Why are scrap dealers portrayed as criminals?

[Vince70]

The best scrappy if your near Ashford, (if it's still there due to the new regulations) is Matt Woodgates in High Halden it's proper old school where you can either take the part off yourself or phone in advance for the part and there's some real old stuff in the yard.

 

It's a father and son concern and both are so helpful and have been in the scrap car business years so know what parts will fit what car and I always found the prices reasonable.

 

Another good place is Arkle auto parts in Maidstone and it's all off the shelve so it's more like just going to the shops than visiting the scrappy and again very helpful with reasonable prices.

 

I rebuilt my Xantia a few years back when it got written off for £50 using Arkle auto parts and that was for a new grill slam panel and bonnet and I got paid out £1650

 

But I do love it if you want to buy a 2nd hand engine or box off one of the eBay sellers as the engine will always be low mileage as it came out of a car which had only done 46000 and was driven once a week on a Sunday by the local vicar to church.

So I don't know where the high mileage knackered wrecks with 30 owners must end their life lol

[Cavcraft]

Having once been to a salvage auction, I'm fucked if I know how anybody makes money from damaged repairable cars. They were going through for more than a non-damaged one would cost, it was absolute madness.

 

I was told by a few people years back that some damaged repairable cars were bought as a front for money laundering, and the people who did them up and sold them on didn't mind losing a few quid here and there.

[Angrydicky]

The best scrappy if your near Ashford, (if it's still there due to the new regulations) is Matt Woodgates in High Halden it's proper old school where you can either take the part off yourself or phone in advance for the part and there's some real old stuff in the yard.

 

It's a father and son concern and both are so helpful and have been in the scrap car business years so know what parts will fit what car and I always found the prices reasonable.

 

 

Sounds good, I'd be interested to know if its still there as it'll be good to know of an old school scrapyard in the Kent area. Could do with a few Maestro bits if there happens to be one in there.

[Rusty_Rocket]

Sounds good, I'd be interested to know if its still there as it'll be good to know of an old school scrapyard in the Kent area. Could do with a few Maestro bits if there happens to be one in there.

 

They're (GM Woodgates) about your best bet for old stuff now.  The old man (Mac) died last year so now only Tony runs the gaff.  He's a big bloke and I remember him being a mountain of a man when I first started going there 20 years ago.  A decent lot to deal with, they are certainly not crims and always happy to talk about old stuff.

If you need Vauxhall bits, Ashford Vauxhall Spares is just down the road, again the owner (Shawn) who runs the place is 100% straight, would not ever consider anything even remotely dodgy!

[cort16]

There was money in it pre the damage category being on the v5. My dad put a dormer extension on our house fixing crashed cavaliers and escorts back in the 80s.

Modern cars are also much more complex to fix with airbags, seat belt pretensioners and hyper sensitive electronics. . No thanks.

[Cavcraft]

I've heard rumours the superb Furber's yard in Whixhall, Shropshire is under threat. You could spend the best part of a day there once (haven't been in years) and it must have been one of the biggest in the country, possibly still is.

[Vince70]

About 20 years ago I lived in Hawkhurst Kent and we had a scrap yard around the corner.

 

At the time I was working in a garage and the amount of people who would pop in looking for the Recon engine specialist that was advertised in the papers and each time I would have to tell them it's the scrap yard at the bottom of the lane only for them to give me a bemused look.

 

Mind you I bought an engine for a Polo down their and it was a great little lump which didn't use any oil or water for 80 quid.

[overrun]

I once nicked some original side repeaters for my Nova from a shit litle yard called Rocktop. I was outside and he collared me, so I sheepishly gave him a fiver and then, unbelievably he returned with 3 quid change!

[Guest bangerfan101]

One of the Barnsley bus breakers a few years back was copped with a wrecker full of drugs, served time for it. Whoops!

 

 

Sounds like millenium at kinsley , office wreaks of smack every time i've been in there

[richardmorris]

Anyone heard anything about Chobham's scrapyard?

 

Slap in the common - walked past it recently and it has some decent old cars inside.

 

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Chobham,+Surrey,+UK/@51.3652202,-0.6033451,294m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x4875d622e0d7b129:0xb8901dad7d684e56

[garbaldy]

There's another scrappy down in St Boswells known locally as "Chalky Whites" (no, he's not a black lad) and most people that I know, always advise that he's a complete arsehole and that he treats everybody like a twat. Each time I've been there, he's been really polite and friendly and went out of his way to help me out. His prices are generally much better than S&I but he doesn't have the same range of cars.

 

Chalky is a top bloke although his prices are plucked out of thin air sometimes, I've never found him to be anything like his reputation suggests  if you meet him outwith work (rally's or car shows) he's really very chatty.

 

S&I thomson are really expensive I can't see how they sell any parts or damaged repairables now you can get stuff delivered off ebay. 

 

Before they went all up market they where quite good as you just had to help yourself,   as for the damaged vehicles some are rather expensive, they had a trooper covered in moss as it had sat in the compound that long due to over pricing, on the other hand I bought my damaged navara from them and I have to say they where a good grand cheaper than anywhere else, not quite sure how they set the prices but it does seem to be a bit of a lottery

[gtd2000]

Chalky is a top bloke although his prices are plucked out of thin air sometimes, I've never found him to be anything like his reputation suggests  if you meet him outwith work (rally's or car shows) he's really very chatty.

