Car-part.com

Have any of you guys used car-part dot com to purchase hard-to-find parts from salvage yards all around the country?

I have, and it works pretty good!

I've been buying parts for my 1987 626 turbo sedan and its friend, my 1986 626 turbo coupe. These are cars that basically don't exist on the roads any more. There are very few parts for this generation of 626 on Ebay to begin with, and these being turbo models, they have some turbo specific stuff that is nearly unobtanium.

So far, through I've bought two turbo-specific tail lamps, a power door mirror (which is very hard to find because it is sedan-specific), and TWO digital gauge clusters which I thought I would never be able to get anywhere, but there they were on car-part.com.

Prices have been reasonable for this rare stuff, and the ordering process has been very easy...Also, Ebay and Paypal aren't getting a cut.

The main recommendation I have for anyone who hasn't tried to use this site before is to actually call the place if they do not respond to you through the online quote-request process. A lot of these places are run by older folks who aren't the best at the interwebz.

Not affiliated, etc. I just wanted to recommend that people try the site because I've been really pleased and excited by what I've been able to find there.

yup, since around ~2000 or so.

belteshazzar wrote: yup, since around ~2000 or so.

Don't encourage the flotilla of canoes that just arrived. If we leave them alone they will sail off into the sunset never to be heard from again.

Yeah, car-part is old news...James isn't a canoe, IIRC, but his large number of hyperlinks sure make it seem that way.

I was just trying to help out. I was excited because I found stuff I didn't think I ever would and which I really really needed to get my cars put together. I hadn't seen this resource mentioned on the board before.

I've known about the site for a long time as well. But I had always assumed that the parts listings wouldn't be kept up well and so would mostly be for non-existent items.

I seriously doubt any canoe would speak of 1987 Mazda 626 turbos. I didn't realize that anything written with dot com at the end shows up as a hyper link.

Carry on...

@carguy123: The OP has 400+ posts that usually is not a Canoe.

@ OP: Thanks for the info I have not been to that site I will give it a look. Ebay is getting really bad.

Thanks for reminding me James... I need to track down my bellhousing.

I used that site to track down many gts/alltrac parts for my Celica. Unfortunately, due to inaccurate cross referencing in the systems most yards use, there were at least as man horrible experiences as positive.

Doubtful it would be an issue for f2t shenanigans, though!

Car-part's contract with the sellers is they have to update their inventory every 2 days, so most places are going to be current. The older/weirder part you're looking for, the less demand there probably is for it. Car-part is a tool we in the insurance business use daily, and it's been a godsend.

ddavidv wrote: Car-part is a tool we in the insurance business use daily, and it's been a godsend.

Yep. I use it on an almost daily basis. Very rarely have I not been able to locate a part on here.

I've found car-part to not be very GRM budget friendly. Because of the effort to find/list/inventory parts, yards who participate tend to charge top market rate for the stuff that is listed. while this may be great for a business who needs the parts and is passing the cost to a customer (insurance / body shop / repair shop / etc.) the cost of efficiency is worth the higher price.

When shopping for parts I need though, I have generally found the prices to be higher than my wallet wanted to spend for parts I could find through enthusiast classifieds / pick & pulls / or local yards, though this does take more time.

As a last resort I suppose it can help you find what you need though.

Calling ahead of driving an hour is important, most importantly, ask "HAVE YOU SEEN THE PART IN QUESTION WITH YOUR EYEBALLS?". Not in the computer, but as a real physical thing. Had trouble with that hunting down a new box for the Yugo.

I use it all the time. As one of the earlier posters noted prices are not great sometimes. I use it to locate parts.

It really worked to my advantage one time - I went to a local yard for a heater fan motor for my Explorer. It was shown as $20 on car-part.com. The guy says that will be $45 - I responded with the price on car-part. I got it for the $20, but he immediately changed the price.

Will it let you search for range of years yet?

Kenny_McCormic wrote: Calling ahead of driving an hour is important, most importantly, ask "HAVE YOU SEEN THE PART IN QUESTION WITH YOUR EYEBALLS?". Not in the computer, but as a real physical thing. Had trouble with that hunting down a new box for the Yugo.

That's a given. You should be doing that for anything where a drive is involved.

half the time i use it for the interchange. look up what i want, see what else fits.

If the used parts I need can't be found on Craigslist or Ebay, Car-Parts is the next logical place to look. Definitely call ahead to check availability and have it pulled.

Richard