Have you ever bought a car just for one part?

[Xander Wildeisen]

I purchased a 1937 Terraplane coupe years ago. Just for the crank hole cover in the grill. I knew I could make a few bucks on the car. So the purchase was not a big deal. But the main reason for buying it, was just to get one part off of the car.

[Matt Harwood]

I really needed a dome light lens.

 

[Bryan G]

I looked at a 72 Cheyenne once, factory AC, guy had bought it for the dash pad and put it right back up for sale. And a couple years ago I came close to buying a 57 Nash; it appeared the previous owner had bought it solely for the clock and maybe one other dash part.

[ChazA]

Yes, bought a '65 Eldorado about 8 years ago with damage on the driver's side of car, just to get the rear chrome taillight molding.  Put the damaged rear chrome taillight molding pieces from my Eldo on that car.  I then replaced the driver's door as I have many spares, and fixed an area in the 1/4, replaced any other missing parts,  and then sold the car.

[edinmass]

I bought a 1933 Pierce Arrow club brougham for the set of side mount covers. A California rust free car, it had later Pierce V-12 covers on it. Sold the covers for more than I paid for the car. I still have the car 8 years later for a retirement project. The car was purchased new by the mayor of Berkeley California and driven as an every day car till 1954. When we got the car home, we found a bunch of Gardner parts in the trunk………so it basically only cost us the gas to haul it home. My idea of a “good deal”. 
 

The trailer behind the car is my 1937 Pierce Arrow Travelodge, Model B.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by edinmass (see edit history)

[1937hd45]

The Sister Thread will be "Have you built a car around One Part?"

[edinmass]

4 minutes ago, 1937hd45 said:

The Sister Thread will be "Have you built a car around One Part?"

The title should be “Floor Sweepings”.

[Larry Schramm]

Bought a car to get one wheel.

[EmTee]

10 hours ago, Xander Wildeisen said:

I knew I could make a few bucks on the car.

Do you know whether the new owner ever found a crank-hole cover...? 

[trimacar]

Back in the 70s and 80s, a friend of mine and I were into 65/66 Mustangs.  Betwenn us we owned around fifty, though not all at one time.

 

Then, coupes were parts cars, even a GT.

 

One thing I really wanted was a factory eight track player.

 

A fellow had two well used coupes with a for sale sign on them, this was in mid 1970s, and one of them had a factory, in-dash, 8 track.

 

I offered to buy the player, he said no, if I wanted it had to buy the cars.  How much?  $200 for the pair (yes, they were that cheap at one point).  Of course I bought them…

 

[West Peterson]

Not mine, but the owner this year's Pebble Beach winner. Well.... not really "one" part, but a whole chassis and running gear. Still... the purchase of the car with the parts he needed probably was well more than 7 figures.

[edinmass]

29 minutes ago, West Peterson said:

Not mine, but the owner this year's Pebble Beach winner. Well.... not really "one" part, but a whole chassis and running gear. Still... the purchase of the car with the parts he needed probably was well more than 7 figures.

West........more to that story than you realize. The missing matching crankshaft wasn't in their chassis they bought.....so they asked around and found the car that was running and driving with the correct crank. They actually bought the numbers matching crank out of another finished car.........now THAT is dedication. 

 

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by edinmass (see edit history)

[keiser31]

11 hours ago, edinmass said:

I bought a 1933 Pierce Arrow club brougham for the set of side mount covers. A California rust free car, it had later Pierce V-12 covers on it. Sold the covers for more than I paid for the car. I still have the car 8 years later for a retirement project. The car was purchased new by the mayor of Berkeley California and driven as an every day car till 1954. When we got the car home, we found a bunch of Gardner parts in the trunk………so it basically only cost us the gas to haul it home. My idea of a “good deal”. 
 

The trailer behind the car is my 1937 Pierce Arrow Travelodge, Model B.

 

 

 

 

You need to contact Val about the Gardner parts. He probably needs them for his Gardner....

Edited November 30, 2022 by keiser31 (see edit history)

[intimeold]

Yes,  A 1932 Ford, just for the original grill.  It had nice patina.

[1937hd45]

1 hour ago, edinmass said:

West........more to that story than you realize. The missing matching crankshaft wasn't in their chassis they bought.....so they asked around and found the car that was running and driving with the correct crank. They actually bought the numbers matching crank out of another finished car.........now THAT is dedication. 

 

 

Ok, That sounds like Corvette matching number logic to me, can you look at a restored J and tell if the crankshaft is correct to the engine? 

