Lets hear some treasure hunting stories

[danny gabbard]

?

[Speed-Randy]

Don't get me started

[johnl]

As you might suspect I have MANY stories of treasure hunts and actually went to Riverside on one today.  Unfortunately for you people most of them are related to the wrong make of car.         

[TexasTom]

I watch the Samba every day ... LOL

Back when I attended UT, Austin, I used to leave business cards on prospective vehicles for the shop.
Well, I got a call one day ... a guy actually wanted to know if we 'bought' cars? Not terribly often, but I asked for details anyway. Well after a short conversation he mentioned the magic words, "Sixty-seven." I said, "So how long have you had it?", and I remember his response because I still barely understand it ... "Since I bought it", he stated plainly.
Turns out he was the original owner. He was an English professor and had owned the car for some 27 years. It had been painted once, but the engine had NEVER been rebuilt, only 'maintained'.
Well, I got the address and showed up the next morning as promised. It was sitting in the driveway ... blue, I couldn't have hoped better.
I knocked on the door and we exchanged pleasantries. "Can I have the key", I asked. His reply, "Well, it's in it!" ... he never took it out and pretty much always left it IN THE IGNITION!
It was only running on like 2 1/2 cylinders on the test drive. I tried to talk him down to $350 from the original asking price of $400, but he wouldn't do it ... so I was out $400, but driving home in a new car.
When I got it to the shop, I pulled the plugs and glass-beaded them since 2 were badly oil-fouled. Now it's on all 4 & ran like a champ! ... Though it burned a little oil. I'd deal with that soon enough.

That car took me down a path I'm glad I took!
If only I still had it!!!

[deano]

I once bought a '67 convertible really cheap (years ago...). The reason it was so cheap was that the car would only go about 40mph, flat out. So the seller couldn't figure out why, and couldn't afford a engine rebuild. I bought, and quickly figured out that the distributor had rusted out inside, so no advance curve. It was running about 5 degrees max at speed. Screwed in another distributor and bingo, 70mph!

Jeff Walters once dumped a decent '66 convertible because he thought the transmission was broken. Sold it, turned out that the right side brake drum had stripped out the splines.

When I was looking for some decent 48 IDAs, again years ago, and they just weren't around, I went to Sacramento on Memorial Day Weekend. No IDAs there, but someone suggested I check the recycler for them. I got home late Sunday night, but stopped by a 7-Eleven on the way home, and got the latest copy. In there, was an ad for 4 IDAs on a Cobra manifold. I called the guy first thing Monday morning, and got him out of bed. I went over to his house and those IDAs.... 4 of them were NOS with 40mm venturis and chrome stacks. The intake manifold was the correct Ford 260/289 for IDAs and I walked out the door for $900. He had got them in a storage repro deal, and only wanted the correct Cobra 260/289 Ford engine and 4-speed.

[Taylor]

About ten years ago my buddy asked me if I could work on his neighbors late model.  The lady said  that the brakes were NEW but didn't work.  I went over there to have a look and the brakes felt really soft and spongy.  She told me that all she was interested in was getting the car driving so she could have One Day paint it and then sell it "like $1200," her words.  I got in the car and looked around and noticed the carpet on the tunnel between the seats looked funny.  I pulled it back to reveal about a 6" piece of rubber house had been installed to "fix" the crusty main brake line through the car.
 
This car was a real clunker, it had bent frame horns and a grease ball of a motor but it ran. I told the lady I would fix the car for the price of FREE if she would be so kind as to let me remove the full set of EMPI orange needle gauges in the car!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  she agreed and I towed it home to fix.  I replaced the long brake line, bled and adjusted the brakes and tuned up the motor.  Now I had to remove the gauges and luckily I had the correct replacement panels to install since she was having it painted anyway.

She was happy, I was happy and she did end up painting and selling the car a few months later.

[Donny B.]

Not my story, but a friends.  He was running around Sun City a retirement community here in Arizona and spotted an old Bug.  He knocked on the door and asked if the car was for sale.  The lady said she could sell her late husbands favorite car.  So then my friend asked if she had anything else VW.  She said that she did have this old tool box.  It was a Hazet spare tire tool box and it was virtually NOS with all the decals on the tools.  When he asked how much her reply was I don't know, but I do need this palm tree trimmed.  He got the tool box for trimming a palm tree.  I haven't talked with him in a while, but he had been offered $1600 for the tool box.  Pretty cool a the time...

[bugnut68]

My story doesn't really compare in terms of parts of uber rarity or super high value, but I was still stoked nonetheless.  A guy living 15 miles south of me advertised a set of Baby Dell carburetors in our newspaper along with some other dune buggy related parts.  I figured, what they hey, I can at least pick up a pair of carbs and manifolds cheap.  So one Sunday I went down there expected to just get the carbs.

Wound up with the carbs, a pair of good used dual port heads, a set of never used S&S dual QPs, a chrome doghouse shroud, a complete single-relief short block (not seized), a complete crank/flywheel/rods combo (1600 crank, I believe), a set of used 92mm P/C's (standard stroke, Mahle brand) and best of all a flat aluminum (non polished, not black anodized) Berg shifter, the style made in the early to mid '90s that only needed a new boot.  Also picked up a whole mess of pieces here and there.  He made a few bucks and got his shop cleared out of useless (to him) VW junk and I went home with some good stuff.  It was win-win.

[HERB]

I went to a very small and local "swap meet", more of a garage sale, put on by an older gentlelman/ aquaintence of my father that has been into VW's (and other vintage auto's) since the mid '50's. There wasn't a lot there I was looking for but he did have a nice clean IRS floorpan he was selling cheap. We talked for a while and he mentioned that he had a"couple of others" in his barn he might sell and would I like to see them . We walked over to his old barn, opened the doors and there they were, two NOS floorpans, one a swing axle/ balljoint, and the other one a swingaxle/ k&l. They apparantly came out of one of VW's local depots years ago for a project that was never finished and they kind of needed to go. Yes, a couple of days later and they were mine!

[bugnut68]

My story doesn't really compare in terms of parts of uber rarity or super high value, but I was still stoked nonetheless.  A guy living 15 miles south of me advertised a set of Baby Dell carburetors in our newspaper along with some other dune buggy related parts.  I figured, what they hey, I can at least pick up a pair of carbs and manifolds cheap.  So one Sunday I went down there expected to just get the carbs.

Wound up with the carbs, a pair of good used dual port heads, a set of never used S&S dual QPs, a chrome doghouse shroud, a complete single-relief short block (not seized), a complete crank/flywheel/rods combo (1600 crank, I believe), a set of used 92mm P/C's (standard stroke, Mahle brand) and best of all a flat aluminum (non polished, not black anodized) Berg shifter, the style made in the early to mid '90s that only needed a new boot.  Also picked up a whole mess of pieces here and there.  He made a few bucks and got his shop cleared out of useless (to him) VW junk and I went home with some good stuff.  It was win-win.

I will mention this: I was amazed how tough it was to sell that shifter given that the "Gene Berg" lettering was ground off at some point in the shifter's ownership history.  It wasn't worth it to me to spend $75 or whatever it is for a new handle just so the name was up top, front and center.