Stugotz
New member
So this happened to me recently. I don't know why I decided to post it here, but here it is none the less.
So my friends know that I'm a motor head. I usually get a call when something interesting pops up, or when someone needs help. Mostly when they need help. I like to help so it's all good. I'm no expert mechanic but I know my way around the car the garage and the tools. Anyway, a friend calls me up and says that he has to empty his mothers garage before she moves. He has no room for anything at his place. I can have whatever I want for free. Bring a trailer and an engine hoist. He was a mechanic and so was his dad. "Tons of car parts and a couple of big blocks" he says. Buried the needle on my sounds interesting meter. So I go there the next day and this is what I find.
It's a dusty old homemade garage that no one has been in for many years. It was a job just to get the barn doors to open. It's maybe 10x30 and there are no windows. There were bins and boxes filled to the rim with nuts, bolts, parts and pieces. But not nice and neat like. Crap was scattered everywhere like a drunken monkey went tearing through there a few times. The roof had holes in it and provided pretty much the only sunlight in the windowless room. Someone had stacked 20 or so boards of Sheetrock and a few rolls of insulation in the center of the garage a long time ago. As you can imagine, the Rock had crumbled into a mess and many generations of mice had shredded the insulation for bedding. It was a friggin mess that was knee deep with debris down the center from front to back. Down both sides wasn't too bad. I mean, it was dusty and dirty and unorganized, but at least it wasn't covered in chunks of Sheetrock. Every flat surface had parts and pieces of dismantled junk. There were crome bumpers stuffed in the rafters over my head. Maybe 20 of them. At least half were still wrapped in paper or plastic. Apparently NOS from a closed down dealership in the area. I found a shovel and started shoveling the crumbled sheetrock out of the center so we could get in there with the hoist. Every shovel full had car parts mixed in it. Nuts, bolts, emblems, tools. I wish I had the time to go through every inch of the place, but I just don't. And I couldn't take it all. I don't have the room. Those bumpers are still in the ceiling. I unwrapped one. Perfect condition. 70 something ford I think. I just have no where to put a pile of bumpers. Anyway, we finally get to the meat and potatoes of this disaster. A bunch of engines and transmissions. All Ford. There's a C4 a C5 and 2 C6's. A 4 speed top loader and a 3 speed top loader. Took all of those. 2 complete motors sitting under a work bench. Both big block 429 cobra jets. One is a fully dressed and untouched take out supposedly from a police interceptor and the other was apparently rebuilt but never used. It had an aluminum intake a clean paint job and a set of headers laying next to it. Friggin dirt all over it. Inside the intake too. Needs to be completely torn back down and inspected. I took them both. I don't know why. I don't need any of this stuff. I would never buy an old big block 429, but it was all free and I got a chubby when he said free car parts. Next thing I knew I was shoveling sheet rock and car parts like I was on an automotive archeological dig. Now there's a pile of transmissions and engines stuffed into my already full garage. I have the sickness. Got it real bad. My roof doesn't leak and I actually work on this **** so it's not that bad. I might "refresh" the already worked 429 and stuff it into my 1980 f100 Stepside, just for the hell of it. Who knows.
So here's the dilemma. Out behind this guys garage was a 70's t bird. He parked it there when he got married 20 years ago and never touched it again. It was parked on dirt and had become one with the earth. Floors and trunk are gone. Brake pedal went right to the floor. Hood bent in half when we tried to open it. Hinges froze shut. Not worth saving at all. We dragged it around front onto the driveway and messed with it for a bit. Actually got it running. 351 Cleveland tapped for a few seconds then happily idled for a half hour at 190 degrees. Had good oil pressure too. "Biggest cam I could put in it without going to solid lifters" he says. Had a nice Lopey sound to it. Headers look rusty but intact. Aluminum dual plane and 750 Holley on top. 9" rear with 3.55's and a Trac lock out back. C5 with a shift kit in the middle. B&M slap shifter on top. All surrounded by a rusty pile of crap. "Take whatever you want. Needs to be out of here in 10 days." What a knuckle busting pain in the rear it would be to turn all those rusty bolts and get the drive train out of it.......but I feel like I need to. Even though I shouldn't. It's free after all. And I do have the sickness. I'm thinking of just yanking the motor and the center section out of the rear and leaving the rest for the scrap guy. Maybe I shouldn't even bother........or maybe I could build a 351 cleveland powered gokart. I don't know.
