Wayback Wheels - Vintage Car Talk
 
Spare parts galore found in scrap BMW
 
By Aaron Neilly
It breaks my heart to see a complete (or close to complete) classic car in the scrap yard, no matter what it is. Being a classic car enthusiast, I know what a challenge it can be to find pieces for an obscure car.
 
As some of you know, I have a 1972 BMW 2002, which after owning for five years is finally on the road, reliable, pretty, etc. One issue I have found with this car however, is getting parts.
 
Not the usual stuff like brakes, fan belts, tune up items, but those little detail things like chrome bits, trim pieces, the left side license plate light, that one unique screw that fits in the interior door panel just above the armrest. Oh, and a wiper motor that was the big one.
 
It was nice finally having the car roadworthy, but I didn't dare drive it anywhere when I thought it might rain.
 
Now, one neat thing about a vintage BMW is that you can get absolutely any part from the dealership. To prove this, a few years ago BMW built a "brand new" '72 2002. But there's definitely a drawback to dealership parts; a good example is the piece of chrome trim that goes along the edge of the roof - mine was damaged beyond recognition from whoever painted the car prior to me owning it. I called the BMW dealership about it, and yes, they could get it. For $600. Then I asked about a wiper motor. They could get that, too... for $800.
 
I decided not to ask about the other pieces I needed, seeing as two fairly minor parts were nearly what I paid for the whole car to begin with.
 
I put some wanted ads on a few BMW forums online, as well as one on Kijiji looking for these parts, or a whole parts car but never really had any luck. I was contacted by a foreign car auto wreckers in the west end of Ontario, but their prices weren't much better than the dealership, and there was no guarantee that the wiper motor would work.
 
So, I drove my little car for two years with some missing trim, no wipers and just one license plate light. It still worked well, got lots of compliments, but I wanted it to be as close to perfect as possible.
 
Finally, last fall I was out for a drive north of where I live. I wasn't going anywhere in particular, or even looking for anything, it was just a great day for a drive. I had followed a bunch of backroads till I was lost, and ended up on Highway 62 North. I figured at this point it would be best to head home since I knew where I was. That's when I spotted it out of the corner of my eye, sitting in the grass beside a house- an absolutely mangled, rusted out, dirty, smashed and otherwise totally destroyed '72 BMW, the same as mine.
 
There wasn't a body panel on this car that wasn't crunched beyond recognition and it had been filled to the headliner with yard waste, but to me, it was beautiful.
 
I knocked on the door and a woman answered. She said her husband was scrapping the car and it was being picked up the next day, but suggested I try calling him at work, which I did. When I got talking to him, he said he had "maybe forgotten to call the scrap yard" as he was hoping someone like myself
would see it.
 
The car has been in an accident in 1983 and had been sitting patiently in the forest since then. I agreed to buy the car for scrap price and two days later we loaded it onto a trailer using a tractor and a lot of chain since the car didn't exactly roll any more. The rear suspension pretty much fell right off of the car when we picked it up.
 
Tearing into my "dream parts car" after searching for it for years was amazing. As soon as I got it home, I pulled the piece of chrome trim off of the drip rail and installed it on my car. That missing piece had been bugging me since the car was painted.
 
Upon cleaning the yard waste from the interior, I realized this was basically a complete and very original car, right down to the optional single speaker AM radio in the center console.
 
I wasn't going to bother getting all the wet leaves and grass clippings out of the trunk to see what was buried in there as I was so happy with the other pieces I'd scavenged, but my curiosity got the better of me- and I'm glad it did.
 
The original spare tire was still in the well, which looked like it had never been installed on the car, all of the missing lights and lenses were in a (decomposing) grocery bag, as well as a few other bits and pieces I needed.
 
I salvaged absolutely every part I needed to make "Heidi" (yes, she has a name) a complete and fully functioning car. I also have a ton of spares at my disposal now as I kept every single piece of that little parts car that was still intact. Who knows what I might need in the future, right?
 
So before you haul that car that has been sinking into the ground for the past 20 years to the scrap yard, throw an ad on Kijiji, or put a for sale sign on it - you never know who has been desperately looking for it.
 
Aaron Neilly is a licensed mechanic with a soft spot for unique automobiles. He can usually be found tinkering on a classic Volkswagen in his spare time. You can e-mail him at: bandicoot.rally@gmail.com
 
 
 
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