Coolest thing you have ever found at a wrecking yard???

A 1941 Chev delivery panel for 50 bucks and drove it home in 1965, also in the same year a 1935 Lafeyette Nash for 10.00, that one was in pieces but was all there.

 

I will have to agree too. Of course this is only true when you are not looking for that impossible to find part you need or the one that is always broken

 

Originally Posted by banjeaux bob View Post
I have to agree.There is something theraputic about rummaging around in a junkyard.I won't say spiritual,but close.

I wrote a story about a junkyard at one time.

It was inspired by a yard I used to go to in Dacono, Colorado. Whenever we went there I was immediately drawn to a '40 Merc Fordor. Nothing special, but you could see the remains of the blue and white T-N-R interior, it had the remains of a metallic blue paint job, a louvered hood and a simple nose and deck job.
Why was it there? What of its history?
There was a Model A circle track car complete with old numbers painted on the sides and the remains of old decals. On the dash was a decal for Rosen Novak Ford of Denver.

I always hoped that somebody would discover the cars and save 'em.

The story was called Purgatory Auto Salvage.

It's on here...

Somewhere.........

 

All I know is nothing creeps me out more than seeing kids toys and clothes strewn about a horrific minivan wreck in the boneyard... gives me the eebie jeebies.

I've watched too many horror movies.

When I was a kid I had a key fetish and used to take keys out of all the cars and stick 'em in my dad's tool box. Went back there a few years later with dad and was pissed to find that they had wire tied all the keys into the ignitions. Bastards found me out! On the other hand, i've got a really cool collection of vintage key chains and shit. All of my rides where cool-ass key chains haha...

I was 8 years old lol...

 

I recently picked up a Desoto Hemi...weak by comparison of some of the other finds in this thread, but I am happy with it, price was right, and it turns over.

 

i agree also i have the most fun tin hunting and digging through junk, theres just something about the history of old stuff that has interested me since i was a child. its so simple yet no one understands it.

 

I had been on a big forest fire for three days straight and was driving my girlfriends Renault home(not a Dauphine,not an Appliance,the other ugly box) momentarily fell asleep at the wheel, ran off the left side of the road and bent two of the wheels on basketball sized rocks. Hitchiked about 30 miles into Alturas Calif. middle of nowhere pop. about 600..went to the only wrecking yard which was really a vacant lot and found two of those freakin three-hole Renault rims..what were the odds?

 

(For the wagon nuts)...:
a charcoal (probably one of 2 rarest colors for this 1/2 year only model) 1957 Pontiac transcontinental Wagon...EVERY piece unique to this model still on it, with the 347.

Recently found a 1958 Buick Caballero (with roof rack, even)
and 1958 Mercury Colony Park station Wagon (complete)...in the same yard. Got prices, still thinking about those 2...they're a ways away.

 

set of 915 bb chrysler heads in the interrior of a 67 sattelite factory radio and clock blockoff plates for my 57

the rarest car i ever seen just by the amount of them they built was
a 70 rallye350 olds 442 i was walking through this old yard i was about 17 at the time (1987) i was walking past a loong line of stacked cars ready for the crusher cars were about 4 high and i was thinking to myself i wonder if any of these 68-70 chargers (there were about 7 in the stacks) were / are hemi cars and what a shame it would be if they were

then something made me look up at this bright yellow stripped shell that said rallye 350 in black letters on the quarterpanel i stopped and stared in amazement that that car was actually even in the yard let alone gonna be crushed even though it was completely stripped well EXCEPT for both the original rubber bumpers were still on it (yeah i know it wasnt a hemi car) but its still rare as hell if i would of thought or had the money i would of bought those bumpers but i was a dumb kid who was too busy looking for 68 firebird parts (my first car)

i also found a 59 or 60 desoto with the hemi still in it (i about sh*T ) to see any hemi in a yard but one of the heads was off and it looked as though it had been off for aLOONG time and a couple of bores had puddles of rusty red water in them sooo......