What would you do ?
So my friends know that I'm a motor head. I usually get a call when something interesting pops up, or when someone needs help. Mostly when they need help. I like to help so it's all good. I'm no expert mechanic but I know my way around the car the garage and the tools. Anyway, a friend calls me up and says that he has to empty his mothers garage before she moves. He has no room for anything at his place. I can have whatever I want for free. Bring a trailer and an engine hoist. He was a mechanic and so was his dad. "Tons of car parts and a couple of big blocks" he says. Buried the needle on my sounds interesting meter. So I go there the next day and this is what I find.
It's a dusty old homemade garage that no one has been in for many years. It was a job just to get the barn doors to open. It's maybe 10x30 and there are no windows. There were bins and boxes filled to the rim with nuts, bolts, parts and pieces. But not nice and neat like. Crap was scattered everywhere like a drunken monkey went tearing through there a few times. The roof had holes in it and provided pretty much the only sunlight in the windowless room. Someone had stacked 20 or so boards of Sheetrock and a few rolls of insulation in the center of the garage a long time ago. As you can imagine, the Rock had crumbled into a mess and many generations of mice had shredded the insulation for bedding. It was a friggin mess that was knee deep with debris down the center from front to back. Down both sides wasn't too bad. I mean, it was dusty and dirty and unorganized, but at least it wasn't covered in chunks of Sheetrock. Every flat surface had parts and pieces of dismantled junk. There were crome bumpers stuffed in the rafters over my head. Maybe 20 of them. At least half were still wrapped in paper or plastic. Apparently NOS from a closed down dealership in the area. I found a shovel and started shoveling the crumbled sheetrock out of the center so we could get in there with the hoist. Every shovel full had car parts mixed in it. Nuts, bolts, emblems, tools. I wish I had the time to go through every inch of the place, but I just don't. And I couldn't take it all. I don't have the room. Those bumpers are still in the ceiling. I unwrapped one. Perfect condition. 70 something ford I think. I just have no where to put a pile of bumpers. Anyway, we finally get to the meat and potatoes of this disaster. A bunch of engines and transmissions. All Ford. There's a C4 a C5 and 2 C6's. A 4 speed top loader and a 3 speed top loader. Took all of those. 2 complete motors sitting under a work bench. Both big block 429 cobra jets. One is a fully dressed and untouched take out supposedly from a police interceptor and the other was apparently rebuilt but never used. It had an aluminum intake a clean paint job and a set of headers laying next to it. Friggin dirt all over it. Inside the intake too. Needs to be completely torn back down and inspected. I took them both. I don't know why. I don't need any of this stuff. I would never buy an old big block 429, but it was all free and I got a chubby when he said free car parts. Next thing I knew I was shoveling sheet rock and car parts like I was on an automotive archeological dig. Now there's a pile of transmissions and engines stuffed into my already full garage. I have the sickness. Got it real bad. My roof doesn't leak and I actually work on this **** so it's not that bad. I might "refresh" the already worked 429 and stuff it into my 1980 f100 Stepside, just for the hell of it. Who knows.
So here's the dilemma. Out behind this guys garage was a 70's t bird. He parked it there when he got married 20 years ago and never touched it again. It was parked on dirt and had become one with the earth. Floors and trunk are gone. Brake pedal went right to the floor. Hood bent in half when we tried to open it. Hinges froze shut. Not worth saving at all. We dragged it around front onto the driveway and messed with it for a bit. Actually got it running. 351 Cleveland tapped for a few seconds then happily idled for a half hour at 190 degrees. Had good oil pressure too. "Biggest cam I could put in it without going to solid lifters" he says. Had a nice Lopey sound to it. Headers look rusty but intact. Aluminum dual plane and 750 Holley on top. 9" rear with 3.55's and a Trac lock out back. C5 with a shift kit in the middle. B&M slap shifter on top. All surrounded by a rusty pile of crap. "Take whatever you want. Needs to be out of here in 10 days." What a knuckle busting pain in the rear it would be to turn all those rusty bolts and get the drive train out of it.......but I feel like I need to. Even though I shouldn't. It's free after all. And I do have the sickness. I'm thinking of just yanking the motor and the center section out of the rear and leaving the rest for the scrap guy. Maybe I shouldn't even bother........or maybe I could build a 351 cleveland powered gokart. I don't know.
What would you do ?
Last edited:
