I just wondered if it's possible to buy wrecked bikes and make money at parting them out.  I see on eBay people doing this.  Some of them seem to have wrecked their own bikes and have parted them out to recover some $$$ but others seem to be making a business of this. 

It would obvioulsy depend on the bike in particluar and how much you paid for it and if the parts are rare etc., but as a general rule ...?

Anybody have any examples? 

I'm not looking to make a business of this but maybe as a way to fund, and make use of the tool purchases I've made to work on my own bikes.

Doubt it with a GS. Most GS owners wont want to buy GS sheite anyway. Motors, carbs, guages, tank, plastic and seat excluded. If you paid more than $2-300 for a crashed bike and even if none of those were destroyed ... you'd barely break even.
You'd need GSXR this and Katana that and even so you barely make do. Ebay is good at evening out most parts prices. Wrecking yards barely break even if they sell ebay a lot.
Cool.
Srinath.

I've made some money selling BMW parts on eBay but nothing great.

As a rule I won't buy a bike strictly to part out. I might buy a bike and it might come with a bunch of 'extra parts' and I'll sell those on eBay to help subsidize the purchase of the bike.

I bought a Beemer a while back and it came with an extra seat, bags, luggage rack, rim - that type of thing. By the time I was done selling all the items (months later) I was about +$500.00.

You can't be in any hurry because some of the items may not sell and it's really easy to accumulate a lot of junk in your garage. For instance, I have 3 BMW seats that just aren't sellling that are still sitting in my basement.

Hmmm ... there was a bit in Cycle World not too long ago where guys had to buy a bike they could ride a 1000 miles for under a $1000.  Seems to me there was a guy that was able to buy a bike and then sell all the extra bits on eBay and actually come out ahead.  I guess it all depends on the right bike at the right price.

For the past 4 years I've been buying used bikes during the winter (Chicago winters= no riding) for cheap, holding onto them, cleaning them up and the like and selling them in the Summer.  The best $ I've ever pulled was a 1992 CBR 600 F2, I bought her for $1400 in November of 2003 and sold her in Summer 2004 for $3000 after putting $300 into her.  I was pleased with the money and I get to learn about different bikes this way.  I think parting out a bike would be such a hassle that it wouldn't be worth it.  Second to that is the fact that you'll have stuff that wont sell, like a cracked frame,  what do you do with that then?  Aluminum/Steel recycling?  It's not worth the small amount of $ in my mind.

when the GSXR1k came out
a guy i know in VA bought 2 brand new bikes and parted them out.....
bought for about 11k  sold in pieces for 15-16k
yeah the frames brought ALOT!!!!!!$$$$$$$$$$$

Oh ... so that's where the money is!!!  Spare parts for those squids!!! 

I don't know if I could do it though .. tear down a brand new bike for parts ... seems sacrilegious.