Anybody have an funny wrecking yard stories?

I used to spend a lot of time at the wrecking yards scrounging parts for my old cars -- especially back in the days when they weren't very organized like they are now. There was always all kinds of funny **** going on at those places. I bet you guys have some funny stories about things going on there too. Here's a couple of things I remember.

One time I went early in the morning looking for a '67 Caprice tail-light. I found one, but the trunk was locked. The guy up front told me to go talk to the owner who was still asleep. He was sleeping in the back of an old delivery truck with his guard dog. The owner calls a guy named "Yo-Yo" over, "Hey, Yo-Yo.... go help this guy out". So Yo-Yo got a big hammer and followed me out there. He started wailing like a maniac on the trunk lid with the hammer about a hundred times for about ten minutes until it was all crinkled up and it finally broke the latch and opened up. They charged me $5 for the light. But they destroyed the trunk lid and the latch.

At another yard, the owner had a super loud PA system. The whole time he was eating lunch, he'd click the PA system on and burp -- nice long juicy burps. Then he'd say "that is all". You could hear his burps echoing all over the huge yard.

Another time my brother's wiseguy friend came along with us. He picked up a big long driveshaft and proclaimed that he was Zeus and threw it like a giant Javelin and it went CRASH right through the windshield of a Chrysler Newport and it stuck into the seat back. We were laughing our heads off. Some guy that worked there just gave him a dirty look but didn't really care. (this was like 30 years ago, so a Chrysler Newport wasn't worth a **** back then).

 

My buddy went and pulled a part at pick your part and left an old breaker bar by accident. It was just a breaker bar but his Dad had given it to him when he was real young and he had it for decades. He was real bummed.

About a week later one of our other buddies pulls up and starts telling us how he scored a part at pick your part and "check out this *****in breaker bar someone left!"

We couldnt believe it, 100's of people a day go through that yard.

 

A couple of stories. Back in the early 60's I was in Cherry Auto Wrecking on Signal Hill in Long Beach. I was cutting the top off of a 51 Ford hardtop to put on my 50 Ford Convertible. They closed and locked the place up, guess they forgot I was in there. I had to break out. Went back the next day for the top. Glad they didn't have a big dog.
Back in the early 90's there was an out of business yard near where I was working in Northern California. They had an old COE wrecker, about a 40 Chevy. I wanted a picture of the truck but a guy warned me about going up there, said the owner was pretty crazy. I got up the nerve to go up there one day and asked the guy if I could take a picture of his truck. He said ok, but I had to take a picture of his mule first. So I did. To this day, I have no idea what that was all about. He didn't ask me to send him the picture or anything, just that I had to take it.
By the way, I still have the picture, well, both pictures actually.

 

So you took a picture of his ***?

 

Theres a yard in North Idaho I went to, and while in the yard noticed that there forklift had a 5 gauge SW pannel in the dash...with all five curved gl*** cresent needle instuments!!! I jokingly told the yard guy he should sell that dash to me, and to my surprise he said "sure, but I gotta get 10.00 for it", like it was all the money in the world. He even took it out! I gave him 15.00 for it, told him his labor was not free The funny thing is, this was there one and only forklift, and now it has no instuments!

 

my wrecking stories involve animals. at my yard in phx we had the basic yard dog. black and ugly but tame as all get out . one day a lady customer came in and was afraid of the dog we told her dont be afraid he wont bite. she said he got teeth dont he. i bought some pigs and truned them loose for weed and gr*** control. bob my counter man being a city guy gave them names and i swear they would answer to their name for treats.

 

Not a funny story, but everyone who was old enough, remembers where they were when certain historical events occured.

In 1963, I was in my first semester of college, and was perfecting the art of cutting cl***es. I was up on top of a pile of cars pulling a steering box out of a 1946 Ford, when I heard a commotion in the s**** yard office. I climbed down and went to see what was up and they told me President Kennedy had been shot. I think about that day every time I p*** by that site (now a library).

