Both are copper. Both get graded. Where they end up depends almost entirely on what is still attached, not on whether it started life as a pipe or a wire.
Copper pipe
Clean copper tube with nothing on it is a high grade. The problem is that pipe almost never arrives clean.
- Solder on the joints. The usual issue, and the usual reason good-looking pipe drops a grade.
- Brass fittings still attached. Brass is its own price. Leave it on and the whole piece gets priced at the lower rate.
- Paint or lagging. Comes off easily and is worth doing.
- Heavy corrosion. Old buried pipe often comes in green.
Pipe out of a bathroom or kitchen strip-out usually comes in as the lower copper grade because of solder. Pipe offcuts from a new install are often the top grade because nothing has been done to them yet.
Copper wire
Wire splits into two very different things and this is where the big gap is.
- Bare wire, with no insulation at all, thicker than about 1.6mm. The top grade.
- Insulated cable, still in its plastic. Priced on the copper inside, which is why thick cable pays far better than thin flex.
So which pays more?
Clean bare wire and clean pipe sit at similar high grades. The gap is not pipe versus wire, it is clean versus not clean.
What actually determines your cheque, in order:
- Is there insulation on it?
- Is there solder, brass or paint on it?
- If it is insulated, how thick is the cable?
- Is it corroded?
What to do with each
- Pipe: unscrew the brass fittings where they come off easily. Do not spend an hour with a grinder on soldered joints, it is not worth it.
- Thick cable: stripping is often worth it if you have a tool and a decent quantity.
- Thin flex: bring it as it is. Stripping it by hand is a bad trade of your time.
- Everything: keep bare copper and insulated copper in separate piles. That alone is most of the difference.
And never burn insulation off. It is illegal, the fumes are dangerous, and burnt copper gets downgraded, so you finish worse off than if you had done nothing.