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If I was heading down to LA or San Diego from the bay area I would stop at those places in LA. They used to all advertise in the Recycler (does that still exist?) and they would have coupons. A very popular alternate vehicle among my friends was a 22r based Toyota pickup, and those pick-a-part places seemed to have a lot of those.
I can't seem to find one in Michigan, they want you to come in and basically order the part from them. The last 2x I have been to the salvage yard (passenger side mirror, tail light), the dealer was cheaper (with a coupon from the paper).
These guys all figured out that they could make more money.
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
Oh crap, I didn't even think of that one! I feel kinda dumb now. But wait, it gets worse. I didn't have my car that night; I let one of my roommates borrow it. He works in Annapolis and parks in the garage downtown. He came out after getting off work, about 2:00 in the morning, to find the car jacked up and the front wheel missing, lugnuts and all. He calls home, and it wakes up my other roommate. I'm a heavy sleeper, and could sleep through anything. God help me, if there's ever a fire, I don't think the smoke alarm would wake me up! Anyway, my roommate finally woke me up, and put me on the phone. I was still half asleep though, and the first thing I told him was to put on the spare and come home. Then he said they took the lugnuts too. So the sad thing is, it wasn't only me that didn't think to pull a lugnut off each of the other wheels, but neither of my roommates did, either! If they had an emotorcon for foot-in-mouth or "D'oh", I'd use it here. :P
Anyway, the next day was Columbus Day, which I had off, and my roommate, who also had a broken foot in a cast (I dunno how much that would have hampered him wrestling around with the spare tire), so he spent the night with some friends in town, and the next morning I went to the junkyard, found the wheel/tire, and ran it up to the parking garage and put it on.
I can't wait to see him tonite though, to tell him about that obvious little thing that never even occurred to any of us!
Or, they might not let you take a piece off of a door, because they'd rather sell the complete door. Trim, window, lift mechanism, and all. Now if it's a smashed door, but still has some salvageable parts, they probably wouldn't care.
Now on stuff that's really in-demand that they know they can sell quickly, they'll pull it out and sell it off and the car never makes it back into the yard. For instance, used 2.7's are a hot item with Intrepids, because they're very expensive to rebuild, ridiculously expensive to buy new, and tend to sludge up. So a good used 2.7 pretty much has a guaranteed home. As a result, just about every 1998+ 2.7 LH car in the yard had the engine pulled, unless it was a bad one. The Intrepid I pulled the wheel off of still had its engine, and "bad engine" was written on the hood.
Now if it's something that hardly ever dies or that there's just not that much demand for, like a Mopar slant six or 318, chances are the car will go back into the yard, engine complete, even if it's in great shape. For instance, that '82 Mirada convertible I saw in there at the time had "good engine" and "good transmission" written on the hood. But then, there's just no demand for a smogger 318 with 130 hp. They were durable (the engines at least, not the whole car), so the failure rate was low. And nobody who's rebuilding a more desireable car is going to want to yank a smogger 318 out of a 1982 Mopar. And most people with a car with a similar engine are probably just going to junk the car when it does finally die.
She slapped me silly cause she thought I lost my mind.
2016 Audi A7 3.0T S Line, 2021 Subaru WRX
Years ago I knew of a small-town yard that had 3 fintails in it, all there because they'd been crashed. I paid the place a visit and the guy running it let me have all the little pieces I could carry for $10. I could have had the 3 cars for $250 total. They still had their period radios in them, which I kick myself for not salvaging. Sadly, I only needed a couple little pieces.
This place also had TONS of 50s-60s Detroit iron...it had been an operating junkyard in the 70s, then was caught up in some weird probate dispute or something for about 15 years. Many of the cars were very weathered, but had to be chock full of unusual little parts, and many odd cars were present. In the early 90s it opened back up for a couple years...then one day around 1996 or so, the owner had all the cars removed, and that was it. The fintails vanished before this point, which makes me hope someone took them to part them out. The place didn't seem to have a crusher...they just accumulated cars. It's a huge vacant tract today.
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
One place here that I went to (for my 93 Civic) had a bunch of Hondas on these racks, stacked three cars high. There was huge sign at the office desk "no rack climbing"
I come in, the guy says can I help you, I say "I'm here to climb your racks" :P :P
He didn't get it at first, it was too ear;ly to crack jokes.
