Your best junkyard/ swap meet/ barn find

As the post says, what is the best find you found at a junkyard, swap meet, barn find, etc?? It does not have to be valuable or rare. Just post your best find period. If you have pictures that would be great as well. My best find was in a commercial junkyard finding a Mopar 8 3/4 sure grip differential which was posi and had the super strong 489 case in it. Paid $85 and will be using it to put in my newer OT( 1971 Plymouth Duster).

 

Welcome to the HAMB but to save ya some grief from some of the guys that are a little more rough on newbies just do a search before you post, there are several threads on this subject, one very new one. Jim

 

I found a deluxe suburban in a junkyard a few months ago, and got most of the fender trim for less than the price of a big mac and a coke.

I was going to use them on my pickup but can't find the few pieces I'm missing anywhere.

 

My Catalina was stored in a barn since 1969. It was pulled out in October 2012. It a original 1963 Catalina 421 4 speed car. 1 of 320

 

Any pics of when you pulled it out of the barn?, does it have the eight lug wheels?

 

I got them in my I phone, for some reason I can't get them to upload. I made a album but the pics didn't post. I think I have to take them with a camera and use the house computer. The 8 lugs were long gone, it has 15 inch steelies. I got it phs do***ented and couldn't believe it was a real 421 car. It's one I will have forever, that's for sure.

 

It's so solid and clean. I really love the car.

 

If that's it, in your avatar, it IS quite clean !!!

 

25 years ago I was looking for flathead six plymouh exhaust manifold,opened the hood of a 49 Plymouth and found a Edmunds dual carb intake with Fenton headers and a Mallory dual point distributor. They came home with me for the price of 55 dollars.

 

I've had a lot of good junkyard finds...
In the last 18 months or so, I've gotten a Fulton visor for my '54 Buick, a pile of NOS Foxcraft fender skits that I'm going to flip, a '58 Impala steering wheel in part of a pile I paid $40 for, a McBar Machine Co. adapter bellhousing for Olds Rocket/Caddy to Ford T85 for $15, an Edmunds finned aluminum head for a Plymouth/Dodge 6 for $20, a couple Corvair steering boxes, a Wonder Bar radio and Autotronic Eye for a '55 Olds (still need to go get that), two Ford truck/Pontiac Super Duty hood scoops, a pair of 45-fin Buick drums, a Mopar big-block bellhousing ***embly (flywheel, fork, tin cover)...

I LOVE a good junkyard crawl!

-Brad

 

In 1972 I found a 41 Ford panel truck that had been in a garage
since 1958. It had almost all of the plates from 41 to 58 wired together
on the back door. I paid $75 for it and sold it the next year $250.
Sure wish I had it back !!!!LOL

 

Feb 2008. It had been stored in this building since 1988.

 

Anybody else make any good scores since?

 

32 Ford axle -- 15 bux about 4 yrs ago from junkyard.

 

Oh, 55 Caddy air cleaner -- 5 bux. Different junkyard.

 

Ford nodular iron chuck with 4.30 gears, Detroit locker and Daytona pinion support. Sitting on the ground at a s**** yard..$5.00

 

In 1968, I found a 1957 Chevy Nomad, Boxley Auto Wrecking, Sun Valley CA. Some landlord in South Pasadena called him to tow it away. $75.00. It just needed a trans. Also, in 1969, I found a 50 Mercury Woodie at Alex Auto Wrecking in Sun Valley. Some lady drove it in because it overheated. I got it for $75.00 and just changed the thermostats.

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I chased this 32 for 20 years before I was able to buy it. It sat in a nice dry barn with a wooden floor for many many years.

 

At Hershey swap meet in the mid '90s, I found a '38 Georgia tag unused still in the original wrapper and got it for $10. The guy handled mostly tags for PA and NY but for some reason had the oddball GA tag. It was a Polk County GA tag--that's the county I live in. Georgia lets us run year of manufacture tags on '70 model and older, so it's on the back of Henrietta the '38 Ford pickup/

 

Back in '06 I found a complete set of hubcaps for my '49 Lincoln. Best $80 I ever spent [emoji56]


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Kane County Fairgrounds at the local Model T club swap- I bought a '32 dash tunnel and gauge panel, missing the bell crank and gauges but still a good buy at fifty cents. Pretty sure it was around 1987 or so.

 

Both my current cars were been barn finds, my first was similar from a deceased estate that had been sitting for years until I came along. I was in the right places at the right times.

 

Found a Ford 427 under the hood of a 69 Ford pick up in a tow yard, bought it for 50 bucks. Actually thought I was buying a 390, didn't know it was a 427 till I was unloading it and saw the cross bolted mains.
Wide ratio top loader 4 speed with Hurst shifter in another Ford truck at or local U Pull It, $35
Years ago I was building up an OT 68 Barracuda, wanted a 8 3/4 axle for it. Even in the early 70's A body 8 3/4s were hard to find. Found one with a posi in a junk yard under a Valiant 4 door with a slant six. Go figure.

