means new as of 6 June 1999.
A Dumpster Diver named Stephen (that's me) found a Pentium computer in the box in a dumpster behind a department store in Connecticut. The only things missing were a keyboard and mouse, but the monitor & 840MB hard drive worked great! I recently sold it for $600 to Ed (He's only paid half...) so I could buy a laptop from Darin. (which has since been sold again)
Billy Bob found a loaded handgun in a dumpster behind the bank that got robbed. He got caught using it in a liquor store holdup and is now serving time.
Pretty good story for a fake, but I'm sure it's happened somewhere...
Greetings! I love your site. I only wish I had discovered it sooner. Over the years I've scavenged many, many items, including furniture, picture frames, a working VCR w/remote, repairable power tools, tires, lawn mowers, recyclable metals (still salable in PA and NJ), etc., etc. My greatest success, however, is a turn-of-the-century drop-down secretary desk. I found it near my house about ten years ago, on the treet on trash day. It was solid oak with a beautiful beveled mirror, but the drop-down panel was missing, and it was painted the most god-awful shade of canary yellow I've ever seen. It sat in my basement until about a year ago, because I was daunted by the time and effort I thought it would take to make it look decent. About a year ago, I was browsing through a local antique shop, when I came across an identical piece. It had been very poorly refinished, was scuffed and rickety, but atop the $565 price tag (!!!) was a big "SOLD" sign! I was inspired! I dug the desk out of my basement, stripped it, made a new drop-down panel from red oak, refinished the whole piece and added some antique brass hardware (also scavenged!). For $18 in materials and about 12 hours of labor, I have a beautiful piece. If the one I saw in the antique shop was really worth $565, then mine is easily worth $600 or more!! I love this hobby!
This Lady has a few words to say:
Lately, every time I go out to dumpster dive (early am) I see at least 2 cops and am ambulance driver sitting only l/2 a block from my house. Don't these [guys] have anything else to do with their time. Aren't there any child molesters, women rapists and murderers out there? I don't do anything but read books, ride my bike (and there are at least 6 cops along my bike route) and dumpster dive. I guess I'm just supposed to sit in my house and cook. Where is our freedom? The authority figures around here (big bully men with big ex-football player necks) are thick. I guess they don't have enough to do but harass people. I could give them a few woman beaters they could pick on. I don't even kill bugs. They should be ashamed of themselves. I don't [mess] with people. I just don't get any fun out of it. I guess they do. Any suggestions. When I change my times and route, I can usually evade them, but whenever I go out at the same time and same regular route - there they are. They get me so nervous I start to shake. I hate those [guys]. They have the power to [mess] with me, but I can't do anything to them - any suggestions? Thanks for reading. Oh, I'm a 47 year old female, so I guess it gives them an extra thrill to [mess] with me. Follow me, find out what I do, my schedule, etc. What a bunch of nosey [guys]. Don't they have a life?
Rose:
I thought this would be a good spot to leave dumpster diving tales. My friend's and myself are avid divers, and we try to dive every weekend. Where I live, Florida, there is a Lay's Potato Chip distrobution center. We've gotten so many bags of chips it's not even funny! We've also found in different places a color, cable ready T.V. in perfect condition, a big fire proof safe, with the keys and combination inside, clothes, a 17 piece water glass set, and so much more!
Kr Ro is looking for help:
Have just been diving for a couple of weeks, and do I ever love it! I am from North Dakota, but live in a good sized city. Could you possibly give me any tips? Should I bother with garbage bags, esp. at apartments?
Be careful with apartment garbage bags - Today's household trash could be anything. Diapers (dirty, of course), chemicals, paint, old food, etc… But as people in Apartments move, throwing out the extra junk, you might find better results.
Judy is:
What are we going to do about the police having the power to search the junk in our cars when the cops stop us. And why do so many people guard their garbage? I've been in dumpsters where they are guarding their garbage. What a bunch of petty mean-spirited people out there. They don't even want us to take their junk! What a bunch of crazy Americans. How do they get so petty and ignorant! They want to police me to make sure I go shopping and spend some money instead of take their junk!
