I have a little story to tell. In itself, there's less conspiracy than there is just aggravating reality, but by digging a little deeper one can see how easy it is for one thing to drastically affect seemingly unrelated other things.

My son recently embarked on a goal of rebuilding an old 1980 Chevy LUV pickup. We had one that had engine problems (which later turned out to be a spun rod bearing), and I thought it was an excellent idea for two reasons: to give him the knowledge of how to fix vehicles, and to give him the pride of knowing he made his truck run. Everything went fine; we had to search for a few parts, and we had to have a machinist do some work on it, but all that is normal.

The other day, he was filling up the fluids in preparation of hearing the old girl run and the antifreeze was leaking right through. Upon inspection, it appeared the old radiator had past its usefulness; there were several splits in the core. No problem - we'll just find another radiator. The problem is that no one (that we can find) makes this particular radiator any more. OK, plan B: go to a junkyard and find one.

Here's where it gets interesting... there are no more older cars/trucks sitting in junkyards waiting to donate parts! A few years ago when metal prices went so high, they were all crushed and melted down. Only cars newer than a few years are now kept for parts.

The conspiracy? Simple. How easy is it to manipulate metal prices? The supply is controlled by a handful of smelting companies. Increase the price of metal, even for a short time, and you remove all sorts of metal items from the economy. Remove repair parts from the economy and you effectively force consumers into regular purchase of either new cars or late-model used cars, since older vehicles can no longer be repaired. In effect, you have restricted the ability of people to escape an industry.

I remember the rush to crush vehicles when the price of metal rose... but never did I think that it would affect me in this way!

I never saw this coming.

Now consider this: if someone were to want to remove gold from the economy, what better way to do so than by increasing the price of gold? That will get people to melt down and/or sell old gold items, especially in a struggling economy. And that, in turn, places all the gold in the hands of a handful of brokers. How many here who have bought gold have actually taken possession? How many have bars of gold bullion or gold coins sitting in a safe in their basement? I would say very few; every broker I have spoken to has been very outspoken about how they can make ownership more convenient for me by storing my gold in their warehouse.

Convenient indeed. When gold was outlawed back in 1933, a great deal was never confiscated by the Federal government - it was hidden in the form of coins and trinkets. It's much harder to hide gold in the form of collectible coins or bullion, especially when it is sitting in a brokered warehouse or there are records of ownership.

Gold owners beware: you may be on a ride you never saw coming.

Oh, and we will fix that old truck... I already got a price on replacing the core, albeit an expensive option.

TheRedneck

in the uk all the scrap metal is sold to china so they can sell us cheap scooters

Not much of a conspiracy, all your scrap is being sold to China.

Getting a new custom radiator shouldnt be very difficult.

Yip the 'rag an bone' man has been round almost weekly around here.

My husband used to enjoy fixing up old cars, before it became ridiculously expensive.

They want all old cars off the road, they want us to buy as new as possible to boost the auto industry even though we generally cannot afford to buy a car and insure it over here. Most new cars are built to fall apart rather quickly and warranty terms are getting shorter.

Those who can no longer afford to drive, struggle to get to work or find a job locally, the trains are too expensive now.

It's not hard to see how so many of our problems are intrinsically linked.

For the past few years we have had people knocking on doors to buy any gold as well as tv/newspaper ads. We are swapping our gold for what will soon be useless paper, doing anything just to get by.

It most certainly sounds like a conspiracy to me.

add that to the cash for clunkers program here in the usa. i saw issues with that from the rip, they give you money for your old gas guzzler to get a more eco friendly car, but all the cars they took were not aloud to use for parts. engines were immediately destroyed and cars crushed and sent off to china. that took many of the older cars completely out of the market for people looking for parts at junkyard. another issue i had was say we do have a emp threat natural or attack, the number of cars that would still be drivable is pretty damn slim now that they done off with cars that can run with out ecu.

Planned obsolescence I see this all the time. Forcing consumers or businesses to upgrade when older components fail. But with the introduction of 3D printers and custom parts this could be a non-issue, missing a part you could manufacture it...

I do not follow the idea with Gold as it is a completely worthless metal to invest in and people are completely stupid to invest in it. In SHTF scenerio you will get much higher prices/Trade for Coffee, Cigarettes and Booze than a pound of something nobody can do anything with...

Yes the cash for clunkers program. That was my first thought exactly. The Obama administration will use this to push his green energy programs by trying to force you to buy a newer vehicle and make the parts of older makes and models unavailable even at junkyards.

Now we know. I was wondering why the Federal Government was paying for these vehicles. Now I know.

And this my friends is exactly how socialism works. The government tries to dictate the markets to control supply and demand. Where in capitalism the market is dictated by what is in demand.

Good call. Sounds like a solid theory. I have a friend who has been telling me to stock up on gold, for the economy collapse. "That will be your only barter chip." he says. I tell him: "If you show up at my house with a rock and want food, in times of survival, I will feed you to my children." haha.

Anyways, I see what you are saying.

On the rebuild side of things, I am also rebuilding a 1980 GMC 4x4. You can order everything new (after market crappy fits, but do able) As I'm doing a frame up, but there are still plenty of oldies in my neck of the woods as well. Some wreckers have the old stuff, some don't.

Interesting either way, S&F

Well, I had to check...
You are almost right, excluding aluminum racing radiators at 400-800$, I was not able to locate any either, except for one, in Florida - no part number, no price.
Waiting for call back.
Some onlie sites would auto-change the 1980 date to 1978.

The Isuzu Pup goes from 1966 then Pup only 1981+.

Funny thing is, a radiator vender had dropped some adverts two days ago so the first call to them was for this radiator.
Strike one for the new vender...

Also, with the 'Cash for Clunkers' gov't program, many of these older cars are hard to find parts for now.
The price of gold may be a racket, but it may also reflect the increasing worthlessness of reserve notes.

For a Challenge, Try finding a left front door window regulator for a 1966 Chrysler New Yorker.
I think I found the only one in North America. or a 3" cal hood for a 1980's Capri. (Mustang = thousands of different cal hoods ; Capri = one (if you can find the maker)
Good luck if you try...have more hard to finds that would drive you batty.