Edited November 30, 2022 by 1937hd45 (see edit history)

[edinmass]

Yup

 

There is a window in the block to check. An on a 15 million dollar car, people care. And applications at Pebble would include photos of ALL the tags and numbers to prove the car BEFORE you get invited. 

Edited November 30, 2022 by edinmass (see edit history)

[edinmass]

1 hour ago, keiser31 said:

You need to contact Val about the Gardner parts. He probably needs them for his Gardner....

He got them back within six weeks. Is he still around? He never sent us the title.  We returned the parts so the car would be complete. 

Edited November 30, 2022 by edinmass (see edit history)

[Walt G]

12 hours ago, edinmass said:

for a retirement project

Ed, do you really think you will totally retire? A decade + ago I retired from teaching art full time, but continued the full time research and writing I do  ( a lot of which went for two car clubs I belonged to for decades and neither one of them I belong to now due to their indifference and dismissal attitudes ) . The research and writing continues to several appreciative editors who are also great friends and kindred souls as well as the stuff that goes here to the forums .  Guys like us and our friends never ever really retire in the "normal" sense of the word. We can't help ourselves - we see someone who wants assistance or information and know we have it  so it needs to be shared .

Walt

[edinmass]

Walt……..retirement means only working 60 hours a week.  

[auburnseeker]

Bought a 56 Olds super 88 sedan for the radio.  Had a bunch of other accessories and even ran but was rusted to death.  I got in turned the radio on and it worked,  I said sold. 

[Xander Wildeisen]

I went to a house that had about 14 Hudson’s for sale. There was a 54 Hornet sedan sitting there full of rust. I just wanted the power steering setup for my 53 coupe. Guy wanted 1,100 dollars for it. I passed on the steering setup. Kept looking at the cars there. And there was another 54 Hornet sedan full of rust. Opened the hood, engine and transmission are gone. But someone pulled the power steering pump with bracket off of the engine. And it is just setting on the front cross member. Still connected to the steering ram. Asked the owner what he wanted for that whole car. He said that one has rust, and no drive train. You can have it for $100 dollars. So I bought that car for just the power steering setup. And parted it out.🤪😂

[George Smolinski]

14 hours ago, Matt Harwood said:

I really needed a dome light lens.

 

The one on the left looks pretty decent. Maybe restorable even.

[TexRiv_63]

In the "good old days" I often bought whole cars just for a few parts. I can't remember doing it for a single part but I did buy a running car to get these '69 Hurst/Olds wheels. Of course back then I had a mini junk yard of extra parts for whatever cars I was into at the time.

[keiser31]

Bought a 1966 Dodge Charger for $200.00. Drove it home and stripped it. Sold it for $400.00. The guy who got it from me stripped even more of it. He sold the body for $1,000.00! We all got some good stuff off of it.

[Larry Schramm]

Wait until Dandy Dave weighs in on this topic with pictures.  He drove from NY to Calif to get a 1913 Buick parts car.

[1937hd45]

1 hour ago, edinmass said:

Yup

 

There is a window in the block to check. An on a 15 million dollar car, people care. And applications at Pebble would include photos of ALL the tags and numbers to prove the car BEFORE you get invited. 

That is very interesting, I had no idea those fine points were looked at long before the car arrived on the lawn. Years ago the shop I worked at restored two Bugatti GP cars that the owner bought for $900.00 some time in the early 1960's. There was the yellow "good" car and the red car. Same thing was done with Model A Fords, pile of parts from two cars and one got the better ones, lesser ones went on the other. Both Bugatti's are on the road today but looking at the mismatched assembly numbers from the cam box back through all the bits to the cowl linkage matters today but didn't back then. 

[28 Chrysler]

I piked up a 1938 International 1/2 ton for the grill trim,. The thing was covered with leaves,grass, sticks and bushes, it was rusted so bad that the bottom 3 feet was crumbly.

I bought a 1967 Morris 1000 cheep but had to take a 1959 Morris 750cc with it. It ended up a good thing, after a week the 67 needed a U joint.

[JamesR]

Quote

Have you ever bought a car just for one part?

 

Some people have bought cars just for the title. I guess that's a "part."

[West Peterson]

23 minutes ago, JamesR said:

 

Some people have bought cars just for the title. I guess that's a "part."

 

Yup. Or just for the identification tag.

[JACK M]

A few times,

I was sorting the very low milage 300 and couldn't get the speedometer working.

The car had been parked in my neighbor's garage for decades.

The speedo shop told me that they needed a small part in the numbers drum before they could proceed.

I knew of a rust bucket 300 about 250 miles north of here and made the trip.