2016 Audi A7 3.0T S Line, 2021 Subaru WRX
I went down there for a little joyride one day in 1992, roughly 14 years later. The strange thing is, I actually REMEMBERED a lot of the cars that were in there. Odd how one day-trip like that can stay in your mind in such vivid detail. I remembered seeing one car that I could identify as a DeSoto in 1978, as it had the teeth and a family resemblance to our '53. Even had what seemed to be the same shade of greenish/turqoise. I remember Granddad saying it was the wrong year, but he didn't tell me what year it was.
That same car was still there in 1992. Turns out it was actually a 1955 Fireflite Coronado, one of the first triple-tone jobs from Detroit. Turqoise body, white spear, black roof. I also found the old dark bluish-green '53 that Granddad ultimately found in the yard to salvage parts from. It looked like we were the last people to pull anything off of it, as well, but what was left was totally shot, as it was rusted, had trees grown up around it, and some of the windows were down or broken out. I talked with the father and son who owned it, and they said they got that car in back in the early 60's. They'd had it fairly close up to the shop, but when they expanded and bought more land (back then it was cheaper to just buy more land than to crush the cars), the car actually got DRIVEN to its final resting palce.
This place opened in 1961 or 1963, IIRC, and they didn't start crushing cars until around 1994. I went back fairly regularly for awhile just to explore, but I think the last time I was down there now was around 1997. It's over 100 acres, and there's something like 10,000 cars in there.
I'd be kinda curious to go back now and see if much has changed.
As a lead up (excessivly long post warning!):
I lived in a little 12x14 cabin that sat adjacent (about 30' apart) to a 14x20 cabin, and we shared a driveway. The neighbor had this old, 70s Datsun pickup that looked about as good as it ran (neither of which was good at all)! Nonetheless, he kept this old junker running day after day, but as winter set in it started to become more and more unreliable. At one point, the master cylinder failed and he decided it would be more effective to find a different vehicle. He had a friend from Denali who had a white 80s Chevy van and was not using it since he was overseas. He contacted the guy and received permission to use it (he already had a key for it), so I drove him down to Denali on New Year's Day (amazingly fun drive that day with almost no traffic and about 8' of new snow on the road!) to retrieve it.
Well, the only bad thing about this van is that it could not make it up the hill to the main road, so I would have to tow him up all the time. Basically, I gave him my schedule and said that if he wanted to go somewhere he would have to get me to tow him up when it fit in there! About two weeks after getting the van home, I towed him up before I went to work, as he had work about 2 hours later. He parked the van on the shoulder of the road and went back to his cabin. When he came out to go to work, the van was gone. It turns out it was towed by the State Troopers because it was a "visual obstruction." They would not give it back to him because he was not the registered owner! So, basically this was a death sentence for the van since it was accumulating impound fees and the owner was not scheduled to come home for another 4 months.
Fast forward 3 days to Saturday. We decide to go junkyard hunting to find a master cylinder for his Datsun pickup. At the second place, the guys in the shop tell us where we can find a trio of old Datsuns. They said, "if you can get one off, you can have it for $5 with no guarantees." Oh, and it was about -25F this day. So, we go walking back into the yard about 1/2 mile, and find the trucks and a promising cylinder. I looked it over to guage what tools I would need, and we headed back to the car. On the way back, he is talking about something random and then, suddenly, "blah blah... wait a minute.... is that? It is! That is my van!" As we get back to the car and I am fumbling for the tools, he says he is going to go "check it out."
So he goes, and I stick to the task of getting the master cylinder. As I am about 1/4 mile into the yard, I hear the van fire up and a few moments later a guy yells, "Hey! Hey!!! You can't take that!" And *zoom*, he's gone. I spent another 30 minutes trying to break that blessed master cylinder loose until my hands were nearly frozen. Finally I gave up, stopped in the shop to tell the guys I had no luck with it and "thanks anyway," then headed home.
I had to chuckle at the irony of the whole situation. So, anyway, he got his truck running a few weeks later and took the van back to Denali as he did not want to take the chance of losing his friend's van again.
We were in Alaska this summer and I couldn't figure out how to find you and buy you a cup of java, even though it seems there is a coffee shop on every corner, now.
Wandered around Hatcher Pass, Palmer, Talketena, and stayed in Wasilla. My sister is the re-start coordinator for the Iditarod so we got to play with some sled puppies, too.
Sorry we missed you.
Jim (starbird)
Awwww, bummer, would have been cool to meet you. We spent quite a bit of time in Talkeetna (montana creek) this summer. Rest of the time was spent up north of Denali Park. Should have just shot me a message on edmunds or the rv forum, I usually check them quite a bit in the summer. When you planning on coming back for a visit?
