I see that the weapons and armor workbenches let you scrap weapons and armor, but where can I do the same with junk?

If you just dump the junk into your workbench inventory, it will do it on it's own. If you really want to do it yourself, at any settlement you control, just drop the stuff on the ground, and you can scrap it from there. (just like you scrap cars, tires, trees, etc when you first take over.)

If you feel the need to do so, you can do it at any settlement. Drop the junk on the floor, enter build mode, then scrap it the same way you would scrap furniture and buildings.

Ok.. I really need screws and none of the stuff I scrap at a workbench seems to have any... :-/

You can set up a search for screws, and any material that yields screws will have a little magnifying glass next to it.

Do you have the Scrapper Perk? That will get screws from most guns you scrap. Honestly that's always the first perk I get now.

Toy cars have them. Vendors sell shipments of any given resource and screws are pretty cheap.

The torso's of giddy up buttercups have at least 2 screws theres a factory full of them next to the quincy ruins

Easiest way, at least a little bit into the game, is to build water purifiers wherever possible and trade clean water for shipments. Sanctuary provides ample opportunity for placing purifiers. Right now, I've got a supply of 280 water and every other day, these are exchanged for some needed shipment at the larger hubs. I reduced actual scrapping to a minimum.

Thanks everyone! Love the help! That's what I love about forums, so much better than paying for a game guide...

Naw man. It's kind of wasteful to do that because the system isn't smart about what junk it uses when you need it. So, when you need one circuit board it might use a telephone which has one. Or, it might use a military circuit board which is like, what, eight?

OP, empty your inventory at your settlement and turn on editor mode. then dismantle the pieces like you would trees.

Actually, the stuff that isn't used gets dumped into the workbench storage. So the extra ones from the military circuit board will be dropped into the workbench. There is sometimes a display bug where stuff doesn't show right away, but if you leave and come back, people have reported that the stuff does show up in the proper quantities.

In addition, there are some items (mostly Syringer ammo) that requires actual junk items to craft. The Yellow Belly syringe, for example, needs an Anti Freeze Bottle, and Mentats need Abraxo Cleaner. Anti Freeze bottles break down into 2 Acid and 2 Plasitc, while Abraxo Cleaner breaks down into 1 Acid, 2'Antiseptic, and 1 Fiberglass. If you break these items down, you won't be able to craft these items, even though you have all the raw materials; you actually have to have the junk item itself.

Wonder why they did that....... The list o' stuff in my workbench is getting long, and unwieldy. Trying to find some specific item I dropped in there is a right pain. I wouldn't mind a button to "Scrap all Junk".... to reduce it to it's component parts.

You don't need to withdraw items to craft with them.

Desk fans have 2 screws each, though have a carry weight of 3 each. If you have the Scrapper perk, most weapons also have screws (avoid pipe pistols unless you need steel).

I'd also like to say for those who heard otherwise, placing junk before breaking them down will not lose other materials when crafting.

For example, if you place duct tape, then use adhesive, you will not lose the cloth. I've seen people state they break down everything before storing because of this, but I tested it and it works as it should.

This makes it unnecessary to scrap all your junk individually.

You can also sort to determine how much material you actually have stored if they're still combined into their original item.

Hope this helps.

You stated that it was wasteful to let the game scrap items automatically when you need them because materials are wasted. This implies that you advocate scrapping everything manually to make sure items aren't wasted. I pointed out that items aren't wasted, and further pointed out some items actually use intact junk items as materials. The statement above is completely out of left field because it sounds like you're saying to not worry about scrapping things manually because things can be pulled from the workbench. This is a complete 180 from your previous statement, so it has me confused. Would you mind clarifying whether you're saying to scrap manually or to not bother ?