7 Jul
2005
7 Jul
'05
10:25 a.m.
At 01:20 AM 7/7/05 +0100, you wrote:
Recycling is a big thing here in the US. You should push that aspect to
the businesses and universities. But you need to do it on large batches and
not just on the one or two computers that you may want. My buddy that owns
the surplus store in Melbourne gets a LOT of his stuff for free from
companies and individuals that want to see the stuff recycled instead of
filling up landfills. He's just gotten a deal to get TONS of computers
In most places in the US you are NOT allowed to hunt for anything in the
landfills and will be arrested if you take anything out. Yes they are VERY
strict! The key to sucessful computer hunting is to find the companies
that buy or are given old electronics for recycling (not the get-rich-quick
3rd party resellers, although you can OCCASIONALLY get a good deal from
them). The recyclers tear the stuff down for the aluminium and other
materials and they only get pennies per pound for scrap so they're
frequently willing to sell the intact stuff for a reasonable price as long
as it doesn't contain any **GOLD**. They get real protective over things
like the old HP and Tektronics that contain very much visible gold or heavy
aluminium.
Joe
In message <1120502180.10023.68.camel at
weka.localdomain>
Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
You're right. The asshole SPAMMERS have virtually kiiled the news
groups! But I've had some luck getting items for specific systems by
posting on news-groups. I got a lot of offers for systems, manuals, etc
when I posted on the Z-100 news groups. Blanket request for "old computers"
or Ebay-able Altairs are meet with distain but if you show a real interest
in a particular system you'll usually find someone willing to help or
donate items.
The other thing that helps is to set up a website and ask for unwanted
systems on it. Again, blanket request for everything old are generaly
ignored but if you show a strong interest in something and ask for specific
systems you'll get offers. I got three of my Intel MDSs that way. Also I
offer to BUY the things that I'm interested and didn't pretend to be museum
and ask for the stuff for free. I'm amazed at the gall that some people
display when they ask for valuable systems and not only want me to give it
to them but also expect me to pay to ship it to them!!! A good example is
the guy in Hawaii that bugged me for months wanting me to GIVE him my IBM
5100 and pay the shipping (by air!) from Florida to Hawaii!
Most of the stuff I get (albeit for the museum,
not personally) comes
from local usenet groups,
Tried that one - most of the uk.leeds.*.forsale type NGs seem to be full of
asshat spammers and such. Oh how I miss my spam-filtered cis-dfn newsfeed :( or the university - it's at the stage now
I think I mentioned the "destroy everything" attitude the local universities
and colleges share. from KSC for FREE for exactly that reason. FWIW Most of
the stuff that he
gets is modernish PC but I've gotten a LOT of goodies from
him. He's the
one that turned me onto the PDP-8 stuff that Thom had. He's also the one
that I got the 20 or so Intel 830s with bubble memory from. And just last
Tuesday I found a boxfull of DEC cards and a pile of Cromemco S-100 cards
in his board scrap. I wasn't there to save the Cromemco but the cards are
certainly worth getting. The important thing to keep in mind about places
like his is that they don't keep the stuff around any longer than possible.
It's common for stuff to come off the delivery trucks and go directly to
tear down. Particularly the OLD stuff (the kind of stuff that we want!) So
you have to check them FREQUENTLY. When it gets really busy (like it has
been for the last three weeks) I go there everyday if at all possible. Even
then things come in and get torn down before I find them!
BTW this brings up an important point. I've gone out with a lot of
different computer hunters and I was shocked to find out that most of you
fail to look through the baskets of cables and old boards. I ALWAYS find
lots of goodies in them! For example, I went with Gary Hildebrand to
computer recycling place in Topeka Kansas and he had just been asking me
for some 1Mb ICs for the Commodore Amiga computers. When we got the the
recycler's we looked through all the computers (I found a black B&H Apple),
then I went and looked through their board scrap and found not just the ICs
that he wanted but they were also on original Amiga boards! Gary was
shocked! He said that he'd been to this same place many times before but
never thought to look in the board scrap! Besides computer cables, cable
scrap almost always includes hings like logic analyzer pods and
oscilloscope probes that make good trading material.
where the local population seem to know to chuck
things this way. I've
only recently joined the local freecycle group, so I'm not sure how good
that'll be in terms of stuff yet.
I'm on the Leeds freecycle group - haven't seen anything interesting yet.
> Landfill / scrapyards in the UK don't seem to be anything like their US
> counterparts according to what I've seen on this list - there just
> aren't items there for the taking.
I've noticed that too :-/
There is stuff out there anyway - you just need
to give people a prod
every once in a while and get yourself noticed as someone who can give
this stuff a home.
Time to put something of a virtual classiccmp museum on my website then, I
guess.
Later.
--
Phil. | Acorn Risc PC600 Mk3, SA202, 64MB, 6GB,
philpem at philpem.me.uk | ViewFinder, 10BaseT Ethernet, 2-slice,
http://www.philpem.me.uk/ | 48xCD, ARCINv6c IDE, SCSI
... Even a blind pig stumbles across an acorn now and again.