Trust me I do buy them when I think I know what they are. I have been going to flea markets for most of my life. I love to do it. I would have to say that everybody on here can find their own parts like this in the town that they live in. There are lost parts that are thrown in the trash because they don't know what they are.
Rental storage locker and garages are being cleaned out everyday somewhere. People die, move, get a divorce and a dozen other reasons, or just plain forget to pay their rent on the storage spaces. Then, what ever they have stored there is sold just like this for next to nothing. There are people that do that for a living and they just bring the goodies to the flea markets and throw it out in boxes on the ground. They will take most anything that they can get for this stuff.
Just last week I got a like new Craftsman floor Jack with quick lift for $40. New that cost $100 on sale. There was a box of Snap-on screwdrivers with broken tips for $1 each. A Hurst 4 speed shifter with rods for $5. A 35'FAT MAX Stanley wide tape measure for $3. I could go on and on but it might make some on here sick.
The point I want to make is it just makes me wonder where a lot of the parts that we know go to these COPO and Yenko and other valuable cars went to. Some carb or head or even that special fan that is only used on a L-78 Nova could have wound up in one of these sales and the parts just might wind up in the scrap iron pile because nobody would buy it.
But I still want to know where to look up parts for myself.
I find all kinds of new in the box GM parts that I have no Idea what they fit but I seldom buy them because I cannot figgure out what they fit.