Scrap Electric Motors Cost: Per-Pound Prices & What Pays More

Scrap electric motors sell for $0.15 to $0.40 per pound at most yards, meaning a typical 10 lb motor brings $2 to $4 and a 50 lb industrial motor brings $8 to $20. Prices track the copper market, since the windings inside are the entire value. Specialty motors like Genteq ECM units command up to $1.10 per pound thanks to copper content and rare earth magnets.

Rates for every other category are collected in the complete scrap metal price index.

Why Electric Motors Are a Scrapper’s Bread and Butter

Electric motors are everywhere: washing machines, dryers, fans, power tools, pool pumps, furnaces, treadmills, garage door openers, and every piece of industrial equipment ever built. Each one is a steel case wrapped around copper windings, and that copper is what the yard pays for.

A typical motor is roughly 10-15% copper by weight. With copper trading near record highs above $4 per pound, motor prices at the yard have climbed with it. The remainder is steel laminations, an aluminum or steel housing, and sometimes valuable magnets.

Motors are also one of the easiest scrap categories to accumulate. Appliance flippers, HVAC techs, electricians, and maintenance crews generate them constantly, and yards buy them by the barrel.

Current Scrap Electric Motor Prices

• Standard motor rate: $0.15 – $0.40/lb
• Typical 10 lb appliance motor: $2 – $4
• 50 lb industrial motor: $8 – $20
• Genteq / ECM motors: up to $1.10/lb
• Automotive alternators: $0.35 – $0.60/lb
• Clean copper (stripped windings): $3.00 – $3.80/lb

The motor rate is essentially a discounted copper rate. Yards estimate the average copper fraction across mixed motors and price accordingly, which is why the per-pound number sits so far below the copper spot price.

The ECM Motor Exception: Don’t Sell These at the Base Rate

Modern variable-speed furnace and HVAC blower motors (Genteq ECM units are the common brand) are a different animal. They carry more copper than old induction motors plus neodymium rare earth magnets that trade at $15-$30 per pound on their own.

Specialty buyers pay up to $1.10/lb for these motors whole, nearly triple the standard rate. If you’re pulling blower motors from furnace changeouts, sort the ECM units into their own pile and ask specifically for ECM pricing. A yard that shrugs at the question is a yard leaving your money on their floor.

What Determines Electric Motor Scrap Value?

• Copper-to-steel ratio: The denser the copper windings relative to the steel housing, the better the grade. Compact, heavy-for-size motors are usually copper-rich.
• Motor technology: Variable-speed ECM motors carry far more copper and finer engineering than basic PSC or shaded-pole motors. Genteq-branded units are the marquee find.
• Size: Large industrial motors (100+ lbs) often earn a slightly higher per-pound rate and rack up serious scale weight fast.
• Cleanliness: Motors with attached brackets, pulleys, fans, and steel shrouds get graded down as “dirty.” Two minutes with a wrench moves them up a tier.
• Copper spot price: Motor rates shadow the copper market. Recent copper strength has kept motor prices at the high end of their historical range.

To Strip or Not to Strip?

Selling whole is fast and gets you $0.15-$0.40/lb across the full weight, steel and all.

Stripping the copper means cracking the case, cutting the winding heads, and pulling the coils. The copper sells at $3.00-$3.80/lb, but it’s typically only 10-15% of the motor’s weight, and the labor is real. Forum scrappers who’ve done the math on small motors consistently conclude the same thing: a 10 lb motor yields maybe 1 lb of copper, and the teardown time isn’t worth $1-$2 of upside per unit.

The practical rule: sell small motors whole, strip only large industrial motors where a single unit yields 10+ lbs of copper, and never strip ECM motors since they’re worth more intact to specialty buyers.

Where to Find Scrap Motors

• Appliances: Washers, dryers, and dishwashers each carry 1-2 motors plus a pump. Pull them before the shell goes in as shred steel.
• HVAC equipment: Condenser fan motors, blower motors, and inducer motors from every changeout.
• Power tools and yard equipment: Dead drills, saws, leaf blowers, and treadmills all give up motors in minutes.
• Curb alerts and free listings: “Broken” appliances listed free online are motor donors on wheels.
• Automotive: Alternators and starters pay their own premium rates above generic motor pricing.

Common Mistakes That Kill Your Payout

• Mixing ECM motors into the general pile: That’s a 3x rate difference surrendered for nothing.
• Stripping small motors: The labor math almost never works below 25 lbs. Sell whole.
• Leaving motors inside appliances: An appliance sells as light iron at $0.05-$0.10/lb. The motor inside is worth 3-5x that rate on its own.
• Selling alternators as motors: Alternators carry their own higher price category at most yards. Ask.
• Ignoring the copper market: Motor rates follow copper within days. Sell into strength.

Getting the Best Price

Sort your load into four piles: standard motors, ECM motors, alternators/starters, and anything worth stripping. Call 2-3 yards with those categories and compare rates per category, not just the headline motor price. Accumulate until you have real weight, since hauling 30 lbs of motors barely covers gas.

Motors follow the same rule as everything else in scrap: the yard prices your ignorance. Know what’s inside each unit, and you capture the value instead of donating it. The same principle drives the numbers in our AC compressor scrap guide and across the aluminum scrap market.

Related scrap price guides

• Scrap Car Battery Price Today: What Yards Are Actually Paying
• Scrap Prices for Oxygen Tanks: Aluminum vs Steel Cylinder Values
• Mercury Recycling Prices: What Pays, What Costs, What’s Illegal
• Stainless Steel Scrap Price: 304, 316 & 430 Grade Values
• Scrap metal price index — all 25 materials and part types