and touched it with the cutting torch. Let’s say if your seat belt was stuck, after 30 seconds you would be dead, 240 seconds you are crisp, and the seat fabric and foam is completely gone.















Nat

[nat_ster]

Part of the parts I brought the truck home for.









Nat

[johny5.0]

thank fuck you dont live next to me , hacking a truck apart with a home made axe is about as hack as it gets

[nat_ster]

Originally Posted by mini

that looks like way too much work...

Never too much work

Originally Posted by Boons

Its called a sawsall dude...

Sawsall is not as cheap and i didn't have one yet.

Originally Posted by wahlstrom1

This....

I see your mini battle ax, and raise you a torch! Fire works quicker.....

Originally Posted by johny5.0

thank fuck you dont live next to me , hacking a truck apart with a home made axe is about as hack as it gets

Remember guys, these first pics are from 3 years ago.

Nat

[nat_ster]

91 Subaru Justy I got for $50. I was going to make a mini 4x4 out of it. Front wheel drive till you press the 4x4 button on top of the 5 speed gear shifter. Then the rear would kick it. But I didn’t have the space, so I kept the driveline, and scraped the rest.

















Nat

[nat_ster]

My little dog looking for mice.











Nat

[nat_ster]

Nat

[nat_ster]

My old 1986 Chrysler Laser with a 2.2 L, 5 speed, no turbo. I bought the car with 187,000 km for $1100. Drove it for 4 years delivering pizza and driving 120km a day round trip to work. The fuel pump quit again at 430,000 km. By that time I only had $1900 into it. Cheapest miles I’ve ever driven. I kept it around a few years with intentions of fixing it as I had really good memories of the first few years of being married. But it’s time to go had come.

Into the dump trailer with a farm jack as a winch.







After it’s crushed.



]

[nat_ster]

1986 ford bronco 2 that used to be my wife’s family unit before I got her the 91 Astro van. It twisted the rear drive shaft, and working out of town, and punching a 60 to 70 hour a week time clock, I never got around to fixing it. So after a few years of sitting, I took her to the scrap yard. My wife has missed the 4x4 ever since.

















Nat

[nat_ster]

Nat

[nat_ster]

Nat

[nat_ster]

A 70’s ford ¾ ton I found a few years earlier while towing. Got it for $150, pulled the flat deck off for my Dodge, and sold it a hour later to the neighbor 3 houses down for $150. So it worked out that I got a free flat deck, that I later striped the outer 3”x3” angle iron off, used it on the current flat deck on my 91, then sold the rest to my old towing boss for $400.

















Nat

[nat_ster]

A demolition derby car we picked up at a cattle feedlot. Kids helped me chain it down.









Nat

[nat_ster]

A few from a acreage clean up I did last year in 2010. By this time the equipment I’m hauling with belongs to the guy I subcontract part of my work from. It’s a 2003 Dodge 3500, 5.9 Cummins, with a 20 foot bumper pull Sea Can shipping container trailer. It has two 7000 pound axles, a 8,000 pound Warn winch and a live roll on the back. That combo with a couple of High Lift jacks, scrap is starting to move well. Scrap at this time is up from $30 to $50 a ton.















And one from the same year, but a different acreage.



Nat

[nat_ster]

Now for the pics from this year.

This is one from a acreage we cleaned up after someone that worked at the dump lived at for 23 years. A few dump loads of miscellaneous steel that was left laying on pallets from a farm Auction over 10 years prior that now was grown up with grass. We also had 5 dump loads of steel rings from inside old, gas powered clothes dryers, that the man had kept for fire rings.

And this





A acreage where a woman wanted to put her RV were the bush had grown up around the vehicles. After we pulled them out, we used the tractor with the PTO powered rough cut mower to mulch up the 5” and smaller trees that had grown there.



I stepped up to using the same guys 40’ Sea Can trailer. It’s got 3, 7,000 pound axles, two Warn 16.5 winches, one front, one rear, 40’ deck with 8’ tongue that can be loaded. Truck and trailer are 65’ long.



Where we are pulling them out of.









Nat