47-55.1 "American Pickers" episode I LIVED today at a parts store.

[MARTINSR]

I posted a photo a while ago with me and Don Knopps from Don's Antique Auto Parts in Niles California (actually Fremont, Niles is now a district there.) Don died last year and his parts store is still there and darn near full! Don was an odd dude, someone with real "character" when you met Don, in or out of his store, you didn't forget him. He is a legend there in Niles, about every Antique store there has framed photos and painting of him on display. He is without a doubt a forever legend.

Well today was the Niles Car show and Don's daughter had the store open! Now mind you, she has been paying $4000 a month rent on this place since he passed away! She has sold off a lot but HOLY CRAP there is a lot there. He was a hoarder, pure and simple, he bought things he NEVER should have to put in the store. There are HUNDREDS, MANY HUNDREDS of every common part you can think of, starters, clutche discs, pressure plates, fuel pumps, water pumps, parking brake cables, speedometer cables, and on and on, MANY HUNDREDS of most of them.

I dug and dug and dug, walking over PILES of parts, I mean WALKING ON TOP OF. I climbed up between a couple of shelves and found the grille I bought. I had been in there many times over the years (I will be putting an NOW door handle on my truck I got from him 30+ years ago) but you were always going right to the part, this time we got to rummage around freely. It was WILD! OMG BOXES of something like the bezel for a window crank, or shock bushing, 5 gallon pails of sway bar bushings, trunk lid strikers! How in the hell do you think you are going to sell 30 trunk lid striker for a 49-54 Chevy? How in the world do you think you would need that in stock? Well that was just the tip of the iceberg. Rebuilt master cylinders, HUNDREDS of them!

I went back with my brother just getting home now, holy crap, that was WILD going through there.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

And a few more.

Brian

[flashed]

There is no telling what all is hidden in there , would love to dig in there .

[MARTINSR]

One thing that kinda sucked, I came across new shackles for the springs that I just bought and installed. They were a bit heavier too. How about a NOS GM sector shaft for the steering box!

There was a LOT of stuff there!

Brian

[mr48chev]

Outside of someone cashing her out on the whole batch I'd say she needs someone who can list it on ebay for her. That's not only going to take some serious parts skills to sort it out it will take some solid Ebay skills.

Something like the trunk strikers could be sold on a buy it now Priority shipping (small box) and can be sold for X available.
That and maybe contacting vendors who specialize in things like generators or fuel pumps.

[MARTINSR]

She has had people selling stuff on ebay and the like, they have sold most of the real salable stuff. Now she needs to have someone give her a couple of bucks for the whole thing and get it over with, clear it out! She is paying $4 grand a month for goodness sakes, give the stuff away and get it over with!

That's how I see it.

Brian

[1project2many]

That's very cool. It actually looks relatively clean and easy to go through. And it looks like many of the parts are tagged which is so important when working through old parts. It's hard to figure out what to sell and what to toss. Fuel pumps are a great example. Unless the pump is made of unobtanium, most of the old pumps aren't going to last in an area that uses fuel blended with ethanol and the restorers today know not to buy the old parts. Generators and starters OTOH are usually worth the price. Old rebuilds usually had bushings and brushes made of virgin metals instead of recycled alloys and they often last longer than today's rebuilds. Parts like steering linkage and shocks, imo, sometimes sell better if they are boxed together as a "kit" and sold at fire sale prices. And FWIW Ebay's fees are crazy high these days so it's best to list old parts on multiple sites.

There's a guy near me, or likely was a guy near me, that had a place like that. He spent years buying inventory out of parts stores that were being changed from one brand to another. Everything was cataloged and stored away and he was the only guy who knew where it was. He had only two light bulbs inside the front of his store, a mechanical cash register, used handwritten slips from one of the old parts stores he'd bought out, and the phone on the wall dated back to the '60s. Nothing electronic anywhere. I bought complete rebuild kits with original leather boots for the trunion joints (early Mopar U-Joint) in my '36 Plymouth for $46. This was over the phone and the parts were mailed up. Oh, please don't send the check until you inspect the parts. I'm sure you won't steal them. I bought a walker muffler with a three digit part number and a two digit part no Walker tailpipe for my car for $55. Internet sellers are asking $400. I bought vintage carburetor kits which came with a lot of time spent explaining how to bring the gaskets back to life (use vegetable oil on paper gaskets, never water) for $15 ea. Actually, I probably couldn't have put the car on the road without his help.

But the coolest part was this: 35 years before as a kid I'd dragged a'28 Chevy out of the woods to try and build my first car. I needed a fuel pump but back then I had no idea what year this old Chevy was. Being pre-internet it was tougher to find old parts but I'd heard about this guy and started asking around until I got a phone number. I called and he told me that yes, he probably had a pump but there were a couple different styles and it would be hard to get the right one without knowing the exact year or having one to match up. So I did a bunch of odd jobs around the neighborhood to raise the $25 for a new pump then asked my father to drive down and get the pump for me. My father has spent most of his life in sales and knows little about cars. He didn't want to carry a dirty old pump so I made a very detailed drawing of the pump including the pump flange, the gasket, and the pump lever. Years later when I first called for the Plymouth parts I started to mention that I'd once sent my father down for a pump for a '28 Chevy when I was a kid and this old buck asked, "Are you the young man that sent the drawing instead of the pump?" I was blown away. It took me over a year to actually get down to his store to meet him but I was rewarded with a tour through a treasure trove like the one you've got out there. Both the inventory and the gentleman who owned were amazing in their own right. Together it was a great experience.

Are you planning to go back?

[MARTINSR]

You have just described this guy! If you lived near here I would think you were talking about Don, that was him! He was robbed and pistol whipped beat up pretty bad a few years ago and he never "came back" he was never "there" again. Last time I talked to him he was just rambling, it was sad.

I may go back but I don't know if it's worth it, finding anything is DAMN hard. You can't believe how many parts I looked at were for Nash's and Lincolns and stuff that isn't even close to what I have. He had a LOT of stuff that never would sell, it's mind blowing. Hundreds of speeometer cables! WOW

Brian

[cmayna]

I use to shop at Don's periodically during the past 20+ years. He knew his stuff.....Will miss him.

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by cmayna

I use to shop at Don's periodically during the past 20+ years. He knew his stuff.....Will miss him.

Yep, as I told his daughter Saturday, he was what I call a "character" and we need more of them. He didn't blend in, he was one of a kind and I liked him a lot. I have story after story about Don, he was something else. Look at that photo with me on my bike. He was 84 in that photo and he was POWER WALKING a few miles into Niles Canyon! He pissed some people off at his store, oh yeah he was a hard nose for sure. Always asking too much, VERY rarely giving you a deal. But damn it, he was interesting, he didn't blend in that's for sure!

I will miss Don, I would chat with him every time I saw him, he remembered me from when I first bought stuff from him 45 years ago! His first place I bought from is now a little coffee shop on main street in Niles. A very nice place by the way, the pastries are shipped directly from heaven! Anyway, back a while ago I was sitting there at the window counter having some coffee at a Niles Flee market or something and there went Don walking by on the sidewalk. It was so wild to think I bought parts from him so long ago right there in that coffee shop, we have jokes about stuff he said back then, and the whole 45 years I knew him story after story, he was a Character for sure!

Brian