I just noticed that Pick N Pull is having a 50% off sale this upcoming weekend.

You will need to check their web-site for locations. They also have an inventory list that is more or less up to date.

I know I am not the only one here that enjoys roaming wrecking yards, so I just thought I would pass this info on to those that do.

Our local pull n save used to have a sale--all you could carry for $x. Had to carry it for about 20 ft. Lots of Mexicans showed up with neck yokes to which they would attach piles of equally balanced parts and then stagger the 20 ft. It was worth the visit just to watch the show and see if the guy with the two 4 cyl engines could go the distance.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

More or less up to date my azz-You are near the same one I am and They Do Not have their act together--The 300cd they have listed is a 450sl etc Etc. Besides the fact they started jumbling all the Benz bmws with the jap junk.

I'm a long time Pick n' Puller but lately they're pissing me off. There's 3 yards in my range in the bay area, 5 if you count the two San Jose stores, and they used to let you use your $2 admission stamp to get you into all the yards on the same day. No longer.

They say they've made up for that with the online vehicle finder. Oh boy. I just went to look for parts for a friends 300D and the closest you can zero it in on their site is "300 series." Since he needs body parts, that's not real helpful.

For BMW, OTOH, they have about 4 or 5 types of 325s, all listed separate. I hit 325i for the Newark yard and got 2 hits and I know they have more E30s than that.

Oh well, times are tough everywhere.

Thanks for the heads up on the half price thing though.

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

I like having my own private pick and pull!

Panzzer..

The last one I was in was the one on Loop 12 in Dallas and I noticed the Euro section was somewhat thin.

I didn't even think of looking in the Asian section. I mean, it would seem to me that any one would know a Mercedes was from somewhere in Europe.

Thanks for the info.

My favorite Pick n Pull round here is the Newark store - E. Bay side about midway tween Oakland and San Jose. It's huge, the ones nearer town are much smaller. The Newark yard has serious German car action but it's more than a quarter mile from the gate, I swear.

Weird thing in the South Bay area, waterfront property is the dregs. All salt marsh, flat as hell, you can't even see it for a couple of miles til you get up to it and it stinks like hell half the time.

I got my 617 motor from there. Had to push one of those four wheeled hoists over there and the push it back a danglin' the motor.

Didn't have to go to the gym that day.

More info than you probably wanted, but here's a couple Google Earth pictures of that yard. First one, the two dots are the entrance and the German car section; second one you can see this yard is on waterfront property, last business 'cept salt ponds til the bay, you can just barely see the same two red dots at the center of the shot:

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

Thats the one-there is no longer a euro section

No Pick and Pulls for us. I'm guessing it's a liability issue here in litigious CT.

__________________

1980 300TD-China Blue/Blue MBTex-2nd Owner, 107K (Alt Blau) OBK #15
'06 Chevy Tahoe Z71 (for the wife & 4 kids, current mule) '03 Honda Odyssey (son #1's ride, reluctantly) '99 GMC Suburban (255K+ miles, semi-retired mule) 21' SeaRay Seville (summer escape pod)

That would be a drag. What, you have to pay high dollar at dismantlers?

Sometimes you get lucky at the pick n pulls. My 300SD has that dark brown interior, you don't see it too often at the yards. My front seats were in horrible shape, couldn't find anything in my color period, finally settled for a light tan driver seat and put a seat cover on it. The springs in mine were busted.

Then one day I found two cherry front seats in my color! It was from a gasser, early 90s I think. They must have made the gasser 126 for a long time. The wild part was . . . .$40 apiece! Leather seats, exc. condition.

But you can look a long time and never find anything that good.

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

Yup! It's as much the "window shopping" as anything else. I'd love to poke around and see what I could find. Might be nothing but you never know when you might stumble across that one needle in the haystack. But we don't get the opportunity, at least in this state. There are supposedly still a couple in central MA and one in RI but then you've got the better part of the day invested by the time you drive there and back on top of perusing the lot.

As I think about it, it might even be the cost of the real estate as much as it is the liability. There's just not a lot of space left around here to keep acres of cars spread out until they've been picked clean. They just don't have the room so they dismantle them, keep the good parts and scrap the rest.

__________________

1980 300TD-China Blue/Blue MBTex-2nd Owner, 107K (Alt Blau) OBK #15
'06 Chevy Tahoe Z71 (for the wife & 4 kids, current mule) '03 Honda Odyssey (son #1's ride, reluctantly) '99 GMC Suburban (255K+ miles, semi-retired mule) 21' SeaRay Seville (summer escape pod)

I have a pick-n-pull 300SD in my driveway.... you can come by any time and poke around

__________________
On some nights I still believe that a car with the fuel gauge on empty can run about fifty more miles if you have the right music very loud on the radio. - HST

1983 300SD - 305000
1984 Toyota Landcruiser - 190000
1994 GMC Jimmy - 203000

https://media.giphy.com/media/X3nnss8PAj5aU/giphy.gif

Get a few more and I might just take you up on it.

__________________

1980 300TD-China Blue/Blue MBTex-2nd Owner, 107K (Alt Blau) OBK #15
'06 Chevy Tahoe Z71 (for the wife & 4 kids, current mule) '03 Honda Odyssey (son #1's ride, reluctantly) '99 GMC Suburban (255K+ miles, semi-retired mule) 21' SeaRay Seville (summer escape pod)

Found at the Dallas Loop 12 yard on Friday...

A 116 300SD. It is just to the left, behind the fence as you enter the yard. Brown in color. Sitting next to a Lexus. It appears the Euro section is truly gone.

In the 'For Sale' section. A very good looking 450 SL, also brown. They just put it out and the guy did not know anything about it including the year. The body looks good, paint is good, top is good... They are asking $5500 for it.

I'll bet you're right on that one - might be other state issues but real estate could be a biggy, especially in CT.

There was an independent yard adjacent to the Oakland Pick n Pull, I liked the guy who ran it, had pretty good inventory. Somewhere around 2000, I went in and saw a sign that they were closing down. He said he was getting burnt out on all the EPA compliance and was "just gonna crush 'em."

Pick n' Pull is a subsidiary of Schnitzer Steel, I guess they harvest the income they can on parts and then melt 'em down. Once I went to the Schnitzer yard in Oakland to sell a bunch of scrap steel I got when I cleaned out a ladies yard - her late contractor husband had loads of steel items that were past their pull date. In the distance I saw a huge stream of brown looking debris shooting out onto a large pile. I asked the guy what it was, he said they shred the vehicles before they melt them and they have an arrangement of magnets and fans to separate the steel from the copper, alum, and everything else - plastic, upholstery, etc. The stream of crap was everything that was worthless. I think they used to just burn the crap out, not sure.

__________________
1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K