I feel like writing tonight, and the subject is going to be, “What’s your best junkyard story.” The first story, I have to go way back in time. January 1, 1980. My wife and I had been married for three months. I had a 1968 GTO four-speed. For some reason “it” had a bad habit of breaking gears in the rear end. My in-laws came down from Ohio for our very first Christmas. (The beginning of the penguin invasion) I think they wanted to spy on me to make sure I was treating their daughter OK. (She was 18) On my birthday, New Year’s Eve, my buddy and I jacked up the GTO and remove the rear end from it. And then we partied with all our friends all night long. We barely slept at all. We ate breakfast and my buddy said to me, “Are you ready to go to the junkyard?” You should’ve seen the look on my father-in-law‘s face. He knew damn well there was no junkyard, or any other place, open on New Year’s Day. Hilarious! We loaded up the old rear end in my buddies four-wheel-drive truck. We needed a four-wheel-drive truck because we were not going to the junkyard, but through the woods to the side of the junkyard. We know junkyards sell scrap metal, so we traded them even deal. Earlier that week we had already taken the rear end out of another A body car. We carried it to the edge of the property right by the fence. My buddy parked his truck right by the fence, we threw the old rear end into the junkyard, put our winter jackets over the Bob-wire fence, climbed into the junkyard, threw the new rear end over the fence, climbed back out, and we were gone! Yes, while we were doing all that we kept talking about the three German Shepherd’s they kept locked up in the yard. We kept reassuring ourselves that they were very old dogs, which they were. We got back home and had the new rear end installed within a few hours. I think my father-in-law was amazed at how fast we could take out and put in a rear end, but he was more amazed that a junkyard was open on New Year’s Day. My buddy and I still talk about that trip to the junkyard. That was story number one. Hope you enjoyed.
Story number two, I am much older now. Boy am I much older. I am up here in Virginia hanging out with a buddy that is my age, 63 years old, but he has arthritis in his legs bad. He needed to go to the junkyard and so did I. This is a very small town. My buddy, Tommy, has known the owners of the junkyard for years. We stopped in the junkyard last Wednesday to see if they had any Chevrolet trucks our year. They said they had four of them. (1992) Then my buddy Tommy asked them if he can drive his truck in the junkyard because he can’t walk very far. You know the answer to that one, NO! Tommy is talking back-and-forth with them. Let me tell you, sometimes those southern accents can start to sound like a chainsaw revving up. He’s telling them he can’t walk very far and he doesn’t care if his truck gets a flat tire. The owners told Tommy it is all about insurance. Tommy was pretty frustrated. So the next day we went back to the junkyard with our bucket of tools. You are not going to believe this. We get there, Tommy is talking small talk with them, and then they said to Tommy, “You can drive either one of those junkyard trucks.” We got to drive a junkyard truck around the junkyard!!!! I felt like a celebrity!!! I’m glad we got a truck to drive around in, because the Chevy section was almost a half a mile away. (I forgot to say it’s very hilly too) We both got all the parts we needed. Boy did I get a lot of parts! They charged Tommy $20 for the electronic parts he needed, and they charged me $25 for a double arm full of parts. I was happier than a pig in slop. I know, you thought I was going to say the other word. I finally got the plastic cowl cover that goes over the firewall by the wipers. In South Florida, all the junkyard trucks are just like mine. Either missing that piece or they’re all cracked up from the sun. I also got all the gaskets for the sliding window in the back of my truck. Somehow my grandkids love taking them off and throwing them somewhere in the yard. Now I can seal my back window sliders. I got a new horn button with the correct wire and that little spring thing. And of course I filled my pockets with all the fuses I could find, along with a very clean looking headlight switch, dimmer switch, and a lot more. I forgot to tell you. I smuggled in my lunch bag/cooler so we had beer to drink the entire time. One of the easiest, best, times I’ve ever had at a junkyard. I have other stories, but it’s your turn.
When you hang around in junkyards like I do you end up with too many stories to tell, I underwent an operation dont recall if it was hernia or kidney stone, Come time for them to revive me the nurse got right in my face calling my name like a mother would wake her child, I come to, slowwly. The first thing she asks me was I dreaming of my girlfriend- I whispered I dreamt I was in a junkyard in Arizona.
