These centres seem to be commercial outfits, presumably awarded the contract by the council. And they probably expect to get some form of reimbursement for the stuff they recycle as part of the deal. Apparently, the scrap metal ends up at our local (commercial) recycler and I'm sure they get a payment for each delivery.

I'd agree it's better to rehome this stuff directly but there must be a danger of a lot of backhanders etc if they were allowed to have people browsing and carting stuff off, so the jobsworths have doubtless set a simple policy of no removing goods. Certainly that's the case in the places where I've been. Sounds as if you have vaguely sensible people at your local dump.

The same jobsworths here have also decreed that no vans or trailers are allowed without a commercial permit. So if you hire a van you aren't allowed in and if you have a load of crap to get rid of you have to use your car, not your trailer. So of course the builders and tradesmen simply acquire large old estate cars which they fill to the gunnels. Hardly a surprising outcome.

Murray

And then 'they' wonder why so much rubbish is fly-tipped.

Brian

There's a woman in charge at our recycle centre , and previously she told me they all take good stuff home and put it on ebay..and they reckon on doing £200+ a week on top of their wages . She will sell you things but at the right price ! Once, i lobbed some old ali saucepans in the Ali skip, and clocked some large billets of Ali in the skip ! I picked one up , 10" long, maybe 5" diameter , bored 1" with a keyway… beautifully machined ,not a blemish…Maybe a floor sander/linisher roller? There were 6 off.. Come in useful eh ?? I carried one over to the portacabin to ask how much , and she went absolutely potty…hysterical almost , as I'd taken something out of the skip..

10 minutes of calming her down , I dragged her over to the skip to show her what i wanted , lent in and picked up another ,as she screams again

"Look , I just told you you're not allowed to take things out of the skips !!!"

"But I'm going to buy them….! How much are they? "

"I haven't said you can have them"… Blah blah..

I knew i was going to win , as she's so greedy , and I had a tenner in my hand .. I scored all 6 for a pound each, and she thought she'd done alright too, which i suppose she had

Had some rubbish in the boot to get rid of. I was passing a "dump" that I hadn't used before and thought it a good idea to pop in. I got told off because I didn't reverse into the marked parking bay. When I asked what difference it made I was told "Health and Safety mate, health and safety". There was no one else there at the time!

The county's gone H and S mad!

Ours had a Police raid too. There had been numerous shed and garage thefts , and the guys at the recycle yard were selling the stuff , pretending it had come in as "dumped".( I expect the misery woman knew…)

I did wonder why someone would dump the Honda 4 stroke brushcutter and unused Mini Belle concrete mixer I had previously bought there..

Edited By Hacksaw on 23/12/2017 17:50:34

.

If only they were all so enlightened !!

My last attempt to buy anything from ours [adjacent to the Anson Museum] went roughly as follows:

Me: Could I buy the lens and mirror unit from that OverHead Projector, please ?

Jobsworth: No, we can't sell electrical equipment

Me: But I only want the lens unit … it just slides off the column

Jobsworth: NO, it's electrical … we can't sell that !

MichaelG.

Makes me realise how lucky we are here. Our local centres, across the county, have separate sections for card, paper, metal, green waste, clothes, shoes, oil, fluorescent tubes, general rubbish, rubble, soil, etc etc. The only restriction appears to be on asbestos where you can only dump about three roofing sheets per year, subject to a free permit and correct wrapping.

And no: I do not work for the tips…………..

James.

Edited By James Alford on 24/12/2017 09:22:41

I tend to get stuff from skips rather than the municipal tip. Best finds so far: 1800 x 900 x 6 steel plate, now my main bench top, 1200 x 900 x 10 6082-T6 plate. Shortly to be soft vice jaws and anything else needing ali plate.

Pallets are so useful, firewood and shop benches have been my main use for them, however I made a 250 kg swl A frame crane at one point from a number of 8ft pallets, and proof loaded it with my 650 kg 2CV. Used that, and a beefed up pallet based garden table to get my shaper out of the van. Then used a pallet based trolley with 4 skip rescued castors to move it about. Not sure I've bought more than 3m of timber in the last 13 years despite doing a good 50% of my work in timber. All pallets or trees people don't want.

Yep,it is truly amazing what people throw away.

Regards

Richard.