Got it home and took the dash apart and had the small part in my hand.

This took about three days.

I called the speedo shop and the guy told me that he was able to use the old one.

 

A few others over the years, a 36 Dodge, a 37 Desoto, the 46 New Yorker that is still here.

 

If it has what I need I feel obligated to overpay.

 

I hate to tell you how many Chargers I wasted when I was racing.

Edited November 30, 2022 by JACK M (see edit history)

[Shipping reccomendations]

I bought a rust free supercharged 1937 Cord Beverly from California without any running gear or instruments just for the front fenders. Sold what was left for what I paid for theCord so in effect I got the front fenders for free.

[joe_padavano]

On more than one occasion.

 

I did buy a very rusty 1967 Vista Cruiser just to get the good roof glass for my 64 Vista. That glass is not reproduced.

[edinmass]

2 hours ago, 1937hd45 said:

That is very interesting, I had no idea those fine points were looked at long before the car arrived on the lawn. Years ago the shop I worked at restored two Bugatti GP cars that the owner bought for $900.00 some time in the early 1960's. There was the yellow "good" car and the red car. Same thing was done with Model A Fords, pile of parts from two cars and one got the better ones, lesser ones went on the other. Both Bugatti's are on the road today but looking at the mismatched assembly numbers from the cam box back through all the bits to the cowl linkage matters today but didn't back then. 

In the “Duesenberg” collectors circle………putting multiple cars in the same shop at the same time is called “unscrambling the eggs”. It was exceptionally common when there were multiple Duesenberg‘s in the same shop the parts were swapped amongst them. Often times low mileage sedan chassis were swapped out with an open car. It was all factory Duesenberg and no  one cared 60 years ago. Today it’s common to spend a million dollars getting a car all back to original. On a Model J that includes body,engine, bell housing, crankshaft, fire wall, frame. Transmission and rear ends were not marked. Numbers matching unmolested Model J’s will bring two to three times more than a “scramble” or floor sweepings car. The market sets the price…….

Edited November 30, 2022 by edinmass (see edit history)

[1937hd45]

6 minutes ago, edinmass said:

 Numbers matching unmolested Model J’s will bring two to three times more than a “scramble” or floor sweepings car. The market sets the price…….

This must make watching J auctions more exciting for the spectators, do both bidders know the true facts or is one covering the bids the uninformed bidder is placing? 

[Buffalowed Bill]

Fifty years ago I bought a 1955 Studebaker coupe for the rust free, RF, fender. A father and son owned a bunch of Studebakers and Jaguars, many of which were parked on the lawn of a high end house in an exclusive Lake Washington community near Seattle. I was restoring my 1955, Studebaker, Speedster and hadn't been able to find a fender. I had planned to bring the car back to West Seattle where I lived, but I needed the fender right away. So I pulled the fender during the day when no-one was home. I had intended to pick up the car later, but it just never happened. Forty years later I happened to meet the son. Neither of us recognized the other, but as soon as we were introduced recognition was instantaneous. The first words out of his mouth were "I really wish that you had picked up that car, it might have saved it." 

[BucketofBolts]

I bought a 1933 Buick as a parts car. Sadly, the parts car looked too nice to be a parts car and I was uncomfortable in attempting to take away any of the parts. I later purchased another parts car and sadly that vehicle looked too horrible to be used as a parts car. 

[3macboys]

We bought a 66 Coronet 4 door just for the trunk lid for the convertible.  Ended up trading the hood for the inner fender splash shields - gotta love car guys, we were at a swap meet with the rest of parts from the 4 door and a guy came along that needed a hood and had the splash shields at home that we needed.  He promised to send the splash shields and we sent him home with the hood, I don't think we even got his name but he took ours and our address and a couple of weeks the shields showed up in the mail.  

[John Byrd]

Yeah, in 1975 we bought a 67 Mustang GT fastback to get the left rear wheel for our 66 GT. Paid 60 bucks for the car, parted most everything else out and made a bundle !

[Restorer32]

We bought a '41 Packard conv coupe body and frame at the Abelove auction just so we would have the top of the windshield frame.  We make header bows for these cars,  They are very difficult to make without a car to fit them to.

[SC38dls]

Just before college the first time I bought a wrecked VW convertible for the top for $50. I took the top off it and told the guy I would be back for the car. Two days later I went back and told him it was the wrong year so I sold the car back to the guy for $20 and I kept the top. It didn’t fit to well but worked ok. 
dave s 

Edited December 1, 2022 by SC38dls (see edit history)