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I Forge Iron

wrought iron value?


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  • 2 weeks later...
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I love working in a railing shop, we fairly often get old wrought railings and fences through that need to be fixed, my standing arrangement with the boss is that I rebuild any railing I deem unfit rather than restore... Of course I'd never scrap a well built work of art, but the basic straight railing junk that we get in alot goes straight into my growing pile of wrought pickets and posts... probably have a half ton of the stuff in everything from 3/8 to 1.5" mostly in 3 foot lengths. Also handy for the couple of pieces we get through that are worthy of restoration, as I can replace the broken or corroded WI with WI...

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Wrought iron averages around $3 on eBay. Assorted or mixed lots. Large pieces in mixed lots seem to comand the highest price in the $4+ range.
Some pictures of iron recovered from a 1880's sawmill site. Large bolts and shafts. Note the keyway.post-4684-0-63185700-1397936881_thumb.jppost-4684-0-05882000-1397936925_thumb.jppost-4684-0-63429100-1397936975_thumb.jppost-4684-0-29886300-1397937039_thumb.jp

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  • 5 years later...

Hi Jenny,

Looks like you've possibly signed up to the forum just the work out the value of your bed frame.

If you intend to stick around then please READ THIS FIRST and add a location into your profile.

 

As for your bed frame. Are you SURE its wrought-iron? Many people call items "wrought iron": gates, fences, bed frames, etc, but more often than not is actually steel which has been hot worked into a pleasing aesthetic and welded together. These items are not made from real "wrought iron".

Wrought Iron is a material which (generally) pre-dates the invention of the Bessamer Converter allowing mass production of modern day steel. Wrought Iron is  close to pure iron but has slag/silica/glass inclusions which give it a grainy structure. The material is highly prized by blacksmiths due to its workability, forge weld-ability, historical value and rarity (since there hasn't been much made in the past hundred years or so).

 

So.... do you have any reason think your bed is made from real wrought iron rather than steel? If it is wrought iron then its probably very valuable in material-weight alone, never mind its value as an artistic piece of furniture.

 

Regards,

Jon

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It's very much like how the term "linens" is used today.  Such items used to be made from linen and so the term for the material grew to be used for the items made from it.  Now if you go to a store's linen department you are lucking to find 100% cotton much less real linen.

Almost all Wrought Iron stuff made in the last 100 years is made from mild steel or A-26 and not real wrought iron.  As a material it has a bit of a bump in price. I buy steel at the scrap yard for 20 US cents a pound and I can buy wrought iron from a dealer at Quad-State for $1 a pound---BUT most smiths do not use it so the market if fairly shallow.

If your bedsted is really wrought iron it would be worth much more as an antique than as wrought iron scrap.

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  • 2 years later...

Pianos don't generally have wrought iron components; the iron frames in modern pianos are almost always cast.

You don't say where you are located, but scrap value for cast iron is currently about $0.07-$0.10 per pound in the US.

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1 hour ago, ThomasPowers said:

TW must be made of money; I'd go for the FREE ones...

Have you seen what wrought iron sells for online?!?!:blink:

I saw one major company wants $57 for 22 pounds of wrought iron before shipping! 

i don’t have a bunch a money but if a piano had several hundred pounds of wrought iron in it then I’d be more than willing $50 a pop! 

After I’ve drove around and collected all the free ones!

you could resale it an more then make your $50 bucks back!

i know I know I know… you buy yours for $.20 a pound at the battle ship cannon graveyard 

I’m just sayin though it’d be worth the $50! Lol

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12 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

you know all the ones you passed up because they were in too rough shape

too rough shape?!?! what’s that? :huh:

have you seen the anvils I drag home? im all about those $1-$2 a pound beaters!:lol:

Heck for that matter I buy broke down blowers, post vises without screws, and random cast iron parts from ol forges for that matter!

I’m not picky I rarely pass anything up if it’s cheap enough lol

you sir are very sadly mistaken!
Billy don’t pass up no $50 wrought iron or cast steel anvils!

I don’t care if the thing is missing a horn or broke in half! I’ll always find a use for them!:P

what I won’t do is pay $10 bucks a pound for something used that I could buy new for less!

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