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Wheatbelt Auto Parts retiring, crushing cars


Pete Phillips

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Paul Lauricella owns Parts of the Past ( https://www.facebook.com/LauricellasCarsOfThePast ) in western New York and has been a friend of mine since the early 1990's. It is a tough business and the purest labor of love one will ever find. Just having the old cars, finding them, bringing them home in one piece is a job in itself that would be hard to hire a person to do. Paul does it all himself. Once the cars arrive the calls don't come rolling in for thousand dollar assemblies or even hundred dollar ones. Requests for the left rear door panel inside release escutcheon retaining pin. It might take and hour, start to finish, to remove one. How much do you charge?

One of the problems with parts cars is that common parts are always bad on a particular model. And the stuff just sits and gets picked away at in little bits. When a good deal comes along and you score $1,000 a couple days later the furnace, hot water heater, or transmission in the car hauler goes.

Most owners of these open air museums try to build a nice car for themselves. The project goes along until it gains value and then gets sold to keep the bank happy.

The guys who run these operations give a lot to the hobby, more than I could ever afford to. These are the places to spend your money first, they need the support. Without it they will be driving a school bus, fixing factory machines, maybe stocking shelves at WalMart. We need to find these vendors first.

Bernie

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Just spent the last few hours looking at Buicks in Oklahoma. I can see why the business is going out. It's really just representative of what is going on everywhere. Junk cars are being advertised for sale for thousands of dollars. Junk. Thousands. Everyone seems to think anything with a chrome bumper is worth tons of $. To be fair, there were several that were worth some money. Sweet cars. But there are plenty that years ago would have wound up in a yard and the owner would have been happy to get it out of the yard. And like Bernie says, for the few parts that would sell right away it would be impossible to recoup from such investments.

I still would love to have a place like this myself. But I also suffer from "fix-em-all" disease. No way I could ever own a yard with Buicks. Other makes, no problem. But probably not Buicks.

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I'm off to my monthly meeting with the accountant for my business in an hour. Catch me a 1 PM and I'll give you a vivid description of why businesses can't survive OR rebuild a carburetor for 50 bucks. Next time your hear the term "tax the wealthy" remember that doesn't mean the idle rich. It's a guy who can afford a car as a hobby.

Bernie

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Going to try to make one more run at it this coming weekend, assuming the snow melts, as the forecast predicts. If anyone wants me to pull something that is in one of the photos, speak up now.

Pete Phillips, BCA #7338

Leonard, Tx

Pete,

I could use the fender mounted fuel tank door from the '41 fastback.

Thanks,

Tom

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Thought that I'd post my part with regard to Wheatbelt.

Just picked up a package from them that I ordered after communication with Ken. It was everything he described and I might ad that we came to terms on a fair price.

Guys, back here in the northeast, one can not expect to get the kind of metal like these inner fender supports are in from the midwest with regard to condition!

So.... if you think that there is something you might need in the future concerning your car, even if nothing more than insurance against an accident, by all means consider getting it now. Once these pieces have been scrapped it will be just that much harder to get......

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Just spent the last 9 hours pulling parts like mad at Ken's place. He keeps saying there is nothing left, but I kid you NOT, I could work all week there and not get to half of the good parts that are still remaining! It is a Riviera owner's dream, from Boattails, back to the '63s. SO MUCH fine sheet metal, glass, trim, bumpers, dash parts, etc. I loaded up 19 fenders today, all of them in near perfect shape--'52, '54,'55, '56, '57, '60,'61, 62, 63, '64, '65. I found aluminum finned brake drums already pulled, just lying on the ground underneath cars. I found the 3-piece backglass from a 1952 model 56-R, already out of the car and in perfect shape. There are 1952 2-dr. hardtop doors in perfect shape that I just didn't have room for. There is so much 1958 small series 4-dr. sedan and hardtop trim that I couldn't get to but a fraction of it. Tom, I got the '41 gas filler door. John, they do not have a buyer for the property--, it is not even on the market yet ( I did get your '68 Riviera beltline trim pulled). Aaron65, I did not get a chance to look at the front shocks for the '53 Special, sorry! Why not call them and see if they will pull them for you? The weather was pretty decent today and the snow is gone. There are no nail head engines already pulled out of cars and very few still left in the cars. I did see a nice '66 Special convertible with perfect doors, glass, and sheet metal from the cowl on back but just ran out of time and space and daylight. There's a decent '62 Skylark hardtop and the big Electras from 1963-65 are nearly untouched, but all are 4-doors. Couple of 1955 4-dr. sedan Roadmasters with some parts left; three semi-decent 1961 Electras and LeSabres, I could go on and on and on...

