Projects Largest parts collection in the world....??

The Parts Story

PART 1:

I shoulda started this thread when we first got started back in December, cuz it's a damn interesting story......I'll give ya the reader's digest version for what's happened to date, just to get ya up to speed. I'm looking for advice, help, comments, ridicule, word-of-mouth advertising, basically just your reaction, so let's hear it!

Let me set the scene....

So our business is glass, hot rod and restoration glass mostly, but we do some occasional shower doors and mirror work for a few select home builders here in Billings too, just for some extra spendin' dough. My partner Evan was at the big car show in Hershey, PA last summer peddling some glass and got to talking with another vendor there who mentioned that his brother had an enormous collection of good old auto parts that he'd been trying to sell. Some of you might know him, Paul Blasinsky. Anyway, they got to talking and the following day at the car show the wind was blowin' hard and it was rainin', so they abandoned their posts at the car show, and went on a tour of southeastern PA, going to 3 different towns looking at 3 different warehouses FULL of parts.

Now when I say that, it's gonna hard for ya to comprehend how big the warehouses were, and how FULL of stuff they were, but for the sake of argument, let's say there has got to be more than 20,000 individual car parts. Everything from light bulbs to bumpers to fenders and everything in between, EVERYTHING in between. And not just one or two of an item, sometimes dozens and dozens of each item.

Evan was floored, and he called me and we started to try and figure out how we were gonna pull this off.......

To be continued....

 

Wow, I'm semi-local to there and i've never heard of this goldmine. Keep us updated on where this all ends up.

 

This was Pennsylvania's "best kept secret" for 60+ years......this ol' fella told me a lot of his friends have been pissed off at him for 30 years because he would never show it to them, and when we were loading up the tail end of the 2nd load I was standing there looking at a whole rack full of old wire wheels and he says to me, "Chris, there hasn't been anybody stand there where you're at for 35 years." That kind of put it in perspective a little for me, nobody knew about this stuff! The first warehouse you see where it's pretty dark is about 75' long and about 60' wide, and it sits smack dab in the middle of downtown Carmichaels, PA, and it's empty now! So is the 2nd barn, the one with the Vette.....

 

that is really cool and makes me envious. the hard part is getting an accurate inventory and knowing what all it fits,ect. I am a parts guy so I think it is very cool but I am wondering if these pics were taken last summer-what is the hold up? Get the money and make it happen unless the guys wants stupid money for it all. I know what it feels like to have an opportunity staring you in the face and all you can do is look at it. I have missed several deals like this in the past year or so because I did not have the wherewithall to make it happen. I hope it works out for you. Good luck.

 

Are you saying that you were able to pull it off? If so,congratulations! That is really cool and I am glad to hear of it. Now what do you have that will fit a 54 Chrysler new Yorker or a 57 Chevy p/up as well as a 52 Chevy Truck?

 

The parts are already bought and paid for, and almost all of them are now in our warehouse in Billings!! 95%+ are identified with the year and make of what they're for too! We're peddling about 50-100 items a week on ebay right now, but we need to sell some of the "collections" within the collection to get a cash injection to get more shelves and to get another semi load brought over from PA.......

 

so what is you Ebay user name? I might be able to help with feedback ect. mine is occparts

 

I've probably got enough parts to completely trim out the tubs on at least one of each of the cars you just named off....

 

Not to crash in on your thread, but I bought a house and garage a local guy was paying to store auto parts in it. I needed to see inside the garage before I paid for it, so when the guy who is renting it comes over to open it up it is stacked about 6 feet high, solid with auto parts and 3 cars under alot of it. Asked if he wanted to sell? noooop. Gave him 30 days to move it all before I moved in and on the 29th. day I had to get on him to move it, because he didn't move one piece in that time. Long story short he still has all his stuff, just stored somewhere else.

 

1955wolfe

 

We got it ALL, lock stock & barrell......

 

You guys are messin' up my 3 part storyline! I was gonna do part 2 tomorrow.....

 

That makes shit like King Tut's Tomb look pale by comparison, talk about the mother lode. You'll need someone to iron and stack the money you'll be raking in. Deffo the find of the century. I'd hock my spleen and both kidneys to get something like that.

Bob

 

Part 2

Ok, ya talked me into it.....it's snowin outside and I gotta get ready for a gig this Saturday anyways, so I'll continue my story......


So, last fall we hammered out a deal with the guy and give him a big ol' check when we showed up the first part of December with a 32' trailer we bought in Indiana on our way over, thinkin' we'd make a few trips with that trailer and be done......WRONG. We thought we had a strategy all laid out well and we stopped at Uline in Minneapolis on our way through and got a shit ton of boxes, big and small. So we pull into Carmichaels and find Paul and get him paid and then go to the first warehouse, and I'll remind you that this is the first time I had seen the stuff with my own eyes and I nearly fell over when we cracked the door and I stuck my head inside there. There were little goat trails through piles and piles and stack and stack of chrome, and racks and racks of re-chromed bumpers, and old tin signs hangin from every rafter in the place, and just TONS of stuff! I thought I may have died and gone to heaven, but I never actually lost conciousness.

So we spent the rest of that day packing boxes and loading the trailer and then when we closed the doors of the trailer and went to close the doors of the warehouse, we looked back in there and we couldn't even tell we took anything out of there! It was still FULL, and we knew we still had 2 barns to empty after we ever got that one emptied! So we made plans for the next trip on our way back to MT, in supposidly the "biggest mid-west storm of the year", which turned out to not be true, because the storm we drove through in January on our 2nd trip was much worse!

So we got back about a week after we left Billings and we had a pretty good sized load of parts, so we thought. I'm thinkin', ok first things first, lets get some cash flowin, so we got an ebay account set up and we were off and runnin'!

That's part 2, this may turn into a multi-part series, so stay tuned.....

 

Great story...only the town is in Southwest PA, just north of Morgantown, WV.

 

This is going to to be good

 

They're still out there!!
Good find.

 

Man, looked halfway organized and clean too. Most of these kinds of things are such piles of messes it makes you brain hurt just thinking about having to figure out what is worth anything (20%) and what has just turned to crap (80%).

 

Check these out too....

 

Wow...

 

I've bought some great trim and grille pieces from Chris and Evan for my Pontiac hardtop, a few SW gauges for other projects, other misc stuff etc, from this collection.

Its a great Saturday morning "cup of coffee" routine, I've been to their warehouse here in Billings 8+ times and it still makes my head hurt to walk through. Its flat out overwhelming, a month ago I got stuck in the tail light isle for 45 minutes and forgot what I originally came in looking for.

Its a daunting task these guys have undertaken, imagine spending your off hours in February sorting/cataloging 100+ new water pumps from the 30', 40's and 50's, some in boxes, some in wrappers, many unmarked and loose.

 

Glad I didn't find it.....
No way I could afford to make a decent offer....

 

That was great that you were able to get all that stuff.

 

WOW that's insanely awesome! Let me know if you've got some 40's Caddy parts you're wanting to part with!

 

I think the #1 question is HOW MUCH did you pay????

 

Good to see that this collection will stay within the hobby, too many times the owner of a large collection passes on, and the contents of the building are hauled off to the dump, because the heirs are in a hurry to sell the property.

---John

 

thats has to be one of the coolest scores ever ..... left me speechless no words to describe the awe of it

 

The white Corvette that appears to be finished is obviously a 53 to 55. From what I can see under the hood it looks like a 55 to me. Is it?

Was it part of the purchase?

 

Holy crap! how many complete (or mostly complete) cars are in this collection of goodies?

Nice to see that the guy let it go to people who will distribute it to people who will appreciate the stuff.