Not sure if this is the best one, but the first one that came off the top of my head: had a buddy as a teenager that was into Fords and we went out looking for pieces for his 69 Mustang. Had a small inner city junkyard in Denver by the name of “MR. Badwrench” ,a nothing special yard, just a typical mishmash you would find in any junkyard of the era (1983). I was needing a door for something and was pointed to a seemingly endless role of them against one of the border fences. Picking through them I came across something that absolutely dropped my jaw, A Mustang door with a jamb sticker that read: KK 429 NASCAR I had a pretty good idea what that was not even being a Ford guy but after dragging my buddy over there he flipped out, that yes, that had to be off a BOSS 429 Mustang(!?) as discreetly as we could quizzed yard owner about the door and the possibility of the rest of the car that went with it, he had no memory of it and we came up with no other trace anywhere of the car or any other parts that would match the door…….. Steve weim55 Colorado
Mine’s not great, but here goes: I went to a yard in Jefferson, Ga in the early ‘90s: I wasn’t looking for anything specific but anything Buick in general. Next to the fence, far away ftom the office but near the road was a ‘70-‘72 Skylark. I looked inside and saw it was a bench seat car with AM radio, but laying in the floor was an AM/FM radio and complete console. Hmmm. Next to the fence. Not in the car they came from. I decided to take my chance on price and carried them to the office. Paid $30 total. Next best find was two 850cfm Buick qjets, hidden under the back seat of a Fleetwood. Paid $25 for them. Patrick
I’ll hit you first, because you were last to report. Dang Patrick, that’s some killer find. Especially when you went out there for nothing and found stuff you weren’t expecting. I’m sure a bunch of guys, me, have taken parts off of one car and hid them in another car, usually Jap cars, so people didn’t find it. We would do that especially when we didn’t go out there with very much money, or didn’t have any money. Weim55, Sometimes it is amazing what you find out at the junkyard. I love the part about you saying, I’m not even a Ford guy but I knew this was big. Mike, I laughed my butt off! What if your wife was in the room while you were coming too. Oh sheet!!!
Back in the 80s when I was running a 57 Pontiac rear end in my 67 GS, I had a good friend, Gordy Freize who owned a wrecking yard south of Tacoma Wa. Gordy would supply me with parts for my race car if I ran with his business name on my car. This wrecking yard was really old and had mountains of parts. Gordy had an axle rack in the shop full of axles. every once in a while I would pull an axle out of the pontiac rear end and look for a twist in the shaft, when it started to twist it went back on the axle rack and I would grab a straight one and put it in. Gordy and I put away a little R&R after hours in the yard office. He passed away at 36 years of age, fell over dead in front of his doctors desk of a mass heart attack. Haven't drank R&R since. Bob H.
I remember glancing inside a circa '78 Caprice sedan (medium blue w/ a blue velour interior), and seeing a red blow-molded MAC socket case sitting in the center of the rear seat. I reached in, mumbling 'please be heavy', and it was; a clean, full 3/8" socket set, shallow & deep. That was probably the early '90s, and it's still on active duty in the shop. Here's a shot of the yard from 1986; the car to the left with the hood up was a '58 Limited convertible, 1 of 839 built. By the mid '90s, the car was starting to fold in on itself. Still... shoulda grabbed whatever stainless I could. The '60 was an Invicta with factory A/C.
The day I found my Jag XJS sitting in the mud in Smitty's junkyard in Pasadena MD around 2003. No engine, trans or rear but key in ignition and leather seats. and nice paint. My son Matt (10 at the time) was with me and we looked at each other and smiled. Knew it was the one to put Buick power into. Asked them if we could buy whole car and if they had title. They said no, they don't and aren't allowed to by law. They did have title. I pleaded my case and $500 later they were picking it up with a big fork lift and dropped it onto my open trailer and said good luck. Still wearing junkyard paint. JUNKYARD CAT would be it's name if it was the old days when most drag cars had names on the side of em......
Hey Bruce, I actually met you a couple years ago. I think it was two summers ago at the Buick mini nationals in eastern Ohio. You had your Jag on a trailer and had just pulled into the hotel parking lot. What a beautiful car, and an awesome story. Not too many people get to take a car OUT of the junkyard. Have a great day!
