Car Crushing Mayhem! Behind the Scenes at an Auto Wrecker - HOT ROD Unlimited Episode 32 - video Dailymotion

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In this episode of HOT ROD Unlimited

Transcript

00:00 Today on Unlimited we're smashing stuff. We're at the junkyard and we're gonna crush a car.

00:03 Today we're in one of my very favorite places.

00:15 Well, actually we're in the engine bay of a slant-six Plymouth Valiant, which is one of my least favorite places.

00:20 The bigger picture is that we're at the junkyard and anybody who's got a classic car has spent some time at a junkyard.

00:26 Today we're gonna get to see what goes on behind the scenes. The stuff you don't ever get to see.

00:30 We're at U-Pick Parts in Sun Valley, California.

00:35 It's part of Adlin Brothers Auto Wrecking and they're gonna show us the entire process of turning a junk car into parts that can be

00:41 recycled into a new car. Sam Adlin started a junkyard in the early 60s and his family's been running it ever since.

00:47 U-Pick Parts is one of our favorite junkyards in Los Angeles.

00:50 We've certainly spent a lot of time here pulling parts for our own cars. As you can expect from any junkyard

00:55 that's close to Hollywood, California, there's a lot of weird movie stuff here.

00:58 They film things here and there's all kinds of strange props and stuff just hanging around.

01:02 So there's a lot more to look at than just the cars.

01:04 Our host for today is general manager Andy Adlin and he's gonna show us around.

01:12 Once a car has all its paperwork clear and is officially off the books as a viable automobile,

01:17 it goes to a sort of waiting room where they drain a lot of the fluids and get the car prepped to go to the

01:21 self-service yards. So the cars end up here.

01:24 They're, you know, they're through the DMV. They're officially junk. So what's the first thing that we need to do?

01:30 Anything that we can get on the top of the engine, we

01:34 manually do here with our workers. Come and take various fluids out

01:38 from the top and then after we've gotten most of the stuff that comes out of the top,

01:42 then we move it over to our drain rack in which we drain everything using gravity down into a collection tank.

01:48 Then we'll seal it up so that nothing leaks and it goes into the self-service yard and

01:54 it will be available for parts. What's next?

01:56 We're gonna walk over to the drain station and you guys can see what we do and how we do it and

02:01 how we try to keep this place as clean as we possibly can. We're gonna go drain some fluids.

02:06 Working in a wrecking yard is a good job if you like driving a forklift. There's a lot of moving cars around.

02:11 Once the cars are on a rack, they use gravity and a special pump to drain the fluids without spilling anything.

02:17 We start at the front with the coolant or antifreeze.

02:19 We drain that first and we move to the back of the car, drain all the gas.

02:23 Then we move to the middle of the car and cut the catalytic converter and now he's attempting to drain the transmission. After the transmission,

02:31 he'll move to the back of the car and drain the differential.

02:34 Environmental rules are really strict around wrecking yards.

02:37 They even cover how the fluids are drained. In order to follow the rules, the guys at Adlin use a special drill bit in the gas

02:43 tank, in the third member and in the radiator hose to get all of the fluids out. The downside to this is that it leaves

02:48 a hole in those parts. So if you're buying a third member, you're gonna have to do some welding.

02:51 Once the cars are dry, they go out to the self-service yard. In a self-service yard,

02:57 the cars are just sitting out there and you pay $2, go in the yard,

03:01 you go inside with your tools and then you can pull parts off of any car that's in there, take them to the front desk,

03:06 pay for them and they're yours.

03:07 It's a really good way of finding cheap parts for your car,

03:10 especially if you have the kind of car where they don't make reproduction parts and you can't find them anywhere else.

03:14 We don't really need any parts today. So we're just sort of cruising around to find something recognizable.

03:19 So as you see on this Firebird, it's ready for part consumption.

03:23 We put it elevated off the ground on stands so people can have access to it.

03:28 So all the stands, you guys make them out of scrap wheels, right?

03:31 Yes. And they're solid and keep everything up, which is nice. Let's have a look and see if anybody's taken anything off of it.

03:37 Okay. So it's still got an engine in it. If I needed that coolant overflow tank, which is the biggest one I've ever seen,

03:43 it looks really good. It's not even yellowed or broken or anything. Let's look at what else is on it.

03:49 It looks like somebody got to the inside. So about how long does each row stay here?

03:54 Typically, we like to leave a row of cars for 30 days or so.

03:58 If it's a desirable row of cars, older cars, more valuable,

04:03 we will leave them longer so that people have more of a chance to get what they want.

04:07 There's some stuff that's not available anywhere. I had somebody come in for an early 70s Scirocco,

04:13 which is not even a car you see anymore. Clutch cable. He couldn't find a clutch cable anywhere.

04:18 In Europe, the internet, nowhere. We're the only ones who had a clutch cable for that car.

04:23 As we go to the next step, we're going to remove the car from the yard.

04:26 We're going to put it in an area to where we actually start ripping the car apart piece by piece

04:32 to get some different metals and different aluminums and different materials that are in the car.

04:37 We're going to go ahead and separate that and recycle it for a little bit more money.

04:41 And then we're going to crush whatever's left and sell it to the mill,

04:45 which has something called a shredder, which will then grind it up.

04:48 [MUSIC]

04:55 Even though the car's been through the self-service yard, there's still valuable

04:58 parts and metals that can be pulled off and recycled separately.

05:00 In order to do this, they bring out the big guns, an excavator fitted with a shear.

05:05 If you have a great love for Volvos with rainbow painted hoods and the stars and

05:10 bars from the Confederate flag, you might want to cover your eyes now.

05:13 This is a weird car, but it's what's here and we're going to smash it.

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06:47 I think I need one of those just for my enemies.

07:05 So as you see, there's all kinds of different materials that are inside this

07:09 that we're going to go ahead and extract and resell as scrap metal.

07:15 >> So what happens to this now?

07:17 >> So after we've finished our manual label part of it of pulling all the wire

07:21 out and pulling all the different materials out, we're going to go ahead and

07:23 put it in our car flattener.

07:25 It's called a crusher and we're going to crush it and make it about 12 inches high.

07:30 So you ready for that?

07:31 >> I'm ready. I like pancakes.

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08:19 I really think that this probably should have been a road kill cuz this kind of

08:23 destruction is more of their alley than mine, but I kinda wanna see it again.

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08:39 We just saw a Volvo get mated to a Chevy Astrovan.

08:42 They are one now, and they're going to go from here to a completely different site

08:48 for the final process of automotive recycling.

08:51 What is that?

08:52 >> That's a machine called a shredder.

08:53 It's a giant machine that has these turning blades, and

08:57 the cars get thrown into it, and it grinds them up.

09:00 And then spits out all of what's ever left off to the sides, and

09:04 you see different materials from left to the right to the middle.

09:07 It's an interesting process, and that will get turned into new material again.

09:12 >> I learned a lot, and I got to see some stuff smashed,

09:14 which is basically what I want out of life.

09:16 So thank you very much, Andy.

09:18 >> Thank you, anytime.

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Car Crushing Mayhem! Behind the Scenes at an Auto Wrecker - HOT ROD Unlimited Episode 32

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