 

 

Before they went all up market they where quite good as you just had to help yourself,   as for the damaged vehicles some are rather expensive, they had a trooper covered in moss as it had sat in the compound that long due to over pricing, on the other hand I bought my damaged navara from them and I have to say they where a good grand cheaper than anywhere else, not quite sure how they set the prices but it does seem to be a bit of a lottery

 

Yeah, It's funny how some people have certain reputations but the reality can be very different. I've certainly nothing negative to say about him from my experiences so far.

 

S&I were very good back in the 1990's when I did most of my rummaging around there. I bought a cheap (£240) 1986 Hyundai Pony from a lad in Melrose in 1991 and found a T-boned, as new, 573 mile Hyundai Pony at the S&I yard. The owners said I could take whatever I wanted off it for £100. At the time, that was an absolute bargain (IMO) and my Pony soon had new suspension, exhaust, drive-shafts, interior, window winders and lots of sundry parts. Hell it didn't need half the stuff I put on it but as it was there for the taking....I put on around 30,000 miles a year on that little car as well!

[New POD]

Scrap yards are always better the further from the docks you are. Hence when I lived in Longbridge, and worked in Solihull, there were at least 10 scrap yards more or less 5 miles from my journey home from work, and another 5 or 6 within 20 mins of home. Now I live in Liverpool, there's just a mountain or cubed iron on the docks.

[Station]

Remember this from an old forum post:

 

 

 

Arrh scrapyard thievery lol

Well when i had the nova i got pissed off with all the crap basic models being broken when all the good decent cars were in the other yard(insurance write offs etc) which keeps getting bigger & bigger everytime i go there.
Well i decided **** it i'm gonna check it out during the day bollocks i'm gonna scale the razor wired fence.

I did just that, drove up with a couple of mates parked it in the service station ran across two fields with lots of prepared tools to scale the big 12ft razor wired fence through a blanket over the wire but nearly split my self on the sprung prongs.
They had mint nova gsi's, new corsa's, mint xr4i's, jags, porsches lots, i took most of the gsi's interior bits night by night & chucked them over the fence, my heart was pounding just thinking if i got caught they could bury me here kept hearing dogs i got so nervous i had to crap in a van.

Got back over ran to the car carrying everything jesus i had an addreniline rush i did this a few more times even went on my own until i got caught by the police, i came out with some ball**** excuse that i was asleep in my car at the side of the road. They looked in my boot noticing that i had loads of wet car bits which i'd just got from the yard. Said they'd check to see if the was forced entry on the place i crapped myself i drove faster & faster all the way home even crapped it for a few days.

I'd never ever do this sort of thing ever again just a silly thing you do when your young & desperate.

 

You sort of have to see it from the scrapyard owner's view sometimes, the amount that gets nicked must be a lot. I always pay for things, but occasionally I do stick the odd switch in my bag.

[twosmoke300]

Its funny the people that think nicking from scrappies is ok . Im sure im mentioned this on here before but my FIL , who is honest to the point of stupidity , thinks nothing of waking out of a scrappy with his pockets bulging.

Its still theft . My local scrappy doesnt even charge for small plastic/glass bits cos its cleaning the shells for them .

The scrappies know who is on the rob and just puts the price up when they do declare something so I suppose its a vicous circle .

[drum]

The aforementioned Sandy the safe thief, sold me a Datsun 140 back in the late 80s. It was a shed and was for razzing about Alyth Hill. He told me he needed a name, any name, Donald Duck would do.

 

About three months later and after much high jinks with the Datsun, some tosser threw a match in it. We threw some gorse bushes over the burnt out shell and forgot about it.

 

You can imagine my surprise when my old man got a visit from the police. Someone had reported the wreck, the police had investigated and Sandy dobbed me in!

[Stixy]

I used to work for a Dismantler and stuff was allways getting pinched  we often laughed at the pathetic lengths people would go to stealing little bits that we would normaly give away with the bigger part they had bought  .

 

 Once i was walking around the back fence outside the yard  and seen a Cortina door being lowered over the fence on some  old knotted seatbelts , i couldnt see who was lowering it but guessed they would have been stood on the top car of the stack to do it as the fence was 12ft high , so i grabbed to door as it got within reach then gave an almighty yank on it and heard a big bang/crash from the other side of the fence   . I picked the door up and took it back into the yard and a few minutes later a bloke came limping out of the yard trying his hardest not to look at me and the door and i was was trying hard not to laugh   .the Cortina he got into was the same colour as the door . At the time in the early 1990's  we were the only dismantler in the area and charged £7 for Cortina doors   ,  

 

I would say to anybody pocketing stuff in yards  is it worth it ?  because if you get caught you cant ever go back there .

[New POD]

The only thing I've learnt is that you should price up a new part, before trying to haggle with a scrap yard owner.

[Guest bangerfan101]

Does anybody know if blackborough house scrapyard in devon is still going ? last time i saw photo's of the place it was piled high with old tin , and chod .

 

use to be owned by a stockcar driver