Been To The Scrapyard Lately...?

[Austin-Rover]

If you have - did you notice a complete lack of Maestro's or Montego's? Out of 5 yards in Bury today - there were 3! Two Montego's and a Masetro! Where are they all going? And more importantly, how are we supposed to get the bits we need for our cars as time goes on?

I hope the rest of you know of yards that are better stocked than mine!

:(

[Mat_C]

I don't bother going much to scrapyards now - they often cube a maestro within 15 mins.

If i do find one, then its often a completely screwed 1.3. If i ever see an MG I'll have an heart attack!

[Quality]

If you are in south-east london/ kent/essex try Mr Austin, near dartford, thay have have everything i've needed so far, front and rear light units, rear bumper, rear bumper light covers.

[Austin-Rover]

Perhaps they are clearing them out for the next generation of scrap Rovers? I counted 7 (:eek: ) Rover 800's in one yard today. Including a very nice looking Vitesse (white car in picture below)

:(

[Beaker]

Ooooh, don't suppose you want to go back there Rich and see if any of them have the head unit to cd changer cable in them do you? Most 800's should have them in.

At the moment we can't play our cd's as we dont have the cable that connects the 2!

Lindz

[matthewsemple]

Those 800s are all new shape ones as well. Unbelievable. That one near the camera is an M-plate - so it's no more than 9 years old.

800s don't rust anywhere near as much as the earlier cars and the engines are usually really strong. They have just gone out of fashion and no-one wants one any more.

Terrible waste of natural resources to have perfectly good cars filling up landfills whilst other cars are being built to replace them. The energy used to make a new car cannot be underestimated and does far more damage than the pollution from old cars that we are so used to hearing about.:banghead:

[MGTurbo]

800's do have their problems.

The engine's, if looked after, go for quite a while, but the gearboxes are very weak, even on the base 820, and often cost alot to fix. Put together with many of them having high miles which knocks the resale value heavily, as well as the poor image, and you can see why these useful cars are ending up in the scrapyards.

Most N reg 820's are worth £8-900 quid now, Vitesse's not much more. They are often plagued with niggly electrical faults like electric windows and central locking failing. Head gasket's also like to weep large quantities of oil from the right hand side too. All of which puts people off, but makes me smile once these 'minor' (to me) problems are resolved.

It's a great shame, as apart from the Maestro and Montego, the 800 is one of my favourites. An 800 Vitesse Sport, or post 1996 Vitesse would be my choice. Expensive to run, but very good looking in 4 door saloon format with STD 17 inch wheels, and great to drive. I wish i could add one to my collection of car's, however, irregular self-employed wage, and serious lack of space put that one right back.


Gareth

[Alan the Vanner]

Blimey! Haven't got any manual 827's, have they?!!!

[H48HPE]

the obvious and only real answer to this problem is to grab as many cheap bits as you can whilst you can to save a lot of trouble in a few years.

On my list would be:

Door handles - as many as you can
Steering column cowling - thieves love breaking these
indicator stalk
door mirrors
lights (headlight lenses in particular)
wiper motor
starter motor
a ton of spare relays etc
seat belts
electric window and central locking bits
mudflaps

I could go on and on.

The main thing is to pile up all those bits that break and you'll struggle to find a few years down the line

get them now while you still can!!

andy

[D87 SMW]

Absolutely zippo in our local scrapyard. :( :banghead: :mad:

[Austin-Rover]

I couldnt believe it when i saw all those 800's - only two of them had any crash damage of any significance. Its such a shame as they are such beautiful cars to look at!

[Landcrab1800]

Andy,

Good idea grabbing all those spares. I will be in contact in a couple of years.:laugh:

One word of warning: I would not advice getting second hand seat belts. You never know what they've gone through or whats on them.

Cheers

Gordon

[J199 HHG]

I visited Burtons Car Disposal at Molesworth nr Thrapston nr Kettering.

http://burtoncardisposal.co.uk

They had quite a selection of Montegos and Maestros, mainly Diesels, but I think a 1600 as well. At least 4 diesels.

So there you go!

[H48HPE]

I visited a local yard at carcroft today, they had one maestro 1.3SL and a couple of montego estates, I was disapointed to see that the maestro had a headlining that would have been absolutly perfect before the car had been picked up with a forklift truck through the windstreen:banghead:

I was after a spare drivers seat before they become impossible to find but they had been spoilt, I did manage to recover a couple of mudflaps and an unused spare wheel with goodyear GT80 tyre.

Andy

[kadams]

Hi all,

You need to look here...

My local scrappie (just off the A14, near Kettering) has about 12 Maestros and so many montegos I lost count. If you want cross spoke alloys or uprated interiors for your Maestys, you could do worse than look there :D

Regards,
Keith Adams
http://www.austin-rover.co.uk

[Andy]

has this scrapy got a website then????????

[kadams]

No, but he has a 'phone :)

01536 414997

[F690OTF(RIP)]

I doff my hat unto you sir; I search long and hard for those who share my insistence on putting the apostrophe on the beginning of the word "phone"!
However, I feel I should correct your spelling in your signature; the correct spelling is 'treachery'. :)

[D87 SMW]

Originally posted by F690OTF(RIP)
I doff my hat unto you sir; I search long and hard for those who share my insistence on putting the apostrophe on the beginning of the word "phone"!
However, I feel I should correct your spelling in your signature; the correct spelling is 'treachery'. :)

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

[kadams]

Thanks for pointing that out... perhaps I was drunk or high - or worse - when I penned that cliche.

Never mind; it's fixed, now.

Steve, if you have nothing constructive to add, it's probably best not to bother.

Regards,
Keith