Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[Rick]

Many of the best scrappies seem to have been swept away, and those I frequented some 20 years ago have either disappeared, or been sanitised beyond recognition. I can only wonder how good they must have been 30 or 40 years ago ... sigh

One respectable one was near Lymm in Cheshire, Statham Enterprises it was called. Lots of 40s/50s/60s iron piled up at all angles, great fun to clamber over and investigate. At the time I was looking for bits to make the Saab van complete once more, the rear window came from a 95 in this yard. On one visit I pulled up in my red Spitfire and went for a mooch around. As I came to leave, another visitor was enquiring whether my car had just been brought in for scrap, which I thought a little harsh - the paint finish wasn't the best, but it was way better than being a scrapper. Some of the photos in the scrap/project car photo section were taken at Statham Ent., eg these pics of Austin A40 Mk2s...





Who else has happy scrappy memories??

RJ
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[peter scott]

Appologies for repeating the following which I think I've have posted on the forum before but it seems to fit in this thread.

My old Jag was scrapped in Eddie Rossiter's scrap yard near Shepton Mallet in 1964 but fortunately it was retrieved by a couple of local lads who put it back on the road again. I went back to visit the yard about 15 years ago and took the following photos. The top half is a collage of video frames to give a general impression and the bottom half shows some of the good cars that Eddie had salted away in various old vans and containers. I believe the collection was all sold off some years back.

Peter


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http://www.nostalgiatech.co.uk
1939 SS Jaguar 2 1/2 litre saloon

[victor 101]

Jones's scrap yard at Waltham Cross in the 60s, there were mountains of cars you could clamber over to your hearts content. Then he bought in a huge machine called a fragmentiser, within a short while they were all gone. The last good one I went to was near Knebworth, behind a high wall, he had cars lorries & buses going back to the twenties. Probably a housing estate now.

[Jim.Walker]

It makes you wonder whether the scrap men had any regrets about what they destroyed? Particularly as, if they had kept some vehicles a little longer they might have made even more money from parts etc.

While on this thread, which is a good example of an annoying and ever increasing problem. Can I ask why photos must be so big (wide)? Having recently changed my PC I hoped that the problem would disappear. But I find it getting worse. Often the pictures expand the script to about 50% wider than my screen, so that laborious scrolling from side to side is necessary to read it. Sometimes I don't bother. I just get fed up and ignore those posts! User Friendly is an "in" term. What happened to it here?
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Quote from my late Dad:- You only need a woman and a car and you have all the problems you
are ever likely to want". Computers had not been invented then!

[Richard H]

My screen is alright..

The only scrapyard I know that lets you in to take parts off cars yourself, and also has plenty of classics is Kirby's in Rochford, Essex. I know Brian M uses this yard as well. I remember back in the mid nineties they still had a couple of Austin A30/35's in there!
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Richard Hughes

[peter scott]

[ukdave2002]

Re the phto thing... our family PC is a Mac which sorts out the display issues, my garage pc is my old work laptop which on I installed Lynux which also seems to sort out photo sizes. its only my current works laptop with windows which seems to have a problem.... Thanks Bill.!

[Dirty Habit]

It must be a "space" thing. Here on our small island there is just not the space to have lots of old cars just rusting in peace. For those interested in American iron it is different. Out of the big cities, they have the space for cars to be lined up in rows, not piled on top of each other.
http://www.alabamajunkyards.com/oxford1.jpg

You can buy video's of some of the larger yards and even do trips to them
:lol:Now that is what I call a "Vacation".
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1964 International Harvester

[buzzy bee]

Hi

I know of someone or their descendants who were in the scrap business in times gone by, they still have most of the cars, or alot of them anyway, and alot have been restored, a lot are extremeley rare and valuable! So there definateley were alot of cars saved in this way.

Cheers

Dave

[poodge]

The old time scrapyards have all but disappeared in nz.It's most likely "urban spread",and OSH nannying that has put paid to them.
Just as an aside,on the local auction website,there was a yard full of Morrie Minors for sale.I assume if not sold,they will go to that great scrapyard in the sky

[Brian M]

[buzzy bee]

Hi

Nearly all the yards around here, still allow you to take the part off yourself, and if you ask nicely in one yard a 10 year old (or simmilar) will come and unstack the cars with the stacker truck! hehe

Cheers

Dave

[Rick]

While pondering old scrapyards I re-discovered this old thread from many years ago, so I thought I'd give it a bounce in case anyone else has scrapyard stories of interest.

RJ
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Home:https://www.oldclassiccar.co.uk
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[MikeEdwards]

I have fond memories of the sell-off of stuff when Furbers in the Whitchurch area closed down a few years back. I'd only been a couple of times to the actual dismantling yard in Whixall (I could never find it without roaming around lanes for what seemed like hours) and once to the damaged-repairable yard in Prees, and it didn't seem as welcoming as my local one, Car Transplants, so I went to the latter most of the time.

I'd had a flyer handed out saying there was a weekend open-house sale, but were passing a few weeks prior to that and decided to drop in as they'd been running small auctions. I couldn't believe the sort of stuff that was there - it seems that as well as selling damaged repairable cars, and dismantling cars, they'd been buying up dealer stocks of NOS parts. Over six or seven visits over the next few weeks, and on the closing weekend, I sourced some Vauxhall parts that are quite difficult to come by - NOS radiator, driver's door skin, new cylinder head - and quite a few inner wheel bearings which were used on my car and one other. Each time I went, they'd have dug out some more stuff from somewhere, so multiple visits were worth it.

I ended up buying quite a few things, some unidentified, but all things that I thought would be enough of a pain to have made that someone, somewhere might use them. I've sold one or two of them, but I must get around to making more effort to identify and dispose of this stuff.
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1976 Vauxhall HP Firenza, 1976 Vauxhall Sportshatch (x2), 1986 Audi coupe quattro, 2000 Audi TT

[MikeEdwards]

I also recall going into Car Transplants on several occasions, back when I could remove parts myself. I always thought it was a backwards step when that was stopped, just because of the number of times I looked in vain for the exact part, but then spotted something similar that would do the job.

I had some good stuff from there, though, over the years. At one point it was as if there was a group of Viva owners who'd fit a new front wing with just one or two welds and then scrap the car, so a quick go with a cold chisel and they're mine. I spent ages one rainy day trying to get the ZF gearbox out of a CF van because someone told me it was a direct swap into a Firenza (it isn't, I later found out) - I gave up when I read the plate on the side that said it was a four-speed, not a five-speed. I had a couple of Britax folding sunroofs, all sorts of bits to improve my daily drivers of the time.

I re-trimmed the drivers seat in my Audi coupe by getting a passenger seat out of a similar car, in the pouring rain on Mother's Day one year, and swapping the cover over. I got most of a set of tinted glass for the same car out of an Audi quattro shell that was sitting in the yard - I broke the rear screen trying to remove it, offered to pay for it, but they wouldn't take anything - "it's probably only you that wants something like that anyway". And much later on leaving the place I saw the two front wings from that same shell leaning up against the back wall of the office, and brought those home. I haven't got an Audi quattro, always wanted one and back then I intended to get one so I bought them "just in case". Now they're too expensive, so I really should dispose of them - apparently they're worth quite a bit more than I paid for them.
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1976 Vauxhall HP Firenza, 1976 Vauxhall Sportshatch (x2), 1986 Audi coupe quattro, 2000 Audi TT