 

one of our local yards I had been walking past an olds for about a year or so thinking it probably been stripped and one day decided to check it out, well the rocket was absolutaly complete even had the air cleaner, well it was a young kid there at the time and I told him I needed the engine for my truck that was broke down, real sob story well long story short he sold it to me for 100 bucks and even pulled it out for me and to top it off the trunk was full of parts, all I need is a block to build another rocket out of the extra parts ( got those for free), the kid could'nt figure out why I did'nt want a small block chevy. "Are you sure? I'll sell you the engine out of this blazer for the same price" na I'm good thanks, He let me get alot of parts off the car also, hubcaps, some chrome interior parts all kinds of shit, poor kid I bet he got a chewin when the boss showed up.Oh ya one time I found a hot chick at the junkyard, thought that was pretty rare, did'nt get to keep her though

 

Used to be a cool old car salvage yard two hours north of me where you had to make an appointment with the owner just to get in. Me and two buddies pull up to the yard and there stands this beautiful blond woman. We start to get out of the truck when my buddies tell me "dude" she's staring at you. I said "naw". She makes a bee line over to me grinning, gives me a hug, and says "I bet you don't remember me" (I hate when woman say that!). Turns out she worked with my wife at the hospital. Owner of the yard razzed me about that the whole time we were there and my buddies still talk about my junk yard "find".

 

Remember those scallops off the fenders of '40-'41 Buicks, that everybody used to put on their fender skirts? Found a pair just last year, that were still on the Buick.

 

I've never found that much cool stuff.....but I drove my primered 64 Fairlane HT to a salvage yard to pick up some parts I had bought and when I came out, a guy was taking my wheels and driveshaft off.....I guess he thought they were cool.

 

A yellow 1969 COPO Berger Camaro in 1982. I unscrewed the "By Berger" emblem and took it home.

I later realized what the car was, went back, it had been crushed..

 

If you've got 9 '62 Wildcats at home then you know how rare they are. Only 2000 made, better scoop that one up!!!!

 

My coolest find to date was a 671 blower stuffed under the fender well of an old pick up wrapped up in a old shirt. Some one had stashed it. I asked the old man that owned the place about it and he didn't even know what it was. I got it for ten bucks!

 

A box of CONDOMS in the back seat of a '62 Lark? OOOOOhhh!!! Now we know what the Yukon Jack was for!!! LOL

 

The coolest thing i've found at the wrecking yard was my mother-in-lawLOL!!! Been in the business 30 years and knows more about cars then most men!

 

a few 41-46 chevy/gmc trucks

 

at the 2009 turkey rod run i bought a pair of 15x8 chrome reverse for 10$!!! there now going on my 59 chevy truck

 

In recent years, A pair of 58 Buick finned drums. Off the car, no broken fins $20.00!
25 years ago lots of good stuff, now it seems to be all latemodel.

 

Remember the wrecking yard that used to have the $40 all you can carry sale once a year? We'd make a day of it.........

 

My old man told me about an old scrap metal dealer that lived up the road who is dead now. He smashed up wurlitzer jukeboxes to get the metals out of them. Rumor had it he junked a good 392 hemi so i went to see his old lady and she gave me two mint 392 valve covers from under the tree out the back. The rest was long gone though.

 

In 1963, a perfect 36 Ford coupe that I bought for $50

 

coolest thing ive found! I was at an auction, in muscoda wisconsin, back in sept. The guy had been collecting t's & a's for what had to be 50 years! Anyway, im walking the yard checking shit out, bs'n with an old guy, & we stumble across the remains of a 29 model a roadster-doors, cowl, rear 1/4s, just enough to get started. Talk to the deceased owners daughter, & she says come see me after the auction- i do, she says she used to play in it when she was little ( shes early 40s) & thinks the pile went to the scrapper! I talk to the scrapper, he looks at it & says "if you can get it outta there, you can have it! 20 minutes a shit load of bug bites, & briar cuts later, it was mine!!! for free- the scrapper even helped me load it! Damn!

 

this is a great thread. Just read all 8 pages!

 

Aluminum corvair box for $30, had a little scare when I set it down and forgot about it and had to retrace our steps but found it.

 

Just last month, one of the pick-n-pulls here had a '79-ish Firebird that had old 16MM movies in tins, Lionel track and some other stuff in it - which would have been a neat find if the car's interior hadn't been burned out. Not even a bad enough fire to ruin the car, just enough to ruin all the stuff inside.

If I'd had more time, they had a Corvair that still had the steering box, too. Maybe it's still there, but turnover's been faster with all the Cash for Clunkers cars.


On a worse note, I bought an overhead console out of a Suburban that had some "naturist" magazines among the remodeling junk someone filled it with. I didn't need to find the polaroids that were in that console.

 

That's pretty funny right there.

 

I couldn't carry half that shit now days! LOL