Old Sodbury

"Prepair Ltd" wrote(snip):-

Couldn't possibly comment - but welcome to the club!

Nick H

I daresay we all go three the phases of acquisition and collection then disposal.

I haven't lost any interest in engines per se, I just don't need to be with them daily :-))

I can also remember the first engine list that I joined, courtesy of Roly. That was back in about 1996/7 and the Americans had already established a fairly large internet community.

Nowadays that is a very widespread community, as there are hundreds of other websites to draw your attention and time. Lister engines have a couple or more, marine engines have three, Smokestak covers most things with internal combustion, and then there are the books.

People are still waiting to get Wendel's latest book. There are stories of people on Smokstak paying for the books in the early summer and still not having received them.

As most folks now know, we had to abandon our attempt to get a set of 12 vols of the BRB VolII as we lost touch with Chuck Wendel at the point of sending the money. Very glad that we hadn't taken payments off of people before they arrived!

Peter

-- Peter A Forbes Prepair Ltd, Rushden, UK snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk

Whilst rising prices are lamentable to us oldfarts there are many factors involved, and the "desireability" of one type over another is only one in a range of issues.

I had my eye on that Gardner and went so far as to make a sensible offer of around half the asking price. Needless to say this was not well received.

The number of collectors is growing but the supply of engines is fixed. When we add this to the fact that we are all living (and hanging onto our engines) longer it is clear that fewer engines are actually making it to market.

Until recently most of the better exanples changed hands quietly between members of the same club, so prices were governed by the social issues of selling between friends. The recent arrival of EBay and specialist auctions such as Cheffins has fundamentally changed the market, allowing buyers to fight over a diminishing number of available engines and more importantly to set a recordable market price.

Are these engines "worth" such prices ?. Caveat emptor.

(snip) c> I had my eye on that Gardner and went so far as to make a sensible c> offer of around half the asking price.

Good on you, it's a wonderful thing! Would it be impolitic to ask if you had the vendor down as someone trying to make a living selling engines, or doing a bit of horse trading to help fund his hobby?

nickh=== Posted with Qusnetsoft NewsReader 2.2.0.8

To be honest I didnt think about that. I liked the engine but not at his price and politely told him what it was worth to me. He chose to keep the engine.

There is always an element of what could be called 'greed', but in many cases it's just a case of the seller having an inflated view of what an item is worth, which is why many sellers will reduce their prices as the day goes on!

Dealers are the other 'problem', often deliberately inflating prices to make the unwary think they are worth more than they are.

I think that Colin's offer was probably about right given the condition of the item and its relative rarity.

Peter

-- Peter A Forbes Prepair Ltd, Rushden, UK snipped-for-privacy@easynet.co.uk