 

My brother and I used to frequent a local yard quite a bit. The guard dog wasn't very old, but knew how to be mean. I got to feeding him chocolate chip cookies. He was one happy pup then, you could tell, he would get a hard on when you gave him the chocolate chip cookies. A lot of people were afraid of him and the big fuss he created, but he never bothered us. He even looked like he was happy to see us!!!

 

I got chased up onto the hood of a car by The Pig Man's yard stock in Toledo, Ohio. Anyone from Toledo knows The Pig Man. The yard was full of '50s and '60s cars until a few years ago. He'd let pigs roam the yard. These big ****ers came at me, so I climbed onto the hood.
Oh...that was the time my girlfriend went with me, too. She wasn't impressed.

Brad

 

about 20 years ago me and a buddy were at our favorite yard looking for a maverick rear for my project. after wandering around we found the one i wanted , and went up to tell the yard owner which one. he said they were real busy and didn't have time to torch it out and that we should take the torch car (they always had some old pile with some holes cut in the truck for the bottles,,,this time it was some old buick) and do it ourselfs

i told him it was real muddy down there and was afraid of getting stuck in deep hole ,but he ***ured me if i went like hell i'd make it through..if i got stuck they'd pull me out with the loader

so we take off , me driving....i floor it as i aproach the big mud hole and make it. i quick turn the corner to go up where the car sitting , hit the brakes...and the pedal goes to the floor! i smashed into the back of some old pickup..smashed in the grille/bumper and busted the radiator..steam everywhere..hood bent up


so we cut it out , strapped it on top of the bent up hood... and went back trough the mud hole up to the office as the yard owner was standing there.

all he said was "oh ****, i forgot to tell you about the brakes"

 

I was in a Northern Wi. yard and looked into this Chev van to see if it had a tilt column. I noticed a pack of cigarettes on the dash and thought it was funny they'd be there. Looked to the back and there's a pile of blankets looked like maybe a body under them. I about **** when it moved. Got out of there and told the owner about it. He and I went back and he checked it out, pistol in hand. Turned out he knew the guy, who was down and out, told him he was welcome to sleep in the yard but to come to the house and tell him he was there next time.

 

Back in about 1960 or 1961 a couple of buddies and I were driving by our local junk yard in Artesia, Ca. on a sunday. Parked out front was a '58 Corvette that had been wrecked. We saw a couple other guys we knew messing around that Vette. We stopped to see what was going on, well these guys were pulling the transmission out of the car. So we got busy and removed the steering wheel and a few other things, I can't remember exactly what else we got (that was 45/46 years ago) but it was stuff like that that kept me out of the Navy and in L.A.County Jail.... Not Worth It!!
I guess that's why you never see a wrecked Corvette parked outside a junk yard!
Saved by his grace inspite by my deeds.

 

Bout two years ago a Buddy and I were cuttin the sheet metal outta the top of a 53 chev 4 door to use as compound curves for the doors on his 34 pickup. Anyway, he was inside while I was running the sawsall around the outside. ANY idea how loud that was in that drum? He couldn't hear worth a dang for a couple of hours.

 

I was 18 years old and looking for some junk for my **** box, it was getting close to dark. I leaned in the p***enger window of a car with a stuck door to rummage around. I heard some very heavy foot steps and then hot breath on my ****.

I thought for sure that some sort of giant junkyard dog was about to have me for a snack.

When I flipped around I was face to face with the junkyard cow!

 

I told a guy I used to work for that I was looking for a 9" rearend. He said his exwifes car was parked infront of his house still and it had a 9" in it. The car was still in his name and he was pretty ornry. He told me to come over Saturday morning.
I showed up and saw a decent driver parked at the curb. He says, well do you want it or not? I proceeded to pull the rearend out of a perfectly fine car while he sat on the porch drinking beer laughing about how pissed she would be when she came to get the car. It even had brand new brakes and was a good ratio.

 

I remember a tmie when I was 16,went to a yard that a buddy of my dads had.It was close to the end of a Saturday afternoon.The old man and his friend said for me to go get what I needed for my car,they were going to visit.Before I realized,it was dark,the gates were all locked and all was quiet!Getting a little freaked,threw my loot over fence,climbed over behind it,scrambled to office to find those two half in the bag,an empty bottle.The owner says,"oh ****,forgot you were out there!Good thing the dogs didn't see climb the fence!You would have been Kibbles"

 

smacked my face on a big commercial truck side mirror because of a ****ing snake. hurt like hell. super glad I was alone.

