Last Friday, during the Memorial day “break”,  Leo and I visited one of the most famous junk yards in Baltimore: “Crazy Rays” .

Crazy Rays has the policy of  “U” PICK IT  / “U” PULL IT, which means that once you find the part you’re looking for, you’ll need to remove it using your own tools and knowledge, either you just need a small nut (like me) or a whole engine, just need to pay $1.00 to access the yard plus whatever the manager decide the part you took off is worth.

I was amazed to see the yard so neatly organized in sections: nationals, imports, trucks, mini vans, etc. After a few feet from the entrance I spotted a red Cabriolet from which I found the nut and the tiny trim piece I was looking for: I was happy.

After pulling the 2 small parts I needed,  I started to roam the whole yard thinking that it was so sad to see all this cars that at some point of their existence where loved and appreciated and that now they’re left to rotten. Almost at the end of the yard, I spotted a nice and “somewhat complete” old BMW, maybe an 80’s model… this BMW didn’t have any seats, windows and the interior was full of debris from being on the outdoors, the trunk had a small pool from the last rain, upon further investigation I noticed that it was still “seating” on 3 out 4 of its stock wheels: BBS 3-piece wheels!

First I thought that it was a shame that the wheels were still mounted on the car, but then I remembered the motto of the place –u pick it, u pull it– right? Hell yeah! I said, I’m taking those wheels with me! but then I stopped for a moment to remember the price I’ve seen for these type of wheels… a decent set of 3-piece BBS can easily go over $1,800 or $450 per wheel. Ouch! So before my dissapointment kicked in I rushed to the cashier to inquire about their price: $30 per wheel..$90 for the 3 wheels! 

Let’s pause for a second. Let me explain why my suddent excitment…

During the “restoring” process of the Cabriolet I’ve visited several websites dedicated to VW enthusiasts and all of them point that owning and restoring (by yourself) a set of these wheels is the ultimate treat you can do to this type of car. Maybe is the work involved on restoring these type of wheels, maybe is the look of them or maybe is the price, not sure, but I will just quote what I’ve learn from people referring to these wheels: they’re sick!

So, after pulling off the wheels from that ol’ Bimmer (which was not easy) I ended up with my first 3 “3-piece BBSs”.

The center caps were nowhere to be found on (or around) the car but that’s not a problem, Ebay is my friend.

On closer investigation of the wheels I noticed that one “shell” has a 1 inch crack, fortunately this is not a problem and can be easily fixed (according to the wheel repair shop).

Now I will scout the BBS and VW boards (and Ebay of course) to find the missing 4th wheel, during that time I will also figure out how to remove 30 nuts and bolts which I’m sure you cannot remove them with a pair of pliers…

Hopefully, once I finish restoring these wheels I will end up with a car looking like this:

Pimpin’!

Here’s where I found these jewels:

This post is tagged BBS, Cabriolet, Cars, VW