What is the craziest price you've been told for a minor part?

400-plus for a rear axle for wife's 63 Valiant Signet. this from a local MoPar performance shop, the only reliable source at the time. HAH! got a FREE Maverick 8" from a good friend and replaced crap MoPar with good Ford axle. was talking to the guy from the MoPar shop a while back; "what did you ever do with that Valiant? ever find a rear end?"

"yeah; FREE. thanks..."

no it wasnt QUITE a "bolt in and drive away" job i will admit... but it didn't cost me 400 out the door.

 

We have owned (5) BMW V12's at once - (3) 750's and (2) 850's - great cars, but you must be resourceful - like any car! We have re-soldered that board many times! Just like the HAMB, you have the use the internet.

Here's one for you:

Brake booster on BMW 750/850 - $1100 for booster plus 8 hours labor - total charge $2000!

There is a tech article on roadfly.org - ~4 hours and a $.73 o-ring at NAPA.

 

Steering Center links for 49-51 Mercs were running in excess of $300 a few years ago, or have yours rebuilt for $300. Now you can get Argentine repops for $99.

Elephant ears (bumper extensions) for 51 Merc = $500-$600
Mercury Accessory steering wheel = $800 for a beat up core


Modern:
Headlight bezel for Audi TT = $1100

Crash Impact Airbag for any modern car = thousands.

 

Bought a 1941 Willys sedan in 1966 for $20, blew the cluster in the gearbox thrashing it like a typical 17 year old, and they wanted $36 for a new cluster.

Back muffler went on my PI Triumph sedan in the 80's. $300 for a gennie, $120 for a generic, $20 for the muffler shop to weld in a bit of straight 2" pipe instead and it sounded great!

Cheers, Glen.

 

Remember we are living way outside of reality as we whine about old car parts prices...
when we complain about $300 carbs...that is cheaper than many commercial rebuilt ones for utterly worthless 1980 cars. Go price any little computer sensor or piece of glass or fender for your late model, even a Toyota...you don't need Germans in the loop to be raped and pillaged on parts prices. Most '32 Ford stuff even is not out of line in comparison to plain vanilla late model stuff. We just scream because everything used to be $25 at the fleamarket...

 

Yep and a loaf of bread ain't 15 cents anymore either.

 

Dude for like $5 bucks you can buy yourself a box of assorted size O rings and gasket material is cheap, make your own gasket all done for well under $10!
C'mon, that way of thinking should be the basic hot rod building mindset!
Doc.

 

I paid $400 for 1 1/2 34 Desoto running boards to use for patterns to make new ones for a car I did. The complete one was in two pieces, but on the plus side all the brackets were there. For the same car, I paid $250 for a tail light stand, bent, broken in two pieces, made of die cast. By the time it was fixed and plated, I had another $500 in it. Same car, the seat frame was one piece, $1600 to get it chrome plated. Took nearly a year to find someone with a tank big enough to do it.

 

sometimes the shipping can be more then the part. i was missing a bracket from my lokar shifter the part was like 5.00 and shipping was 13.00 and it was not even that big