Pete Phillips

Edited by Pete Phillips (see edit history)
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I suspect the property can't be "put up for sale" until it's cleared AND cleared of any potential environmental hazzards from its "land use". It's not likely that a potential purchaser would want to be stuck with any cleanup fees and such, I suspect. EPA has guidelines for salvage yard operations, from what I have seen locally, so that might be why the property hasn't been listed just yet. Not to forget about any possible landscaping to correct for the crusher's future operations in that mix, too.

Hate to see such a treasure go, but I know they can and, for many reasons. Thanks to Ken and his associates for all they've done for the Buick hobby!

Just some thoughts . . .

NTX5467

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  • 3 weeks later...

Just spent another 19-hour day driving to Carrier, OK, pulling and loading parts, and driving back home. The crusher was supposed to be there this coming MOnday the 10th, but there will be a few more days' reprieve due to it being too muddy for the crusher to come. I loaded up two pickup truck loads plus a trailer and there is still plenty of good stuff there, especially glass, sheet metal, dashboards, etc. But I have made my last trip. There is a limit to my space and time. Got some decent straight eight cylinder heads; early Riviera front fenders and trim, lots of '57 side moldings, some Dynaflows to be taken apart for parts, couple of 430 cylinder heads, lots of miscellaneous. Ken kept throwing boxes and boxes of loose, miscellaneous parts at me, clearing off shelves and shelves and shelves! Hope to have it all organized and cleaned up and sorted out in a few months!

Pete Phillips

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The crusher was delayed, so I drove part of the way to Wheatbelt last night, got a motel, and got there this morning for one last trip. Got lots of '63 Riviera parts, '58 Special parts, but I was literally steps ahead of the crusher this afternoon, and there was so much more left that I didn't have time to save. It's very upsetting to see this. Some of the crushed cars I was sitting inside of, getting parts from them just an hour or two prior. The sound of the crusher ruining all those good parts was very painful. I had to leave...

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Guest shadetree77
T....The sound of the crusher ruining all those good parts was very painful. I had to leave...

This really struck a chord with me Pete. If you'll remember the trip I took to the "junkyard that time forgot" a while back (the one Lamar took me to), the crusher was literally a half mile down the road actively crushing the contents of the yard the whole time I was there. Very disheartening! I was lucky in that I could not SEE it doing its work, but the sound was very upsetting. It was very surreal to be scrounging through all of those awesome relics with the sound of machinery and grinding metal a constant reminder that I had better hurry before all of this treasure is lost forever. It may sound corny, but I still have dreams of that old junkyard. I'll probably never see anything like it again. All I can do is watch the Youtube videos and lament.

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Do me a favor Pete. If you got a picture of a '54 headed for or in the crusher, please DON'T post it. I so wanted to join you and Mike in grabbing what could be grabbed but finances just didn't allow it at the time. Glad you were able to take advantage of the sad situation though.

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Pete,

Your remarkable efforts to save as many Buick parts as possible would make a great story for all to read in the Bugle. I know we MMC members would be very interested in reading all about it....it's Buick history.

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Those pictures are tough to look at...

Like my wife told me when I mentioned your work, you just can't save them all, even though you want to! It's guys like us who keep this stuff from completely disappearing, and we should all give ourselves a pat on the back for what we can do and have done. Good job, again, Pete. :)

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It's been a number of years since visiting rural Carrier and recall Ken as a really nice fella, and can really understand moving from there to Arkansas. I can also understand why another yard is going away and have seen many many go over the last 15 years. Good luck and enjoy retirement!

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  • 4 weeks later...

Willie, I think it could be translated a couple of ways.....Argentina is major meat....Argentina is big meat....Or, I guess you could use a very, very loose translation, unlike those pants she has on which I think ain't loose noplace!!!!!

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This is what I get for stepping away from the time spent on the forum. If someone had informed me and I could have arranged storage with Gopher State friends, I think I'd have made a trip. First off, the temperatures Pete was dealing with would have seemed like short sleeve weather with the winter we've had (still lots of snow around here although should be gone relatively soon if weather prognosticators are anywhere near correct). I've purchased a few things from Sue and Ken through the years and will have fond memories.

About a 15 hour drive, mostly down I-29 for me. Would have been a fun road trip.

Oh well.

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