Another race-car-building ritual: taking the engine-donor shell to The Crusher

Pull the 1.8T engine for the race car, sell the rest at $130/ton

Most of the time, the cheapest way to get a complete engine/transmission setup with all the harnesses, computers, and other bits that make an engine swap work is to buy a wrecked or ugly donor vehicle, pull the stuff you want, sell off as many parts as you can, and then bring the remains to your local scrapper.

So far, the build of my 1941 Plymouth Special Deluxe hillclimb car has consumed two donor vehicles: a worn-out 1992 Lexus SC400 and a rollover-victim 2009 Chevrolet Trailblazer. Both of those were fed into The Crusher's cold steel jaws (I always capitalize the name of The Crusher, out of respect), and yesterday we returned with another offering to the global commodity markets: a B5 VW Passat.

The Rocket Surgery Racing VW-powered Renault 4CV at High Plains Raceway Photo by Murilee Martin

In addition to building the chassis for my Plymouth, Colorado engineer and hot rodder Rich von Sneidern has a few other race-car projects in or around his shop. There's his evil-looking 1978 Checker Marathon, of course, and there's also the Rocket Surgery Racing Renault 4CV, which features a mid-mounted Volkswagen Golf engine and Audi front-wheel-drive transaxle driving the rear wheels. The 4CV weighs very little and goes pretty well with its naturally aspirated engine, but Rich is looking to retire the Renault from LeMons racing and add enough forced-induction power to make the car a proper Colorado hillclimber.

Plenty of room for more engine in the back of the 4CV! Photo by Murilee Martin

One great thing about looking at VWs and Audis as potential engine donors is that they depreciate hard after about age 10, and once the interior gets icky or the body gets banged up you can just about name your price. Rich is a regular at local police-impound auctions, so he kept his eyes open for an Audi A4 or (platform-mate) VW Passat with 1.8T turbo engine. Sure enough, he picked up a smashed-up-but-running Passat for $600.

Our usual Crusher had just closed its doors forever, two days earlier. Where now? Photo by Murilee Martin

A few years ago, when Chinese industry was booming and scrap cars were fetching $250/ton in Denver, The Crusher's waiting room was a madhouse of cool cars about to be shredded without mercy. These days, though, scrap cars are down to $130/ton around here, and so things have calmed down at the metal-recycling places. We brought the Passat over to our usual place, the one with employees who aren't too picky about paperwork… and it had just closed its doors forever, a mere two days earlier. Others with unwanted cars on trailers or flatbeds showed up while we were there, and everyone had to scramble to find another low-hassle Crusher nearby.

A little research revealed another Crusher a couple of miles away. Photo by Murilee Martin

Like all big cities, Denver has numerous businesses that buy scrap metal, so we did a little smartphone research and hit the road.

Here we go! Photo by Murilee Martin

This place wasn't too busy, so we drove right up to the big scale.

All these cars have hours or maybe just minutes to live. Shame about the early Volvo 244. Photo by Murilee Martin

While Rich went to go haggle with the cashier, I checked out the other cars being dropped off as scrap. Mostly they were the usual 20-year-old Saturns and beat-up Chrysler Cloud Cars, no loss there, but this doomed early Volvo 240 made me a little sad. 240s are getting scrapped in huge numbers these days, in spite of having excellent racing potential, and this one was too battered to be worth saving.

You don't see many of these on the street. Photo by Murilee Martin

Here's a solid-looking early-'90s Toyota Corolla station wagon, complete with roof rack. A rare though not valuable car, and it's worth more as scrap than as a vehicle.

Filling out paperwork at The Crusher. Photo by Murilee Martin

Assuming that he'd be going to the laissez-faire Crusher down the road, Rich hadn't bothered to bring the bill of sale from the police auction. That caused a time-consuming hassle but everything got sorted out after a while. The employees at this yard made him fill out some paperwork, so that if the car's VIN set off alarm bells with The Man they'd be able to track him down.

Say goodbye to the engine donor. Photo by Murilee Martin

The car was stuffed full of additional scrap from other projects, which compensated a bit for the lack of drivetrain and wiring harnesses. Once the truck and empty trailer went back on the scale, we learned that the Passat and its contents were worth 160 bucks. Once Rich sells off some of the parts he yanked off the car (e.g., the stereo and some interior bits), his engine/transmission should be nearly free.

Such luxury! Photo by Murilee Martin

On the way out, we passed this Lincoln Town Car coming in. It looks clean, but it was unwanted.

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