 

My buddies and I go to some junkyards called crazy rays, You have to pay $1 to get in. I guess they figure that will cover what fits in your pocket. One time a friend was pulling a rear so we were just ********in and decided we needed music, So we set off to find stereo stuff to make a system on a truck tailgate next to us while he worked on the rear.
We came back with a good battery, tape player stereo, 2 6x9 speakers, a vw antenna, various wire, 3 lawn chairs, a couple tapes, a golf ball and long piece of metal like a hockey stick and another friend was wearing a new pair of pants he found in a van. We had the stereo pumping in a few minutes, then it was hockey golf time. Just as I swung the **** out of this metal thing Some guy came around the corner, it flew right by him almost hitting him then bounced off a windshield strait up in the air and landed about 1 foot from the guy.
That was a good day at the junk yard.

 

My Father-in-law runs a body shop that his Dad started in a barn on the family farm back in the 50's. His Dad used to have a small junk yard with it too. When I was a kid (like 8 years old), my Dad was building a 53 F-100, and was looking for some parts. We went to one of the local yards,and the guy there told us to try a small place called "Bud's" farther north, and gave us directions. We found the place and looked around. There was lots of old cars, and my Dad found a few things, and I got chased around by a few farm animals. Now, fast forward about 30 years, and I'm married to a woman who's Dad owns a body shop called..."Bud's Auto Body"!
Yes, it is the same place! Unfortunately, My Father-in-law had all the stuff crushed. He also crushed all the good old stuff (NOS 50's-70's tin) in the loft of the barn, about 5-10 years before I came into the picture.
My wife and I had a good laugh when we realized I had actually been to her Grandpa's junkyard long before I ever met her.

 

one summer in eastern wa. my cousin and me were picking out a bench seat in a old closed down wrecking yard for the neighbors clubhouse so we had a place to sit. found a nice one in the back of a old snyder's bread van. took it back to the clubhouse dropped it off and by the time we got to his house the neighbors dad had called pissed as hell! we thought we were in trouble for helping ourselves to the seat, boy were we wrong! it was full of baby rattlesnakes! after that we were under house arrest by my uncle the rest of the summer. i still hear about that one 30 years later!

 

A buddy of mine was traipsing through an old wrecking yard and was suddenly in bad need of a ****, decided he couldn't hold it any longer and opens the door of an old truck to lean against it to steady himself and pounds one out right there on the ground, ..when he finishes he discovers that he's not near any gr*** or leaves to wipe up when the glove box door pops open and there was a fresh roll of toilet paper in it,....supposedly a true story!

Another buddy of mine was looking for the front clip off a 49 Ford and found a good one in a yard in PA but the owner was winding down the business and insisted that he take the whole car, buddy didn't want the whole car just the parts that he needed and argued with the guy till he was blue in the face, finally he loses the arguement and drags the car hundreds of miles home, once he gets it home he looks under a stinky old blanket on the back seat and finds a 1911 Harley engine and sells it to the Harley Davidson museum for thousands$,.... I don't know, probably a pack of lies!

Every spring for the past 20 years I would go on a field trip to the same old boneyard just to take pictures and look at crusty old tin. This yard would always have big old truck bodies to store parts in and I would always see this one rams horn exhaust manifold, not two but one, it was beautifully ground down and show chromed and was obviously off of an old custom but since there was only one I thought it would be a dumb thing to have until the last time I was there the sister to it amazingly showed up and I bought the pair for twenty bucks,....absolute God's truth!

 

there was a yard I drove up too to get a back window outta a 50 chev bus coupe. the newest thing in the yard was a 1960...I'm stompin around the great expanse of cool old tin and came across a twin engine aircraft tail up buried in the dirt with the remnants of a 50 cad on each side of it (cut/crushed by the plane) I got done what I needed done and when I was checking out I asked the old man about the plane...he said, "bout 5 years ago that plane crashed there...they came, investigated, pulled the flight recorder, cleaned out the dead guys and never came back....we originally were going to cut it up and s**** it, but then we remembered, eh we're a junk yard....who gives a ****."

