The city of Rochelle is looking to acquire a WW II 65 ton Whitcomb locomotive but we want an estimate for scrap value to present to the company that owns it. This value could be used as a tax right off for the company if they donate the unit.

Currently HMS 1 (Heavy Melting Scrap, 1/4 inch and thicker, smaller than 24x60 inches non-galvanized) is around $130/ metric ton (2,204 LBS). Copper in electric motors is about $0.22/lb

Any idea how much copper might be in the traction motors? That would be my biggest unknown.

Any help would be appreciated. Looks like our mayor is on board and the company wants a written offer.

Steve

Is the engine museum material, or basically a shell? It would be a shame to see another rare diesel get planted in a park outside at Rochelle.

Wasn't it built in Rochelle??

By museum material, I mean is it potentially operational.

Anyone know what happened to the one in Henry, IL? Whitcomb #13591

13591 is not a valid Whitcomb b/n. The highest number is that series (gas/mech.) was 13248.

http://www.youngstowniron.com/gv_pricing.asp

Here in Youngstown heavy melting scrap unprepared is $75/ton. Electric motors .20/lb.

The locomotive would weigh 58 long tons x $75/ton is $4,350. I wouldn't separate out the motors and generator as it takes labor to get to them, and such labor would negate the higher value of the motors.

A scrapper bidding on it would probably not go any higher than $2,500 due to the cost to him of cutting it up and hauling it to the scrap yard. Many people who try to place a scrap value on locomotives forget to think that steel mills cannot charge entire locomotives into their furnaces, and there is a cost to cutting up the components into parts small enough to be charged into the furnaces.

It's amazing that it took four posted to get an answer to a question related to preserving an engine.

I think Hot Metal is right on the scrap man's ballpark offer but, depending on your requirements, you could justify a higher donation value if necessary.

Regards,

Art S.

Remember that IRS rules prohibit a recipient of a donation setting an assessed value for the donation for the donor for tax purposes--or so I've been most repeatedly told. It's incumbent upon the donor, not the recipient, to deal with the IRS on this "value" issue.

That being said, what Brother Rowlands said is correct: one has to calculate the cost of breaking the metal down into manageable chunks. I've watched scrappers who thought they were going to make a killing scrapping a piece run out of acetylene (and lose their shirt) repeatedly over the course of three weeks when they planned to have it done and gone in one week.

If they can make the (unlikely) case that someone would pay for the parts or motors, they could raise the figures just a bit--but you're still only talking a couple thousand bucks at best.

Alexander - you are correct, the receiving organization should not provide a value for any donation. However, an outside source may provide it, but it should be made clear where that value is coming from. As stated, there is a huge difference between the scrap value and operating worth of a locomotive. The cost of cutting up a locomotive can be huge. However, if the parts can be used and resold elsewhere, that does raise the scrap value quite a bit.

Timing is everything in commodity markets and scrap prices have been very low lately. Most locomotives have at least some reusable parts that help increase the value, but that is unlikely in the case of an elderly Whitcomb, especially if it has long obsolete (Buda) engines.

Union Pacific recently auctioned a large group of locomotives. While the EMD switchers had significant resale value, the big GE's appear to have gone for little more than scrap, ranging from $14,000 to about $40,000. Based on the relative weight of your locomotive, this might give you a rough value range.

https://www.proxibid.com/asp/catalog.asp?aid=102394&ipp=100&sort=0

Alan Maples

The company that owns it says that the engines do run (not original Buda engines) but the traction motors are going out and the expense of fixing them is not worth saving an old locomotive. The Illinois Railway Museum probably doesn't have the interest nor money to save this unit as they already have a similar GE unit and moving it from Mason City, Iowa would be very pricey. The city is looking for two more bids (have one already) to move it to Rochelle and it surpasses the scrap value by at least a magnitude of 10.

Steve

Absolutely. All Whitcombs prior to 1952 were built in Rochelle. I believe this unit was built in 1944. It is a war baby and the company says it saw service in Germany during WW II. These units were why Whitcomb was awarded the Army-Navy E award during the war. This is why the locomotive means more to Rochelle than the IRM. These were built in Rochelle and were our bragging rights during WW II.

Steve

What do you mean by "long tons" and where does the 58 number come from?



That is my understanding also. That is why the scrap rates define the maximum size allowed. Most electric furnaces aren't set up to accept huge pieces. At the iron foundry I used to work at our largest electric furnace was a 40 ton and the scrap had to be small enough to fit in a pre-heat ladle that once the pre-heat was done would lift the scrap to the oven, swing the lid off and gently dump the scrap in. We didn't like big chunks splashing molten iron out of the oven nor damaging the refractory lining. Relining a furnace was costly down time. Even with small chunks, charging the furnace produced a shower of sparks like the 4th of July. Our favorite scrap was steel rail. Composition was guaranteed and easy to cut up into small pieces.

Steve

Isn't that less honest? A donor could put an inflated price to justify a bigger write-off for themselves. Does the IRS need a third party quote?

Steve

A "long" or "gross" ton is 2,240 lbs. A "short" or "net" ton is 2,000 lbs.

Gross tons are commonly used by the iron and steel industry; net tons by just about everyone else in the United States.

I've found most scrap dealers buy from me by the gross ton but sell to me by the net ton.

Alan Maples