In a message dated 6/4/01 9:41:10 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
drillock@EARTHLINK.NET writes:

>
>
> Due to State and Local regulations, the fluids are drained, batteries
> and other hazardous materials removed, gas tanks ripped out, etc. Then a
> giant front end loader (fork lift) is used to gently, ha ha, cart the
> victim several hundred yards to it's spot in a row. There it is placed
> on 3 or more welded stacks of old steel wheels with no regard for any
> consequential damage to brake lines, hoses, wires, body, bumpers, etc.
>
> Get the picture?
>
>

i agree.   once a car hits the salvage auction circuit, its on its way to
being trashed..even at the salvage auctions, the expensive stuff (radios,
center caps, alloy wheels are swapped out for steel ones, spoilers dissapear,
etc) grows legs and walks away, being picked over by salvage auction
buyers..the van is picked up by a forklift (usually ALWAYS, even if it does
run) and the gas tank/LP tank is always crushed (you pick up a vanagon with a
forklift, you WILL crush the gas tank, its inevitable) and most yards will
toast the fiberglass bumpers (if not already) by the time it makes it back to
it's spot in the yard. gotta push it back into it's spot in the row?  no
problem, that's what forklift tines are for..  ram it right back in there.
most cars actually get more damage on their way from the final owner to their
final resting place in the junkyard than they even had before the car was
junked..

my best mental image was quite some years ago when i happened to be at a yard
and witnessed the fork lift driver picking up a '62 23 window microbus by
jabbing the fork tines thru the skylights in the roof....    that makes ya
sick..
chris

[text/html]