I died a little inside today.

[Randall W. Lott]

My workplace just sent hundreds of electronics products to be destroyed.  They didn't want me taking any of it, even though most of it was working.  There were huge power supplies, tons of rack equipment in re-usable cases, test equipment, PC's, UPS's, fiber optic equipment, and much more.

What a tease.

[eevblogfan]

and you you killed part of me as well 

[Randall W. Lott]

Dave would have been able to do a tear-down every day for the next 5 years.  Boo! 

[dr.diesel]

This is actually pretty common.  If they give it to you, then someone else finds out, bitches they didn't get something, complains to HR and all hell breaks out.

Many companies have an internal auction site, gives everybody a chance.

[Randall W. Lott]

I could understand if it was to be donated, but we literally had to put "destroy" stickers on it to be hauled away to the scrap yard.

[Hydrawerk]

 

[peter.mitchell]

You know what scrap yard?

[free_electron]

Tax writeoff

[Randall W. Lott]

They wrapped pallets full of equipment in plastic wrap.  I have no idea what kind of place could dispose of that much equipment, but there will have to be a huge truck to get it.

[mikeselectricstuff]

They wrapped pallets full of equipment in plastic wrap.  I have no idea what kind of place could dispose of that much equipment, but there will have to be a huge truck to get it.

May well be just going for scrap metal.
Speak to the truck driver to find where it's going.
Maybe sneak big 'call me' label note  onto the pallets.
 

[Hypernova]

Go rent your own truck right this instant and stalk the collection truck like a hawk.

[DavidDLC]

My workplace just sent hundreds of electronics products to be destroyed.  They didn't want me taking any of it, even though most of it was working.  There were huge power supplies, tons of rack equipment in re-usable cases, test equipment, PC's, UPS's, fiber optic equipment, and much more.

What a tease.

Totally understand you, I had the exact same situation, hundreds of power supplys, scopes, signal generators, and more.

And yes, they didn't want me to take a single thing.

[bookaboo]

Is the industry security sensitive? What I mean by that is if they are worried about people taking production equipment and shipping it to china to set up assembly lines. I've seen working servo motors worth in excess of $5k USD being cut in two for this reason.

[jmc2000]

Tax writeoff

Good point, and less hassle with paper work, ensuring they didn't make a profit on it when giving it away.

[Randall W. Lott]

The thing is.. my company is a "non-profit".

[Lightages]

Yes, it is the old ridiculous problem with government and red tape. They write off the equipment a little each year until it is "worth nothing" on paper. Then when it is completely written off the equipment can become a tax burden. So when the equipment is to be removed from the books they must destroy it because any other action reapplies a value on the equipment and they have to give back they taxes deducted for the depreciation they have claimed. It is very sad and very wasteful.

I was doing some work comissioning some equipment at an IBM research centre one day and saw rolling shelves all around the building in hallways with the "to be destroyed" stickers all over them. Some of it looked brand new in condition and most of it was very expensive equipment. I added up the estimated used value on one pile and I also died a bit that day. There was over $250,000 worth of equipment on just that one pile. There must have been 20-25 rolling shelves around the hallways. Oscilloscopes, meters, scales, microscopes, power supplies, etc....

I watched as they carted one out to the portable crusher they had in the receiving bay and watched and listened as the ram closed down. 

[JuKu]

How come you didn't volunteer to destroy some of it?

[Lightages]

I forgot to mention that there was some government official standing at the crusher marking down each serial number as each bit of equipment got thrown in.

[ivan747]

This is actually pretty common.  If they give it to you, then someone else finds out, bitches they didn't get something, complains to HR and all hell breaks out.

Many companies have an internal auction site, gives everybody a chance.

When I start my own business emporium the size of Google I will have my own internal eBay for the test equipment the company trashes away and isn't good enough for me. 

On a more serious note, imagine all you could do with that perfectly good equipment in a developing country like mine! We need that stuff!  I am sure you could donate a bunch of those to the state universities (with the tiny budgets they have, they would definitely take advantage of anything) and even private ones. Jeez, you can even sell them for a ridiculous to students or a good price to local companies. 

[Radio Tech]

This is actually pretty common.  If they give it to you, then someone else finds out, bitches they didn't get something, complains to HR and all hell breaks out.

Many companies have an internal auction site, gives everybody a chance.

Pretty good point there. And this is what drove our company to stop. We used to have a very large fabrication shop at the manufacturing facility I work at. We build industrial fork lifts.  So we are talking about tons of scrap metal. Metals plates from 1/16 of an inch thick to over 4 inches thick. Various widths and sizes. It was a paradise! If you wanted to build a utility trailer there was plenty of scrap to use and this stuff went for cheap. Also included was test gear from the lab and also computers

Every quarter the plant would have an auction for employees only.  100 bucks would give you 2 truckloads of scrap. But there was a greedy manager that had a home based welding shop.  He took 2 pallets of metal and hid them in the yard. The morning of the auction someone discovered his stash.  And since it was located outside it was moved to the auction area and sold.

The manager of the department went to HR and convinced them that the company should sell the scape to a recycler instead of auctioning it off to employees. And they followed suit. We have tried to get the company to change this but said they would be liable if someone got hurt at home.
Now the only thing you are allowed to take home is wood and card board. And do not take a picture of anything in the facility with your personal phone. That is grounds for termination since we are  foreign trade…

[tom66]

My workplace had a room full of WEEE scrap. My boss said, "anything you like you can take". I ended up with a load of graphic VFDs, LCDs, dev boards etc. plus a power drill and electric screwdriver, which both had dead batteries (just needed reforming with high pulse current, easily done.)

[megahz]

That sucks, and they didnt even auction it?

[staxquad]

My workplace just sent hundreds of electronics products to be destroyed.  They didn't want me taking any of it, even though most of it was working.  There were huge power supplies, tons of rack equipment in re-usable cases, test equipment, PC's, UPS's, fiber optic equipment, and much more.

What a tease.

Would have cost you at least $40,000

for the new extension to where you live to house all that gear.

They're doing you a favour

[free_electron]

The thing is.. my company is a "non-profit".

so , again : then it is written of as a loss... so as to reach zero profit at the end of the year.
it was bought with money , used, and there was a remainder ont he books -> scrap it and you can deduct it...

basics of bookkeeping...

[Randall W. Lott]

I work at a laboratory operated by our state university.  I estimated $200,000+ of gear was being thrown out.

I'm not allowed to take pictures at work either, because hundreds of large companies send their equipment or use our facility to test for interoperability.  We apparently have about $50M of equipment.  Racks up to the ceiling full of equipment.

These items were decommissioned, so I can understand why they can't give away gear that was erased from the books.  My boss had me take a break from my PCB design to help load up the palettes, haha!

One of my co-workers had been able to take some things in the past, possibly by purchasing it for cheap.

Life is full of unfair situations.  This has been no exception.