.
Jim warns about safety
I love your site. I work for a major trash hauler, and i just thought that you should mention something else regarding safety. For as many people out there throwing perfectly good stuff, there are others out there that transport their other trash to those public dumpsters, which is illegal. If someone throws hypodermic needles in and you get jabbed there are serious health risks. With all the possibilities out there for infectious diseases, extra care should be taken. Ps my uncle scores big at pool city during the xmas season. Other stores like jc penney and ames destroy everything that they plan to throw out. It gets crushed before they put it in their dumpsters.
Tigercups questions:
--------is this illegal, can you get aressed if caught in public dumpter?????? I have gone by dumpters and seen interesting things, but was allway afraid what would happen if caught going thu one by company!!!
It could be illegal, depending on where you are, what dumpster you are interested in, and what you get…… Mostly, you'll probably just get scared off by security or police, if anything. As long as you didn't break locks to get in, or climb a fence to get there, you could be alright. Or then again, you never know....
Molly tries to turn the profit:
One night about twenty years ago my mother walked out to our apartment dumpster to empty the trash and found a 13" television--brought it home, plugged it in and that was that! From our apartment complex alone we've found enough stuff to support ourselves for two years at the local swap meet, and most of our clothes, appliances, makeup and perfumes, sets of dishes and other household items have come from the dumpsters. Some finds: countless vacuum cleaners, telephones, answering machines, coffeemakers and toasters; four leather jackets, several televisions and VCRs, my favorite big black "stompy" boots, potted plants (both real and silk), paintings, several 14K gold chains, black combat fatigues, toys and dolls galore, sculptures, oil lamps and candle holders, cases of chocolates, six-packs of beer, lamps, etc., etc. etc. And of course--money!
And this is *just from our medium-sized apartment complex,* during our early morning walks. Having read the other stories submitted, I think I'll venture out around the neighborhood!
Mark tries to turn the profit:
Here on Long Island the pickings are good.In one 3-week period I Made over $400 cash, stocked up on cool stuff, and traded for a Nikon stereoscopic microscope. 80% came from 1 dumpster: Electronic components, electrical connectors, tens of 1000's of nylon zip ties, hundreds of neat metal boxes, hinged at the top w/hasp. From a dumpster at a hospital, I grabbed 100 disposable vaginal specula. All of this I did on my lunch hour. I got lucky and found a guy who buys this stuff. I hit the dumpsters, take it straight to him, collect anywhere from $5 to $50 a day. then on Sunday I go all day. Good thing I have a van. I've been scavenging, diving, and yardsaling all my life.(39yrs) My best yardsale find: A John Deere Electric riding mower-$200. This thing is the ultimate: Quiet. powerfull, no maintanence, operates for pennies a charge -does the whole yard- acre+ and still drags a trailer w/ton of dirt all day.Also a $285 tripod w/dolly-$4.00. 5" ac-dc color TV: $5 - --9" color TV-$5 I could go on and on.
Richard sends a mini-novel:
GREAT PAGE! Anyway, i thought I'd mention my diving practices. The first time was when the moron doctor threw my cast away while I was in another room. They wouldn't get it because it had been ent to the dumpdter. That night I snuck out and dug through the trash till i found it. I found over 200 feet of EKG graph paper, including some with a real heart beat monitored on it (boy did it get irregular after 30 feet! :) I also found a leg cast, but didn't touch it. I grabbed my cast, some of that paper (it was cool!), and then, cause they were so cocky about the whole deal, tipped their dumpster.