Just recently I went down to the pick apart to get some parts for my POS daily....found an entire box of *****s in the trunk of a lexus....seemingly used *****s....I used a rag and picked one up and tossed it at my pop (I'm in my 30's BTW) as I said "hey dad check this out" he caught it and just stared at it for a minute till he figured out what it was, he then dropped it and proceeded to clean his hands in a greasy dirt patch...needless to say I was laughing so hard I was crying....

 

Me and my friend Jeff, for whom I'm building a new car, went on a tin hunting expedition - North Carolina MOPAR style.

Now, forgive me in advance, but if you've ever dealt with some of these dyed in the wool MOPAR muscle car types you know what I mean when I say they're a different breed.

We start our hunt by visiting this one guy we've dealt with before. This guy is easily sitting on a half-million dollars worth of MOPAR muscle cars just laying in the woods, some run; some don't. Surrounded by all of this potential cash he lives in the shi*iest trailer you ever saw. Well, he doesn't have a suitable body we were seeking so he sends us to one of his B body buddies located way out in the sticks.

Eventually, we find the other guy's place, and let me tell you it was a sh*t hole too! Junk and garbage all over the place and bunch of 60's MOPAR muscle cars in various states.

So, Jeff heads to the double wide to knock on the door, while I stand near a late model Dodge dually loaded with car batteries to have a smoke. Upon knocking on the door; he is immediately surrounded by a half-dozen little ankle biter dogs barking their ***es off and threatening to bite him... Me? Well I'm laughing my *** off, but not for long, as almost instantly I'm surrounded by a pack of a dozen or more - larger and MUCH larger dogs; all threating take a piece of me. I resigned myself to the fact that I was not getting out this un-****hed and just as I grab a car battery off the back of the dually, the kind with a lift strap, it was my only option for a weapon; the property owner appears at the door and calls off the pack!

That episode was too close for my taste and no we didn't find what were looking for.

 

Last year was in a yard with some friends looking for some parts off a 50 chevy they had didn't find anything. But scored a Studebaker oil bath air cleaner for $5 well we were ****ing around in the yard checking out the wrecks when my buddy(not the brightest) announced he had to piss well he walked over to the fence and whipped it out, let out a girly scream and fell to the ground ******* himself.Well we got him on his feet thinking he was joking then we found the warning sign he had pissed on an electric fence. We still give him **** about that one.

 

8-10 years (early 70's) old with my dad looking for parts to keep his '53 Chevy in motion. He's off pulling something while my sister and I opt to look the place over. We climbed up on top of the nearest derelict to scout around and found a silver half dollar laying on top of the car. We started hopping from car to car and suddenly realized that someone had placed silver dollars and half dollars on nearly every car in sight. Needless to say, but it got our attention real fast. Never found out why, but we both left that day with about $50 each in our pockets! To this day, I still take a real good look around when I go to the yards.

 

There is a yard I and my friends frequent regularly for parts. My girlfriend at the time was with us every time pulling parts for her cars as well (got a nice red leather interior for her '72 Caddy once). Well she spotted a trashed '64 Cad there and wanted some shots of herself with it.
Next time we went she wore a bikini under her work clothes, and before we started parts pulling we did a quick photo shoot on the Cad.
That isn't the funny part. Next to the Cad was a van, and on the other side of the van a half dozen guys were stripping a Mustang convertible. They were so intent on it they never noticed her stripping down to the bikini, climbing on the Cad, the whole photo shoot, or her dressing again.

 

Well, once upon a time, these two young teens were yanking a carburetor off an abandoned Mopar in an old field behind a recycling center. They weren't sure if they oughtta be doing that or not, so they was bein' all sneaky and stuff.

Some dude shows up in a pickup truck and starts messin' around in the yard maybe fifty yards away. The two boys hid under a semi trailer to avoid being seen.