Jolie
These used to be everywhere...can't remember when I last saw one
It's funny how people selling beaters always say easy fix, if it's so easy why don't they get it done. I guess it's easier to hide potential problems if a car is not running at all. :sick:
2016 Audi A7 3.0T S Line, 2021 Subaru WRX
Yes it does, heck its cold now. Just got back home tonight after washing the Ram and the temp is already -16.......brrrr. This is the coldest its been so far this winter.
Unusual way to sell a car. I'd probably rather not deal with this guy What's he think he's got anyway?
Could use more details and better pics, but this is interesting Kind of has the hasn't moved in a year look to it
The miles are reasonable so could this be a good reliable nice looking car?
Nice car. Seller is all over the place with his trade requests
You never see anything like this around here and it's a few miles from my house. I think that he wants too much given the shape
If the seller says to forget registration, who am I to argue?
If it looks like this in person, this could be a steal
Manual tranny and Ford 9 inch w 4.11s.... pretty nice
Master salesmanship
The miles are up there but is this my chance to finally own one of these? 5 sp is a big plus
Right!
That car up here (alaska) would be gone in a day or less. Heck, if it was ok otherwise I'd buy it without a second thought. Then again, I have access to a junkyard full of parts for cheap and a little brother to work on my *projects*.
Yeah that guy with the trade requests doesn't know what he wants, and is confusing.
I like the BMW, I would consider it if it's in as nice shape as he says it is.
2016 Audi A7 3.0T S Line, 2021 Subaru WRX
Hmh The CRX SI had a VTECH all the way back in 1990 huh?
The motor only has 10,000 miles on it and you already had to rebuild the turbo?
Is this a train wreck Shifty?
Here is my Volvo Rally Wagon.
Oh another rally wagon although this one seems to nice to beat up in a rally.
My 1985 Consumer Guide has a test of a 300D, and for being a Diesel it doesn't sound like a bad performer. 3515 pounds, 123 hp, and 0-60 in 12.1 seconds. I think with GM's 350 Diesels, you were lucky if you could break 20 seconds!
The price was kinda staggering though...~$30,000
A turbo is the only 300D one would really want. They can keep up with traffic no problem. Good torque. 30K was a lot for a car of that size then...but I'd take it over 2 Chevy Celebrities!
Looking at my book, I think I see why velour was so rare in Benzes. The 300D and 190 models that my book covers are listed as having MB-tex standard, with velour being a $1073 option and leather being a $1083 option. I'd imagine that anybody who decided to upgrade decided that they might as well just blow the extra ten bucks and get the leather!
In contrast, the domestics simply refused to make a high-quality, expensive looking vinyl, so they just made cloth/velour standard in their nicer models, with leather being an option...usually about $400-600.
MB-Tex wears like iron. I can't believe how well it holds up over time. Even some of the old craigslist beaters have great looking interiors because of the longevity of the MB-tex.
MB interiors had an odd heirarchy. Euro cars had a cloth that I believe was ranked lower than MB-tex. We never saw it, but you can find it in grey market cars, it is often a plaid pattern. Then comes the unbeatable tex, then the velour, then the leather. US market velour cars are indeed quite rare. The Euro market at the time was a bit different, and velour S class from the period are as common as leather. S class cars in Europe could be bought really stripped down too...even with the lowly cloth.
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
Oh ... now I see the problem. I'm not smoking enough crack.
I think you should at least put the darned thing together if you insist on asking this much for it.
Only 14k miles and it needed a new clutch?? yeah... right. Try 114k.
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
There isn't that much crack available!
A nonmatching, nonoriginal, modified mustang coupe for big money? Only if the buyer doesn't know what they are doing.
That car doesn't have anything going for it. Its not a convertible and its not a V8. Which means it is absolutely nothing special and not worth very much, I'm afraid.
One thing folks seem to forget with Mustangs ... there are ALOT of them out there. So there is no reason to settle for a bottom model like this one, and certainly no reason to overpay.
Anyway, that's my totally uneducated and inexperienced opinion.
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
65 Mustang
'11 GMC Sierra 1500; '98 Alfa 156 2.0TS; '08 Maser QP; '67 Coronet R/T; '13 Fiat 500c; '20 S90 T6; '22 MB Sprinter 2500 4x4 diesel; '97 Suzuki R Wagon; '96 Opel Astra; '11 Mini Cooper S
"great winter project, hardly any rust," overpriced by factor of 10?
I stumbled on some info on that car on Jalopnik website. Apparently it belonged to some movie director and it's a Chrysler one off from the 50's.
Here's the link:
Tornado
2016 Audi A7 3.0T S Line, 2021 Subaru WRX