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The Ins and outs of a Salvage yard.


heavy breather

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Reading through some of the past and present posts, I have noticed that some could use a little more information to make finding used parts a little easier. I manage a salvage yard in Idaho, so I thought I would share some history and information some might fight interesting and useful.

The Ins and outs of a Salvage yard.

It used to be that when the family clunker died you would take it down to the local scrap yard and sell it to some greasy guy who would then take it and stack it on top of all the other jalopy’s already rusting in piece. It would sit there and rust in piece with the others and occasionally some thrifty person would come along and buy a few parts from it to keep their clunker going just a few more months. As the environment started to become important to people and politics, “junk yards” quietly started to clean up their acts and organize a little bit. Many junk yards started turning to a system call the Hollander System to organize and catalogue their parts. The Hollander System was started by a guy named Roy Hollander and his wife during the great depression.
Basically what the Hollander system is, is a way to catalogue and organize all your parts, and enable the salvage yard to keep track of what parts work with what applications. It evolved a lot when computer technology became available. Now not only could they quickly find parts for your car in their inventory, but they could now link to other yards across the country to find parts for your car. With the software, salvage yards have the ability to track what they spend on inventory and how much they made off their inventory. Salvage yards are now a multibillion dollar a year industry. They recycle millions of cars and parts every year. Millions of repair shops across the country turn to salvage yards for hard to find parts, or economical solutions to repairs.
What the Hollander System means to you the consumer. Basically it is a numbering system assigned to parts. It starts at 100 and goes to 699. For example, all body parts are a 100 number. A complete front clip is a 100, a front bumper is a 105, and further on down an engine is a 300, the engine block is a 302 and so on. All the main engine components are a 300 something. Now the fun parts, after that main number that tells us what part we are looking for, comes the interchange number. This number tells us all the different applications that particular part will interchange with. For example I have a 2003 ranger with a 4.0 V6. If I were to look that up I would look up a 300-9070A. Again the 300 means I am looking for an engine, the 9070A tells me how many years and from what other vehicles that particular motor was a factory option. In this case the inter change number tells me that my engine can come from one of these two vehicles as a direct bolt in.
1 RANGER 01-03 4.0L (VIN E, 8th digit, SOHC, 6-245)
2 B4000 01-03 (6-245, 4.0L, VIN E, 8th digit)
Now there are also none exact interchange for parts. My exact interchange number is 9070A , but if I don’t have that option in stock, or one is not easily available I can look for a non-exact. In this case there is also a 9070D option ( and 2004 Ranger with a 4.0 or a 04-06 B4000 with a 4.0 both with Vin E 8th digit.) and a 9070E ( 2007-20010 B4000 with a 4.0 V6 VIN E for the 8th digit.). These engines will also work in a 2001-2003 ranger with a 4.0 V6 if you change something. For example the 9070D will fit if you re use the timing cover, intake manifold, and the harmonic balancer from you’re old engine. The 9070E requires the same changes plus the injectors.
The point to all this, is that this system makes it easy for your counter guy at the salvage yard to find factory option replacement parts for your car. However, it also limits the counter guy. For example, Ford has used the same lug pattern from the 60’s or 70’s all the way up until early 2000’s. So a wheel from a 1980 F-150 will fit on a 1996 F-150, but because the wheel from the 1980 is not a factory option, the computer will not tell the counter guy that they have a set of wheels that will work.
What this means, is that you the consumer need to be educated on what you are looking for before you call the salvage yard. A great example is my own search for an 8.8 rear axle with 31 spline axle shafts to upgrade the 28 spline axle shaft rear axle assembly that my truck came with. The 31 spline axle was not a factory option for my truck because it did not have the FX4 package. I had to do some reading here on this forum to find out that Ford put the 8.8 with 31 splines in the FX4 and the Explorer, and that the FX4 axle is a direct bolt in, and that if I am willing to weld on new spring perches and shock mounts, I can bolt in an axle from an explorer and have rear disc brakes as well.
So when you call in, or go to your local salvage yard you need to know what year and application you want your part from. If you know that your part was available as an option in a 5 year span, still give the counter guy a specific year and application to find your part. In my case, the yard I manage does not have an axle for a FX4 ranger so I had to go looking for one. I get to ask using the Hollander numbers, so that makes it easy for me and the yard I am calling. But trust me when I say call in with a specific application in mind to find your parts.
Now another resource that is extremely handy to have when looking for stuff. There is a web site Called Car-part.com, probably 98% of all the salvage yards across the nation and Canada us this web site. Every night they log onto our computers and update their listing with our entire current inventory. So everything that I add to my inventory gets added to their listing, and everything that I sell or delete gets removed. This happens with every salvage yard that has a subscription with them. This is also the same web site that many of us use to find parts for our customers when we don’t have the part they want in stock. This web site is available to everyone with internet access. It’s free to look up parts, they make their money by having the salvage yards pay to up load their inventory to it. This allows you to comparison shop across the country from any internet capable device. You don’t even have to call in and ask the guy at the counter if they have the axle, you can look it up yourself and find out if they have it, and how much they are selling it for. It also gives you the ability to tell the guy at the counter that the salvage yard down the road has the same part with fewer miles for a $100.00 less. And all he has to do is look it up to find out you are right.
More handy info. The part/ inventory number listed on the internet, is the number for that car, so every part that comes of that vehicles has the same number, that way if we find it lying around somewhere we know what it belongs to and can identify it.
Not all parts are inventoried. Only parts that we have a Hollander number for get inventoried. 99% of all salvage yards do not inventory parts that don’t have a Hollander number. Without that Hollander number we don’t have a way to make sure that the part interchanges. This includes parts like hoses, belts, trim, interior and exterior, nuts and bolts, and seats before about 2000 depending on make and model. Remember from the beginning of this post, there are only numbers from 100-699, when you think about all the parts that make up a car or truck, that’s not a lot. But it is most of the major components. Most salvage yards will give you the VIN for a specific car if you want to match paint codes or find out if the computer or wire harness or something like that will work with your vehicle. All you need to do is call the local dealer ship with the donors car VIN and your VIN and the guy at the parts counter can run the numbers and find out if they take the part number if the car is less than 20 years old. Different manufactures start dropping VIN information at different times. Also, not all dealers have the same software for VIN decoding; I have had the best luck by using dealers in larger cities like Salt Lake City UT.

