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It defies logic

Started by Steve Crum 20999, January 12, 2005, 11:00:00 AM

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Steve Crum 20999

This morning I took and hour and called a half dozen different junkyards in the region (Pa/Ny), To see if I could find a fender and door for my 76 CDV. Or a whole car to buy for parts. Not suprising I got the same story from all of them, "scrap is up, so weve crushed everything like this". I guess it never occured to most of these rocket scientists that a door in decent shape off one of these will fetch more that a whole car that is squashed, if even the most minor marketing effort is made.
I guess the old adage the most people spend to much time trying to earn a living, to make any money, is all too true.

Rhino 21150

Crushers should be banned, except for Japanese cars... Just kidding! Try Desert Dog Auto Parts in Arizona for the door. UPS in four days is typical.

Steve Crum 20999

Thats the downside, even if you can get a door at a fair price, it costs twice what you pay for the door, to get it here. I knoe Whine... whine LOL

Matt Harwood

Actually, steel is EXTREMELY expensive right now--China is buying everything they can get their hands on. When I built my rotisserie about 5 months ago, the quote on steel I got was only good until THE END OF THAT DAY. It used to be that a steel price quote was good for weeks or months and prices never changed much. When I purchased the steel I needed, it was about $0.72/pound. Its more now, approaching $0.80. Its like the catch of the day or something: "Market Price" is all youll get.

These cars are worth FAR more as scrap than they are as parts, especially to someone who doesnt see them as collector pieces.

It stinks, doesnt it?
--
Matt Harwood
Cleveland, OH

Johnny

Interesting situation with the price of steel.  Im not too surprised to hear about the junkyard man crushing cars.  Most of these guys are the "cigar chomping" get rich quick type of guys.  A new Chevy is the same as a Classic Packard to them.  With steel approaching 80 cents a pound, I guess most junk cars that weigh 2 tons are worth around $3000 in scrap.

Mike #19861


 Yes, perhaps $0.08 per pound for processed ready to use steel. I doubt the unprocessed raw un recycled steel in a scrap car would be worth near that.

 Im sure that the wreckers would be lucky to get a couple of hundred dollars for a 2- ton car. Which still leaves the logic of selling parts that will be worth more than the overall scrap taking second seat to a quick buck to take advantage of high steel prices at the moment.

  Mike

Matt Harwood

Quote from: Mike #19861Yes, perhaps $0.08 per pound for processed ready to use steel. I doubt the unprocessed raw un recycled steel in a scrap car would be worth near that.

 Im sure that the wreckers would be lucky to get a couple of hundred dollars for a 2- ton car. Which still leaves the logic of selling parts that will be worth more than the overall scrap taking second seat to a quick buck to take advantage of high steel prices at the moment.

  Mike

Thats 80 cents a pound, not eight. Thats A LOT of money for a junk car in any condition.

And, yes, youd think that theyd consider that the parts are worth more as parts. But of course theres waiting for the right guy to come along to buy said parts, and storing those parts somewhere so they dont rot until theyre worthless as either scrap or parts, and somehow letting people know you have those parts available. If I can sell as many scrap cars as I can get my hands on for, say $500-1000 each, just because of the steel in them, why wouldnt I? No storage, no waiting, no advertising--I have cash in my hand an hour after making one phone call. Sounds like a no-brainer to a lot of people.

Unfortunately, these guys, as you point out, dont recognize something with intrinsic value vs. just more scrap metal. I wont shed a tear for 99percent of the cars that are scrapped. But that 1percent, as you mention, really hurts the hobbyist.
--
Matt Harwood
Cleveland, OH
My 1941 Buick Century restoration:
http://www.harwoodperformance.bizland.com/1941buick/index.html TARGET=_blank>http://www.harwoodperformance.bizland.com/1941buick/index.html

Steve Crum 20999

Being in the stainless fabricating business, Im painfully aware of steel prices and scrap prices. If I could get $.80 a pound for crushed cars Id crush my daily drivers. Average crushed price at least in this area is $.05 to .08 per pound. If you take the time and expense to cut everything to less than 30" length you might get $.12 a pound. Considering the drivers door on a 76 CDV weighs about 125 pounds and the lowest quote Ive gotten for a door that is on the west coast is $125.00 + $10.00 packing and $150.00 delivery, Id say $1.00 per pound isnt a bad deal to hang onto and store some of the more in demand body parts of these old cusss. Like I stated, only a minimal marketing effort needs to be made to move these parts at a premium price. Its taken longer to type this reply than to put 3 listings on ebay. If only more parts/scrap operators had smarts enough to see beyond today, they could make a killing and we could still get the parts we need for restorations.

Robt.Vonheck via a drenched SanDiego Calif.

Diddo, -the problem is, so they stockpile the many different doors/hoods/lids/etc. -all that takes space and management, which costs money, so to most autowreckers it just dosent pencil-out for them to engage in it seems (especially when a prospective buyer says, "oh its black, gee i want the door in purple" -or something of the sort!)....    Whats more, on PBS/tv-recently, they showed a highly automated Calif.-"car-recycler" -as they likened to call themselves, wherein they drove-in a prestine new MercedesBenz that would cost $250k in the showroom they said, --and proceeded to dump it into this huge contraption that shreaded/separated the car in minutes into its various base-materials (ie: alum./steel-iron/plastic/glass/fibers/etc.).  Apparently the car was taken because it did not have the proper Calif.-SmogEquipment...  "Ouch" guess thatll show the public not to mess with CityHall! --Whew!!  ~Bob vH