 

I know this is an old thread BUT....I love junk yard finds..two of my most memorial 1,a 32 five window complete $25.00 2,,,a 33 Willys sedan delivery,no engine,,$50.00.... and many more similar ..
The good old days.

 

About six years ago A friend told me that the old guy up the road had died and it appeared that the family was cleaning out the place I had remembered some old cars around the place so I went for a drive to check it out pulled in the drive way was met by one of the son's told him I was sorry to her about his father he proceeded to tell me what a S.O.B his father was as we stepped around the corner I saw the car that I have always wanted sitting in the middle of a over grown garden plot with remains of old blue tarp covers and old tires holding them down a 1950 Studebaker Champion ...... I had to have it he told me that his dad had bought it from the the original owner about 20 years ago never did any thing with it I had no cash on me so I made a $500 offer he said he would go in and talk with the rest of the family then he told me that they needed to find someone to clean up and haul away all of the s**** off the property all 90 acres and clean out the barns (3) I went to look around while he talked to the rest of them he came out and told me that they would take the $500 if the car did not sell at the estate sale in two weeks or if I wanted it now $800 **** I didn't have any cash so I told l would haul in all s**** and clean out every thing they said OK nest day loaded up and hauled in three loads of s**** paid them $800 from that and hauled it home cleaned it up drained and refilled the fluids and shot some oil in the cylinders put in a battery and hit the key nothing.....Then figured out you had to push the gas peddle down to start it I did and on the third crank it fired up belched some **** out the tail pipe cleared out and idled down to a pur drove it to the sale and showed it to the family they took turns driving it and I have been driving it for the last six years finally had to pull the carb off and rebuild it last year replaced the water pump still same fuel pump converted to 12 volt worked on cleaning up the property for 4 months ended up with 2 Kaiser Frazier's ,50 dodge coupe ,model A and T frames ,and so on. ......And I am still selling stuff that came from the place...

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While at a local cruise-in last year , I heard a guy talking about cars in his garage....I asked about them and found ou one was an "A" coupe...Followed him home and this was what I found...Bought it immediately , took weeks to dig it out...Its now at my garage while I gather parts

 

Slightly OT but in the early 90's I helped a fellow worker who was moving in with her boyfriend as the
house she had been renting for the last 20 years. After work I would load up my pickup and drop off the load at his house. A week of this and she was moved, she then said she had an old vw in the barn
did I want it. Went to look at it was a 62 Karmen Guia with 21000 miles. She had bought it as a demo,
used it for a few years then the battery died so she put it in the barn.

 

Back in the early-90's, I was at a swap meet and was coming up empty on finding anything I needed/wanted. I was poking around a big pile of boxes and spotted a bit of bright yellow in one particular box. I opened it up and found dozens of pair of new, 1962 NYS license plates. I bought the box for $75.00. When I got the box home, I found there were 47 matching pairs of unissued plates that had been in storage in small County court house, never returned to the State. The box originally held 50-pairs, but three must have been issued. The numbers were all sequential, the plates were like brand new with the original onion skin tissue separating them from each other. All the numbers were clear for use through the DMV and able to be used for licensing 1962 cars.

Over a period of 3-4 years, I sold the plates for $50/pair which helped finance one of my projects. I also sold a pair to a guy who eventually became my best friend and we've worked on many cars together over the years and continue to do so.

 

Another just slightly OT. A '66 Nova L-79 air cleaner in a buddy's garage, $20. These things were hen's teeth before they started repro-ing them. Ran it on my '62 for awhile, then flipped it for stupid money.

 

I was told by a friend that there was this old tow/junk yard about 60 miles away from here in a small town that you really can not get to from here. So a couple of friends and I went down there and looked around, talked to the old guy that owned the place and then made a plan to go back down in a week with tools and get a bunch of stuff. He had a bunch of cars from the 40-70s. Every one of the 50s cars were missing the trunk and rear quarters. We asked him what was up with that and he said some guy had come in and bought all of them to build couches out of. I came back with a pickup load of parts. My friend that really isn't into old rusty stuff got a pair of taillights for his 62 caddy couch for $3. I got 2 doors from a 46 chevy truck, small parts from a 70 chevelle, rear window and mouldings from a 46 chevy sedan, front spindles from a 70s pinto, center windshield divider bar 46 chev truck, a/c evaporator for my old mans 70s cordoba and a whole bunch of other odds and ends that I cant remember any more. The total cost? The old guy added everything up on a s**** of cardboard, I am getting nervous because it takes him about 10 minutes to add everything up and he says how about $42? I handed him $60 and told him to keep the change. He looked at me funny and said no one had ever done that before. We had a great time there on that Saturday unfortunately he p***ed away not to long after that and everything was crushed. He had told us that the epa and the dnr was after him to get rid of everything so I am sure that was why it was gone not to long after he died.