The guy notices the hood up on the old Chrysler and seems to be studying the scene a little too intently for the boys' liking, so the dumber of the two bolts up, bashes his head on the bottom of the trailer, then staggers and plows his way through piles of hubcaps, bottles, aluminum and gl*** as he makes his "getaway" sounding like the Hulk trashing a garbage can factory or something!

A short time later, his buddy comes calmly walking out of the field to join him and smiles as his stupid partner sits there rubbing his head. "As soon as you left, that guy said we could take whatever we wanted off that car!" he says laughing. "...And he thought your wacky 'escape' was hillarious, too!"

 

Back in 1985 I had a Chevy II and needed small parts of it and even back then parts were rare and hard to find for it. A friend asked if I had ventured out to this junkyard north of town. After getting directions to the middle of rural no where, I found the dirt road it was suppose to be located on. I could see driving up the cars were stacked 8 and 9 high. I parked and got out and noticed a old house with the front door open and chickens coming in and out. One chicken was in a sand box with kid that looked like hadnt taken a bath since he was born. So this little guy comes out yelling what the F%*@! you want! This guy looked and spoke just like Ernest T B*** from the Andy Griffith Show. I told him I what I wanted and he said something but it wasnt understandable. He just took off and I guess I was to follow. So I follow this guy down this dirt oiled path between these cars and I hear this screaming from up on the hill running along side the path I guess to Chevy II parts. Well the yelling keeps getting louder and louder. The guy in front me is ignoring it all and just keeps walking fast and mumbling to himself. All of sudden he stops and looks up. These to guys start yelling at each like mad men then the guy on the hill starts throwing hupcaps and anything he can get his hands on at us. Headlights, hupcaps, etc.. are flying and I start taking off the other way. Then it just stopped. We walked a little ways- turned a corner a really really nice 64 Chevy II Nova convertible appeared. I felt bad taking the tailights out of it, but I needed them bad. On the walk back, I stop towards the end of the path way back to the junkyard and I m counting my money to give to him and I look over and there sitting on top of a 55 gal barrel is a brand new 1982-83 Corvette Crossram fuel injection manifold complete. I ask how much? He said "10 dollars ...you go now". I took it and my tailights and as walked as fast to my car as I could go. Theses folks look and acted like the hillbillys from the movie "Deliverance" .
Later, I told my buddy what had happened he laughed so hard I thought he was going to pee himself. He couldnt believe I actually went there bymyself either.
He said the owner would frequently be visited by the police looking for stolen cars - namely ones that had been broken down on the side of road and just disappeared.

I went back a few years later, the same older cooter came out and down the driveway towards me. Walking right at me. He pulls a gun, but he was far enough way I couldnt do anything to defend myself. So he keeps walking at me and fires right as he gets up to me to the right of my ear. I didnt see the dog that was running away from him down the driveway. He killed the dog and made me deaf in my right ear. I spun around and left and never went back there. I had my 45 in the glove box.....and thought about going back up the driveway.
I paused and thought about it....... just went home and scratch mentally to never go back there again, no matter what vintage tin might be there.

Ive got alot more those type storys and probably others do to.
Who hasnt encountered the DOG from hell and a junkyard?

 

Last year I bought 2 ******s. One was a nice clean 97 wagon with a blown engine, the other one was a rolled over sedan. I pulled the engne out of the wagon and sedan. I wa getting ready to do the swap and I called the wrecker so he could pick up the rolled shell and take it to the s**** yard. The guy had a real strong accent but I figured he understood what I meant. Well I come back from work and that dumb*** had taken my good car and sent it to the s****yard. So I get in my car and I drive to the yard and ask them where my car was. They pointed to a pile of compacted cars. My good car was a flat as a mattress. Needless to say, the guyz at the yard were laughing their ***es off... But I wasnt

 

Had a mate a few years ago worked in a wrecking yard. The boss was an absolute *** hole, kept short changing my mates pay packet telling him he would make it up next week. Never did though.
He got his revenge though, working in the yard he made friends with the two dogs. Many a week end we spent in there with the guard dogs pulling parts for mates and selling at swap meets. He made up for the short pay packet alright!