1990 I was in Carlsbad CA cutting a rear quarter off a Century for my 73 GS and noticed not 20 ft away a black 1974 GS with complete red bucket seat interior and missing on the fender was the dirty outline of Stage 1 emblems ….The kicker was it had a sunroof! I didn’t know back then how rare it was, but it wouldn’t have mattered, it had another stacked on top of it! But damn!
72STAGE1, Isn’t it amazing what you can find a junkyard sometimes. I love walking down the rows and you are literally looking for a certain shape in your eyes. Damn Chevelle’s!
I could spend hours and hours in a junk yard back in the day just roaming. Now it's just let me hopefully find my part and leave as the car's aren't exciting to me these days. Back in 1981 or 82 a friend wanted a pair of buckets seats for his Frat house at Umass. Now I have found some good stuff under the seats before but this one was a "different one" Pulled the seats from a Grand Prix and under them I found about $200 cash folded and a good size bag of "crazy tobacco" and another bag of maby 200+ white pills. I knew them as Lemon 714's or quaaludes. Back when I was 18 to 24 ish I did smoke the crazy tobacco one in while so I admit I took the bag and the money but left the pills cause I heard conflicting storys on how certain people react to them. It showed the last time that the Grand prix was inspected was 1974 so for some reason the money and contraband stuff was never missed.. I hated though coming across a car that had alot of blood inside..
Peter, Now that is an interesting tale. I can only imagine they forgot the money was under the seat because they took too many of the 714’s. I remember those being around in the 80s. First people were laughing and then people were fighting. Sure I’m glad I didn’t do that. I’ll stick with the wacky to Bacci. So did the money under the seat pay for the seats. They couldn’t of been that expensive. Good deal
Yup, it was the storys of ups and downs of taking those pills that scared me Never crossed my mind that they forgot the money and 714's because of them LOL! The wacky to Bacci was good enough too for me at that time but as years past it made me paranoid. Wow thats over 35 years ago since I last did the Spicoli. He got both seats which were buckets for $50 I think or $40. He initially wanted to find a power bucket seat and hook up a power source in the frat house living room but couldn't find one that one one day.
Not really a junkyard story per se, but I'll add it anyway. Several years ago I drove my now sold 65 Bamboo Cream 65 GS down to the Minnesota Spring Extravaganza where I met up with a few locals, plus a couple others from bordering states. I was about 30-40 miles from our Friday meet up point when the fan clutch decided that was the perfect time to seize up. Wasn't a serious problem, so kept on rolling, albeit a little slower. At the show next day I wandered over to the swap meet in hopes of finding a replacement as none of the guys I was with had one. Within 10 minutes found not one, but TWO good used ones, one which was off a 65 Electra. Nobody believed my luck at that. Replaced the bad one while the show went on. Never travel in your classic Buick without a toolbox. Edit to add the guy with the Electra fan clutch dropped his price from $10.00 to $2.00 when he heard my story. OK, junkyard story from way back when. I owned a 79 Mercury Marquis 2 door at the time they were a dime a dozen. The local U-Pull-It always had several in the yard so rarely couldn't find anything I needed. About two weeks before going an vacation with a friend and her daughter, the drivers seat back just broke. It was a full bench. Cue the scramble to locate a suitable replacement. Didn't matter if the color didn't match my car, just needed a replacement. Well, that week, the yard only had 4 door cars. Soon found one matching my interior color, but it was a 60/40 split bench Didn't have the seat tilt as needed in 2 door cars for rear seat access, but driver's side was power. A quick check of my car revealed it would bolt right in, and the power lead was already there. Grabbed them for $50.00 and ran! Once back home, had the job done in about 2 hours as I had to tap four the bolt holes already in the floor pan. Kept that car a few more years and never changed the seat.
I went to a local yard in the late 90s and saw a nice blue 70 Electra 2dr that had recently arrived. Complete car with mint brocade blue seats 78K on the ODO....key in ignition. No idea why it was there.... I asked if I brought a battery I could see if it would run...went home and got one....put it in and after a while of cranking it started and and ran perfect. They said $400 and they would pull it...had too many cars so I said I'd think on it....a week later I went up with truck ....and MOTOR WAS GONE. I asked if they pulled it for me and they laughed...nope someone else
