Delrin rods...... thrown away

[Bogey]

One of my Sons works in an industry where they use Delrin rods in/on a conveyor line that handles heavy loads 24/7. He was here the other day and I showed him some of the work that have done using Delrin and that it is expensive to buy. I asked him if he was familiar with Delrin and he related to me the first sentence here. He said the stuff is great and you cannot hardly wear it out. He then said that at work they had updated the line and changed out the Delrin rods that they used as bearings. I asked if he could salvage some of the rods from the plant.
Thats when he said the rods were thrown in the dumpster and hauled away. I asked ," How Many"? About half a dumpster was the reply. I wonder why they did not try to sell some of this as salvage?

[Big_Bill]

The answer Mike is probably because of the tax deduction of a replacement or upgrade.

Making an upgrade, they probably can deduct 100% of the project.

If they sold the delrin, they would have have had to depreciate it, add what they sold it for, then see what the deductibility tax wise was.

I'm sure that their accountant calculated it from both angles, and that their best choice tax wise was to throw it away.

Now if you track down the waste disposal company that they used, you may be able to purchase some, or all of it from them, if you hurry !

Bill

[Bogey]

You 're right Bill.  The Bean Counters struck again.   Too bad the material is long gone now.   However, now my Son knows that if he sees any heading to  trash pile to try to snag a piece or two.

[shadow]

That's a goldmine that was laying in the dumpster. Ed

[RedFeather]

Being a retired accountant, I would say that's bean bashing! Those rods are probably accounted for as expendables and not a part of the asset (conveyor belt system). Simply routine maintenance. If there is no ready market for them it would be uneconomical to try to find a buyer, make arrangements, store until sold, etc. And you don't know that the disposal company isn't recycling them somehow. Might want to ask the young man to make a few enquiries. Worst case, he could always set aside a box or two.

[lastmanout]

I know of a worst case of waste- Recently the Buell motorcycle company was closed by it's parent company Harley Davidson. There was a picture posted of a large dumpster filled with at LEAST 100 new Buell motorcyles-to be junked. About 1 Million dollars of finished product right to the salvage yard.  I suppose it was better to take it as a tax write-off than wholesale/warranty the bikes. Moral of the story- don't buy a Buell motorcycle and beware of H-D management.

[RedFeather]

I'll go one better. There's a documentary about the death of the electric car in California. The major car companies pulled all of their leased vehicles back and destroyed them when California decided to go with hydrogen fuel cells. There is a clip of a fellow with a local cable channel show who was at a junk yard to do a story on the big chipper/shredders they use. Several brand new Ford electric cars were there to be shredded. When he asked the yard owner about them, they guy said Ford gave him a few at a time and told him they were not safe to be sold to the public, so recycle them.