Scrap metal is a miscellaneous item in Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas.
Characteristics
Scrap metal is a combination of generic waste metal, pieces of a metallic material or parts of any product that contains metal that is capable of being recycled from previous consumption. Piles of scrap metal can be turned into various non-player characters in exchange for rewards as part of unmarked quests.
In Fallout: New Vegas, it is also a useful alternative to a higher Repair skill to make repairs. Scrap metal is a necessary component in the crafting of the weapon repair kit. It can also be broken down into 200 units of lead, which is used in the crafting of ammunition at a reloading bench. However, lead is the easiest component of ammunition to get, as the primer, powder, and casings are all less commonplace.
All varieties of robots will usually have scrap metal in their inventory upon destruction, and scrap metal can be found commonly throughout the Capital Wasteland and Mojave Wasteland.
Fallout 3
Locations
- In the add on The Pitt, there is an ammo press that can be used to melt scrap metal down into ammunition. The ammunition returned by the press is greater than the scrap metal input.
- 67 pieces of scrap metal can be found throughout the Capital Wasteland in fixed locations without add-ons. It is usually either found in toolboxes or sold through specific random encounter merchants, such as Crazy Wolfgang.
- Tinker Joe can have up to ten pieces for one bottle cap apiece. He can be found outside in the parking lot of the RobCo facility at certain times of the day.
- 11 are also spread throughout the RobCo facility factory floor.
- 20 on the shelves in the bunk area of Meresti Metro station.
- 13 are found in the robot repair center.
Related quests
Fallout: New Vegas
Locations
- 28 pieces can be located in the REPCONN test site basement.
- 16 pieces can be found inside Cerulean Robotics in Freeside.
- 13 can be found in The Divide in or around the wrecked building just outside the entrance to the Ashton silo control station.
- 12 can be found in the ruins of Dry Wells.
- Ten are located on or around the shelves near the flagpole inside the walls of Camp McCarran.
- Old Lady Gibson located in Gibson scrap yard has a large stock of scrap metal, up to 14 at a time. Her inventory restocks every 72 in-game hours.
- The player character can find plenty of scrap metal throughout Big MT, looted from enemies, found in containers and sometimes given away by non-player characters.
- There is an abundance of scrap metal located throughout the Nellis hangars adjacent to the mess hall & munitions storage. Several pieces can be found on shelves and containers in the front and back of the hangar.
- Seven pieces can be found inside the shack at Southern Nevada Wind Farm.
- Seven pieces can be found inside Harper's shack.
- Two pieces can be found next to ED-E in the Nash residence in Primm.
- Two pieces can be found in Victor's shack.
Related quests
Crafting
With the addition of the Honest Hearts add-on, player characters are given two options to craft scrap metal from commonly available items. Both recipes are available immediately upon installation of the add-on and can be accessed from any workbench so long as the player character has a Repair skill of 25 or above.
| Name | Skill Requirement | Produced On | Items Needed |
|---|---|---|---|
Scrap metal (Cookery-to-Metal) 
|
Repair:25 | Workbench |
|
| Scrap metal (Meals-to-Metal)
|
Repair:25 | Workbench |
|
- ¹ The "Meals-to-Metal" recipe calls for the non-metallic variant of the butter knife, rather than the metal version.
Behind the scenes
Scrap metal was originally called "spare parts" and was designed to function just like alien epoxy (which was added to Fallout 3 with the Mothership Zeta add-on), but this idea was dropped during pre-production. Evidence of this still remains in the item's internal EditorID: "SpareParts." In The Outcast Collection Agent quest, the speech choice to give scrap metal to Casdin refers to them as "spare parts."