I just bought my first F-150 and am really interested in doing my own maintenance and repair. I was just wondering if there are any good junkyards or other places to get parts within a resonable distance of the Minneapolis area?

 

i like the availability of johns in blaine and viking in farmington. but joe in hasings always gets my vote b/c he is a good man. i hate ace on rice st and i dont mind action or acme on sycamore but i can never get what i need there, but when they have it they dont rip u off. i also recommend crosstown on marshall, but they never seem to have it either but its worth a try. i found on a lot of that stuff it was only a few dollars more to go new. theres one on jefferson and 35e i heard some good things about also.
i used to go to 101 out in shakopee but i am too far away now, it is a grease yard but the people are nice. i dont like u pull r parts but the prices r good if u find what u r looking for, u cant hardly pull large items and most of the stuff is stripped by inbreds before it even hits the public, but i have gotten some killer deals there , even though u need to pay two dollars cover and drive to rosemont, i always call joe for the older stuff and he deals strictly ford 90 and older. i got some stuff that was hard to find at viking recently for my 302>351 swap that i couldnt find anywhere. i paid for it though and they sold the intake minus sensor which i dont like, where a grease yard might have. anytrhing u have in mind or gen maintenance?

 

So far the only maintenance that I have done is some oil changes and some surface rust removal on the doors. the next thing i need to get, especially before the winter, is a new motor for my windshield wipers, because the current one starting to go downhill. right now i'm just researching the difference between a new one and a used one (cost, quality,etc.), but i just didn't have a good idea as to what kind of junkyard would have a part like that.

 

that is a fun part to install. i have one out in the garage out of a 79 but i think it is different. i would try joes but one of the fancier "recyclers" like viking or johns might have one already pulled. these places sell new and reconditioned also, but not sur on a comparison to lets say napa. if they would even have it, some of that stuff is dealer only. but i think they sell them

 

Joes is about the best when your looking for any harder to find Ford parts. He knows his stuff as well. I drive all the way down there from near Milaca.

 

u would think north woods are caked with parts, i was around hillman looking for my father and i saw a few fields with some gems. suppose the yards around there dont offer much selection. not too much turnover.

 

There are a few places around me but I just like Joe cause he's a nice guy and knows his Ford stuff. I know one of the places just north of me was shut down a couple of years ago for cookin' up meth. I know that there is a pretty good place west of me that has a lot of older stuff but cannot think of what the name is off of the top of my head. Has John's Auto Part's customer service got any better in the last 3 years. I had a couple of incidents with them which have pretty much kept me from doing any business with them anymore. We got a C4 transmission from them that only had reverse so we took it back. They tried to insult my intelligence and tell me that I installed the transmission wrong. We got our money back but it was not a great experience. They didn't have another so they sent us to North Metro to get one. That one lasted quite a while until my brother got a hold of it.

 

Boss 358,

If you remember the junkyard west of you dealing in older parts please let me know. I'm restoring a 1960 F-100 and so far have not had much luck in Minnesota.

Thanks,

billsco

 

oops

 

u have windy hill in new london, ok if they actually have it, a lot of dealers buy them out, and another guy told me about this gold mine not too far from there, it was called roders in the willmar area, they had parts caked everywhere and stuff for his 64 galaxie he thought was obsolete, said there was tons of trucks, never been there myself, but he said they were reasonable, also french lake out by annandale is said to carry older stuff also, but i would still try joes he has trailers of the stuff

 

Thanks fordtrks,

I'm looking up the phone numbers now and storing them in my handy-dandy speed dialer as we speak. Wonder how my wife will react to being the No. 5 button.

 

you gave her a button?, heck, i was thinking about blocking mine...lol

 

HAHA...good one. Can you send me the instructions for blocking calls ASAP?

Bill

 

easiest way is to cut the line with a side cutter...lol

 

French lake was the place I was thinking of. Bill, have you ever heard of Green Sales? I was in a Ford dealership a while ago looking for some parts that are not available aftermarket so he gave me some contact information to this place. This company buys out all of the dealerships old stock and obsolete parts. The only thing is when you call them you have to know the part # of the part you are looking for. They also have an inventory search on their website. I would do a search for green sales.