Author Topic: There`s copper in them thar hills........ (Read 775 times)

Jackal1 · « **on:** August 01, 2006, 07:42:48 AM »

...............and yards and businesses.
With scrap copper prices being up it has produced a new form of thief. The copperjacker.

Stealing the copper from AC lines/coils, etc. has became dang near epidemic around here.
We had one family that had their AC lines stolen while they were asleep. The guy said he woke up a couple of times and noticed it seemed to be getting hot in the house. He finaly got up to find his AC was not putting out cool air and investigated to find the lines had been cut and stolen.
Also a lot of empty, older rent houses have been hit for the copper wiring.
I was just wondering if this was going on elsewhere in the country.

Meatwad · « **Reply #1 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:17:38 AM »

Thats lower then low

eagl · « **Reply #2 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:30:44 AM »

No blood for copper! Wait, isn't copper from south america? Don't we have some monroe doctrine or something that lets us kick south american butt whenever we have a shortage of something? Venezuela nationalized their oil industry so maybe we can nationalize peru, chile, or wherever we get most of our copper.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper

And why don't drug dealers smuggle in copper instead of drugs? They'd be like heroes instead of, well, drug smugglers.

No drugs for copper!

Personally I blame boosh, and damn copper thieves need to be hung or shot. 2nd amendment... use it or lose it. Support UK freedom - buy British made pointy objects! Made from Staffordshire Moorlands copper, no less!

We could smuggle copper into the country in bronze statues, because it's a little known fact that bronze is high in copper content! Good thing most people don't know, otherwise they'd be stealing bronze statues and trying to extract the copper!

It's only a matter of time before you see bums on the street licking the copper off of pennies and hten selling their copper-laden kidneys and glands on the copper black market... And how long before someone lifts the statue of liberty's skirt for a risque copper "heist"? Get it, lifting a skirt is a heist? haha you guys have no sense of humor.

Saintaw · « **Reply #3 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:33:10 AM »

When I was in Czeck republic last year, someone explained to me the reason why the phonelines were so cra**y was that the employees are stealing the copper wires and are replacing them with old wires. Nice stunt on a large scale i say. Bravo!

Mickey1992 · « **Reply #4 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:39:53 AM »

We had a gas explosion here about a year ago that took out half of an apartment building. Luckily no one was hurt as part of the building was unoccupied.

The explosion was caused by some idiot who broke into the building to steal the old copper plumbing. He ruptured the gas line and soon after the building blew up.

http://www.nbc4i.com/news/4664248/detail.html

Two months ago we had a rash of thefts of copper downspouts.

My sister works for the railroad and it is a HUGE problem. Not only are people stealing copper from depots, but they are actually stealing the copper wiring from WORKING RAILROAD SIGNALS.

eagl · « **Reply #5 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:40:10 AM »

I heard that aluminum works better than copper anyhow.

Jackal1 · « **Reply #6 on:** August 01, 2006, 08:48:05 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Mickey1992
My sister works for the railroad and it is a HUGE problem. Not only are people stealing copper from depots, but they are actually stealing the copper wiring from WORKING RAILROAD SIGNALS.

Hehe.
The last time that scrap copper went up, I knew a guy who borrowed copper from the railroad lines.
A few of us were headed to a biker run in the piney woods when we pulled off on a sand road to let mother nature take it`s course. The road crossed a railroad track.
Most of us were checking out the tall pine trees and talking about their possible age/height, etc.
I turned around and caught this cat looking up longingly at the old telegraph wires running beside the tracks.
I told him...don`t even think about it.
He eventualy got caught doing just that by RR detectives who were not very happy about the recent loss of wire.

Mickey1992 · « **Reply #7 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:02:10 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Jackal1
He eventualy got caught doing just that by RR detectives who were not very happy about the recent loss of wire.

Causing disruption or harm to rail transportation is a Federal offense too. There is a HUGE difference in possible jailtime between stealing your neighbors AC copper, and stealing railroad copper.

Tarmac · « **Reply #8 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:13:21 AM »

My buddy who works for the power company says it's a huge problem. They have to have security guards by the big substations because bums will go in and steal the copper out of the multimillion dollar transformers. Occasionally they find a fried bum, too.

Nilsen · « **Reply #9 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:18:42 AM »

It happened here too a few years back.. It was mostly large rolls of cable that was stolen from construction sites etc.

We have had folks at our business too that has helped themselves to the barrels we have out back. They are full of metal shavings. Each barrel are about 1-200kg depending on contents when full and gives us plenty of "pocket money" when we sell em to the scrapyard every month. Thats right... the IRS are not seeing a dime of that money

Im just glad they havent broken in yet. We have about half a million dollars worth of different materials stored there, usually in nice round bars of different lenght and diameter.

Vudak · « **Reply #10 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:23:25 AM »

It's happening up here as well. Copper and any metal really that a scrap yard will take. The dopers are really fond of this one as it's not a big pain to pawn it and you can make a killing. Not to mention that most people don't exactly expect "their copper" to go missing, and don't guard it.

Beefcake · « **Reply #11 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:57:14 AM »

About a month ago we had a lady get fried while trying to steal copper wire from a Railroad signal pole. They kinda forgot (or didn't care to) cut the power before trying to yank the line loose.

NATEDOG · « **Reply #12 on:** August 01, 2006, 09:57:58 AM »

happening is Dallas! big time! my family owns a rent house, empty right now, my cousin went over to mow the lawn, and caught a guy with a hack saw walking up to a copper pipe in the back yard...... the guy took off.
they had something on the news about it too..

GtoRA2 · « **Reply #13 on:** August 01, 2006, 10:36:26 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Tarmac
My buddy who works for the power company says it's a huge problem. They have to have security guards by the big substations because bums will go in and steal the copper out of the multimillion dollar transformers. Occasionally they find a fried bum, too.

That sounds like a solution to the homeless problem. Just have to figure out how to make them more lethal!

Jackal1 · « **Reply #14 on:** August 01, 2006, 10:39:57 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by NATEDOG
happening is Dallas! big time! my family owns a rent house, empty right now, my cousin went over to mow the lawn, and caught a guy with a hack saw walking up to a copper pipe in the back yard...... the guy took off.
they had something on the news about it too..

Yea, I saw on the news yesterday where a church had been hit in Dallas for the copper.