Understand copper ore mining and grading

Copper ores are divided into sulphide ore and oxide ore. Sulphide ore is floated to the top of a load of crushed mine rock and is immediately ready for electrorefining. The floatation process, or hydrometallurgy, is the most cost effective way to extract copper sulphide from unwanted surrounding rock. The denser ore is leached from the remaining crushed rock with a sulfuric acid solution and a solvent stripping process that produces the raw ore before the solvent is recycled. The more steps in the process, the more expensive the metal produced.

I recommend: Buy copper with 99.95% or greater purity from Midwest Metals. This extra pure copper is needed to fabricate electrical components. Take advantage of Midwest Metal's online quote capability to make price comparison and purchasing easier. Buy copper infiltrant in powder form from ACuPowder International. Infiltrant is copper fused with iron, which fabricates products with greater tensile strength and hardness than iron alone.

Buy copper ore from the right supplier

A copper ore supplier, whether a copper ore importer or a copper ore exporter, deal in various grades of copper whose prices vary. Some provide discounts for recurring and bulk orders, so consolidate your orders and work with just one or two suppliers.

I recommend: Download Weldaloy's "The Secrets to Choosing the Right Nonferrous Forging Supplier" and learn what 15 questions to ask to weed out the bad suppliers and ultimately find the one who has the experience, price, quality and delivery you want. All-Chemie, Ltd. is a global distributor of ultra pure copper and high conductivity, oxygen free granular copper. All-Chemie provides copper powder, sheet, wire, rod, microfoil, foil, shot, ingot and single crystal in grades ranging from 99.99% to 99.99999% pure. Get the full grade range of copper from Belmont Metals, Inc. They supply electrolytic copper at 99.9% purity and commercial grade copper at 99.8% and 99.5% purity.

Use scrap copper instead of mining copper ore whenever possible and sell excess scrap for profit

Scrap metal has already been mined and processed, so negative environmental impacts from mining and process of raw copper ore are lessened when scrap is used rather then just being thrown away in favor of mining more ore. Use scrap for fabrication projects whenever possible to reduce raw materials costs. Sell the scrap you generate and can't use in order to put it back to work for someone else who can use it.

I recommend: Join the online community at MetalPrices.com and keep an eye on scrap copper and raw copper ore market trends and prices. The current price trend tells you when to buy the scrap you need for your projects and when to sell copper ore excess for the best price. Read The Copper Journal, a monthly publication that contains economic forecasts and analysis of market indicators for the global metals markets.