Ford Ranger Catalytic Converter Scrap Price – Why So Expensive?

Your Ford Ranger is likely to be a very long-lasting and reliable vehicle. This pickup truck is not that big and it’s mainly created to pull some weights and to get the owner through all terrains. These vehicles are accompanied by quite a big catalytic converter or even two of them for larger engines.

The catalytic converters on your Ford Ranger truck will work for a limited period of time. After that, you will have to get ready to pay some money for replacing them with aftermarket parts or original converters. Otherwise, you will not pass the fog test and your car won’t be road-legal anymore.

But there is a way to compensate partially for your expenses. Your old catalytic converters still cost some money, and today we are going to tell you the following:

1. Where are the old converters on your Ford Ranger?
2. What’s the scrap price of the converters?
3. How much expensive metals are there in a cat?
4. Can you take the precious metals by yourself?
5. What’s the price for converter replacement in Ford Ranger?

Let’s get started!

Where are the cats placed in your Ford Ranger?

It’s not hard to locate the catalytic converter in your vehicle. But it’s quite hard to take it off the car by yourself. The thing is quite heavy and the bolts are likely to be stuck. Sometimes even professional instruments don’t help much and mechanics need to use some alternative methods.

Also, it’s very important to save the bolt holes and the other parts of your vehicle’s exhaust system so that you could easily install the new catalytic converters.

So, here’s how you can find your cats:

• the best way is to look from underneath because they are more likely to be under the engine;
• also, you may locate your muffler quite easily and then find any devices that are located between the muffler and the engine;
• catalytic converters often look like mufflers, but they are heavier and usually a little smaller;
• they can also be covered by special heat protection sheets to avoid heat damage of other objects;
• sometimes cats can be located right near the engine where the exhaust manifold starts.

As soon as you locate them, it’s not that hard to take them off unless the bolts and nuts got stuck. Even if they did, you will be able to use some kind of rust remover to try and deblock the bolts. After that, you can take the catalytic converter off the car and see if it’s still full inside.

Sometimes, in very old cars, the converters may be melted or destroyed and this will reduce their scrap price. So you may want to see on your own if they are still full of those precious materials.

So, how much for the scrap converters for Ford Ranger trucks?

Scrap converters for your Ford Ranger may cost between $90 and $540. The final price will depend on many factors which you should consider:

1. The year of your vehicle. Let’s say, the older the car, the less likely any scrapyard will want to pay a lot for your scrap cat because it may not have all those precious metals and materials inside.
2. The type of the converter. Ford has been experimenting with ecological equipment and has been using different types of metals for its converters. So if originally the cat had more rhodium, for example, it will cost more.
3. The visual condition. All scrapyards will want to see the catalytic converter before they offer any price to you. Usually, you can show them pictures of it. If the converter is all rusty and has holes in its body, it should cost much less.
4. The company you choose for selling your scrap converter. Once you have found a good offer, you should check some more places and ask if they can pay you more. Sometimes, you can get even much more from other companies.
5. The price of precious metals on the market at the moment. The precious metals tend to change their prices daily, and the changes can be dramatic, so they can influence the final price you can get for your old converter.
6. Your ability to take the converter off. If you don’t have the possibility to take the thing off your car by yourself, you are likely to pay for labor at the local garage which may be pretty close to the price of the old converter.

You should bear in mind that these factors decide how much money you get in the end. And some of these things are hard to change, they just happen, while some other things totally depend on you and your actions.

What are the metals in your Ford Ranger catalytic converter?

All Ford Rangers have quite simple converters that are produced with classic technologies. Inside, all cats have kind of a honeycomb made of ceramic materials. This honeycomb contains all those precious metals that are the reason why your scrap converter still costs some money.

Here are the metals:

1. Palladium. The current price is about $72.50 per 1 gram. Around 4 to 6 grams of palladium can be recovered from your old converter, so this is about $200.
2. Platinum. The current price is about $33 per 1 gram. Around 5 grams of platinum and sometimes even more can be taken from a Ford Ranger catalytic converter. Let’s assume it’s another $150.
3. Rhodium. The current price is around $596 per 1 gram. Here comes the most interesting part. Unfortunately, a Ford Ranger catalytic converter has around 1 gram of rhodium only. This makes another $600 for scrapyards.
4. Scrap metal. The current price is around $3 per 1 kg. This is the cheapest thing but scrapyards gather a lot of scrap metal, so they will also make some money from this.

If you sum up all the potential revenue, you will see that around $1000 can be taken from a single catalytic converter. And here you may ask yourself why no one actually tries to take those metals and sell them independently? It’s not that easy.

How to get the metals out of the converter?

Scrapyards have all the equipment that is made for getting all those metals and preparing them to be sold. Also, they have partners such as automotive plants, jewelry companies, industrial businesses ready to buy only large amounts of rare metals like palladium, platinum, or rhodium.

If you try to sell 1 gram of rhodium, you aren’t likely to find a person willing to buy it from you. Industrial companies will want to buy 500 grams or 1000 grams of this metal. For this, you will need to take apart over 1000 catalytic converters which is quite hard and time-consuming.

Also, for taking those rare metals, you will need special equipment. Without it, you just can’t melt all the other parts of the converter and get the rare metals. And then, do you know how to distinguish between platinum and rhodium, for example? You can just be fooled by buyers.

What are you going to do with all those waste materials? Scrapyards have to pay for recycling or they build recycling plants by themselves. This is good for ecology and nature but bad for their budgets.

How can you get more money for your Ford Ranger scrap catalytic converter?

Usually, people don’t care much about ten or twenty dollars they can get extra for their converters. But what if we tell you that you can get a couple hundred more?

Local scrapyards that deal with old cars usually just offer $50 to $90 for your scrap converters. But a Ford Range cat should cost much more. You will have a couple of ways to earn more money:

1. Go to different scrapyards and ask them how much they are ready to pay for your converter.
2. Go online and find specialized websites that offer much better prices for your scrap cats. You will need to take the pictures of your converter, including the picture with the serial number, and send those to some companies. They will evaluate the cat and offer you a bigger price.
3. Go to eBay or any other website like this and try to sell your cat converter to a private buyer who knows how to get metals out of it and who to sell them.

These are three ways we can think of that will let you earn more.

Final words

As you see, catalytic converters shouldn’t be just thrown away or left at the service station where you usually service your car. They may cost up to $540 if sold to a specialized scrapyard. Ford Ranger has quite big converters with a lot of precious metals inside. Unfortunately, taking these metals out is not that simple, so you will have to sell the old cat to a scrapyard.

Don’t hurry up when you have your old cats for sale. Just investigate a little to understand how much some other companies can give you for it.