Hope fully this in site will help some of you have better luck finding parts. If you have questions, please feel free to ask me, or if something does not make sense. You can also shoot me a PM, and I can help you locate parts. If the moderators will allow it, I can also post my toll free number and you can call me direct. But I don’t want it to appear that I am advertising and create problems for someone.
 


Denisefwd93

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around here.. anything over 10 years.. "TOO OLD" is the answer.
 

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Mark_88

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Good to know~ thanks for the information.
 

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Interesting. I'll have to keep that in mind, might make looking for things a little easier. The big problem I've had in the past has been the argument with the yard where they say it won't fit. I've gone through that with things like interior door handles, axles and manual transmissions. I've had yards refuse to sell me parts because they say it won't fit (the most notable on that was when I wanted to put a ZF-5 in my F-150. Since those were only in F-250 and up, that's what I asked for. When they saw my F-150, I was flatly told that it won't fit and they won't sell it. I'm not sure if it's just that the code doesn't show it as an interchange or if it's just the local yards being ignorant, because it bolts right up and works fine.


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heavy breather

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Probably a bit of both. I'll sell you what ever you want. What you do with it after that is up to you. But if it comes back looking abused and you want it warranties, I'll be quick to tell you to pound sand.

The only exception is electronic parts. If I tell you it's not a match and you insist on buying it, I'll write on the paper work that it's sold as is. Otherwise once you pay for it, it's yours.


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heavy breather

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Interesting. I'll have to keep that in mind, might make looking for things a little easier. The big problem I've had in the past has been the argument with the yard where they say it won't fit. I've gone through that with things like interior door handles, axles and manual transmissions. I've had yards refuse to sell me parts because they say it won't fit (the most notable on that was when I wanted to put a ZF-5 in my F-150. Since those were only in F-250 and up, that's what I asked for. When they saw my F-150, I was flatly told that it won't fit and they won't sell it. I'm not sure if it's just that the code doesn't show it as an interchange or if it's just the local yards being ignorant, because it bolts right up and works fine.


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That why I suggest that you have an application to give the counter guy. They don't need to know any thing beyond that. The only problem you will have is if you are wrong and you brake the part. Then you are hosed on the warranty. Other wise tell them nothing they don't need to know.


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Mark_88

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I was about to post something similar because if the part is not quite in the realm of the model year you are buying it for it won't show up in any search. I've used the pick and pull much more successfully on random part hunting expeditions than searches through the databases.

But they do work great for plug and play types of part or engine replacement.
 

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That why I suggest that you have an application to give the counter guy. They don't need to know any thing beyond that. The only problem you will have is if you are wrong and you brake the part. Then you are hosed on the warranty. Other wise tell them nothing they don't need to know.


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That is how I do in parts stores with my Ranger. If I mention anything about it being a Ranger I end up with it "does it have a 2.0, 2.3, or 2.8?" when the first thing I told them was I have a 302 in it.

I had one lady at the parts counter tell me I sure had a bunch of neat cars (since I ask for parts for something different just about every time I go in there, plugs for an '88 Mustang 5.0, thermostat for a '95 Mustang 5.0...) she thought I actually had all of them. :icon_rofl:

It comes down to a need-to-know basis... and most of the time they really don't need to know.
 

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Found this this morning.



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heavy breather

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At the same time, though, its sometimes tough to get the customer to give a counter guy an application they can work with. I don't ask questions I don't need to, but if I ask you, it's because I have to. And when people wanna tell me every thing but what I need to know, its really hard not to reach across the counter and slap the stupid out of them.

Drive shafts are the worst, I have to have the wheel base to find one, for some makes and models there are 20-50 different options. People will tell me all kinds of information, but the wheel base. And then they get pissed because I won't guess.
 

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At the same time, though, its sometimes tough to get the customer to give a counter guy an application they can work with. I don't ask questions I don't need to, but if I ask you, it's because I have to. And when people wanna tell me every thing but what I need to know, its really hard not to reach across the counter and slap the stupid out of them.

Drive shafts are the worst, I have to have the wheel base to find one, for some makes and models there are 20-50 different options. People will tell me all kinds of information, but the wheel base. And then they get pissed because I won't guess.
Drive lines suck.

In the ag world were I deal in parts you have metric and standard than then about a dozen different telescoping options... And then you get into the different pto coupler options.

Small engine and lawn stuff is my biggest pita. The model on the hood rarely means anything, nobody thinks to get the real model and serial off the sticker (gets interesting when said sticker falls off) along with the numbers off the engine if they need anything for that.
 

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