The moral of Chapter One is Don't Dive in Medical Dumpsters, and don't tip the dumpster either. Neither are safe for you, and this messes things up for the next diver to come along
More recent dives have been VERY profitable. half a dozen monitors, a working B&W TV, about half a dozen computers, a few printers, drives, cards, antistatic envelopes for electronics, electric typewriters, a battery powered portable word processor (works!), keyboards galore, disks, 3 years of MacWorld magazine, Apple II parts, 2 Apple IIs, 2 Commodore VIC-20s (one works), a C64 (used to work, but died), my still in use C128, 4 TRS-80 computers, hard drives (which I now make chimes from, using the disks), half a dozen 8 track players! :) some stereos and radios and clocks and stuff, Broken camcorder (made into a robot) a ZIP disk, CD players, walkmans, a few VCRs, TVs, A polaroid instant camera, a can opener I turned into a mini bench grinder, an etch-a-scketch, I salvage the broken stuff and use it to make robots! (hobby of mine)
My best story of all was when I found 3 monitors, 3 computers, 3 electric typwriters, 2 printers, and a box of keyboards. THis was before I had my car, so all of it had to go on my bike. I don't use the CRT, so i disassembled the monitors and removed the boards. Then i removed the drives, LEDs, boards, and power supplies fromt he computers. I grabed the boards out of the two printers, and got the keyboards. All that was left was the typewriters and a part from one computer and the cops drove up. I decided to coperate fully, and when i told them what I was doing, they shined the light on the garbage so i could see how to finish removing the power suply from the last computer! I left the typewriters cause i was a bit emabarased to have fianly been caught by the cops after 10 years (even though they actualy helped!). I left with all the electrnics, none of the useles stuff, and went home with a smile on my face, even though my heart as going about 300 BPS! I thought I'd had it!
RUBIDO is resourceful:
I am a musician, and I currently play two bass guitars built from parts scavenged from the dumpster. The electronics alone for one are worth over $300. Tonight my partners and I found a stack of about a hundred bicycles-- we stripped the best parts off of a few and plan to build ultimate Frankenstein bikes. God bless the Resourcefully Shameless Recyclers.
Amen!
onwego boasts:
every once in a great while we pro dd's hit the mother lode. the other day found over $10,000 retail cosmetics-brand new, name brand, all resaleable, at a rite aid drug store going out of buisness. this is the 3rd such $10,000 + I've found in my dd career. kind of like the feeling a golfer gets when he hits a 400 yard hole in one. took 3 hours worth of work but I should make about 2 grand off it. so happy to find so many dd with sites and info. this is my 1st full day on the web-just have to make sure it doesn't interfere with my dd schedules. thanks for the neat site. best of luck diving-hope you too find the mother lode of treasures soon.
I hope we all find the Mother Lode
Ccyclone Web adds one more:
i saw a divingboard that i took and have it at my house in maine. although we were unable to aquire the items, me and my cousin found numerous bikes, two lawn mowers, usefull stuff off of an oven, and a shed (ok condition)
Janor11 writes:
We are four students studying for our Bachelor's degree. Our study is computer engineering. We are living in the Netherlands and our school is in Amsterdam. We are doing a project called 'Information Retrieval'. In this project we have to choose a strange hobby or sport. We have to interview some person who has knowledge about this sport or hobby. We hope you will be co-operative with the project. Please send your reaction to the sender, projectgroup 'Dumpster Diving'; from Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Of course I cooperated. I just hope they passed their project...
Ryan ? writes:
After all of the Thrifty Drug stores turned into Rite-Aid's they replaced the big light-up thrifty sign with a Rite-Aid one. I said hey, letters have to be sitting in a dumpster somewhere around there so I checked it out and what do you know? I am now the proud owner of a giant T,H and Y!
Michele lists:
2 end tables, coffee table, foot stool, 2 broken electric lawnmowers (which ultimately became 1 working electric lawnmower), 1 electric lawnmower requiring a touch of solder, oodles of bottles of liquid laundry detergent with about 1 cm of liquid in them (which I turned upside down to retrieve the valuable fluid, of course), 1 working VCR, 1 computer desk with one cigarette burn (easily sanded away), 1 EGA monitor (14"), 1 ps2 keyboard, 1 "MIDI" connector keyboard, 1 VT220 terminal keyboard
Great idea for laundry detergent!
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