EBay madness

[ianmacc]

34 minutes ago, MrWolf said:

It had to happen didn't it? We ragged an eBay listing put up by a fellow RMWeb member.

The odd thing that I have found over years of doing autojumbles is that the stuff you are tempted to throw away nearly always sells. I have literally retrieved things from my scrap pile to fill up space on the stall and it always seems to sell first.

The same rule applies to having a box marked "everything in here - £1.

 

As I don't have money falling out of my a## either, I don't throw much out, I put it on eBay and see what it makes. 

Which is often a big surprise. I put a pile of Tri-ang plastic coach bogies on eBay, another lot of assorted 70s wagon chassis and a bag of 6 broken, incomplete coach bodies from the same era.

I also tried to sell some "good" stuff.

 

I was expecting to star on here in the "Why hasn't he binned this c2ap?" contest. (And perversely, secretly hoped to, just for the resulting laugh.) The surprise was that the rubbish made enough money to buy a Bachmann pannier minus its outer box and the stuff I expected to go went around three times before selling.

By the way @ianmacc you seem to be in the minority here, you appear to have a layout that is complete, up and running. As others have pointed out, nicely done too.

 

 

 

 

, 

 

I have a lot of repeat buyers that Hoover up all the old triang etc stuff because I sell it for reasonable prices. They take a great deal of pleasure from fixing up old Jinties etc and enjoying our hobby on a budget. 
 

I also like the sustainable element of passing on cheap spares to resurrect old rolling stock rather than land filling it.  The chancers that ask more for parts such as motor bogies or body shells than the actual complete item is worth are deluded. 

Yes it is up and running. Complete is true in that I don’t need to do anything else; but no layout is complete. I need to swap out those nails for better fence posts at some point lol 

 

[John M Upton]

I did something similar back in the early days of Ebay and 56k dialup, found a cheap lot of all sorts of odd bits and bobs for about £20.  Got a lot of useful Lima spare parts out of it and a couple of years later, sold on some of the remnants.  To this day I have no idea why a broken Lima(?) French TGV driving car with no motor went for a bonkers twenty five quid...

[cessna152towser]

30 minutes ago, John M Upton said:

I did something similar back in the early days of Ebay and 56k dialup, found a cheap lot of all sorts of odd bits and bobs for about £20.  Got a lot of useful Lima spare parts out of it and a couple of years later, sold on some of the remnants.  To this day I have no idea why a broken Lima(?) French TGV driving car with no motor went for a bonkers twenty five quid...

Some years ago I spotted a huge bargain job lot on eBay buy-it-now, "collection only". Day one I drove all the way from Scotland to buy the stuff in Taunton, two nights in a hotel, West Somerset Railway trip to Minehead on the middle day, then drove home on the third day with a long break in Kidderminster to allow for a round trip to Bridgnorth on the Severn Valley Railway.   By the time I had resold all the items I didn't intend to keep I just about covered the cost of my three day trip.

Edited October 24, 2021 by cessna152towser
typo

[andyman7]

51 minutes ago, ianmacc said:

 

I have a lot of repeat buyers that Hoover up all the old triang etc stuff because I sell it for reasonable prices. They take a great deal of pleasure from fixing up old Jinties etc and enjoying our hobby on a budget. 
 

I also like the sustainable element of passing on cheap spares to resurrect old rolling stock rather than land filling it.  The chancers that ask more for parts such as motor bogies or body shells than the actual complete item is worth are deluded. 
 

I so completely agree. My goodness, I bet I've sold a whole heap of things over the years that the RMWeb ebay police would flag as 'only fit for the bin'; I assume that these are different to the RMWebbers who moan about how railway modelling is now only a rich man's hobby. But quite a lot of what I sell really just covers the cost of listing and packing it, on the basis that if something has a future use I don't like to bin it. Yes - I have sold empty boxes! Not for £15 or £20 but normally post included for a fiver which for anyone who knows how much postage is and ebay fees is actually me giving it away because I'd rather not bin it if someone else wants it. On occasion, an auction pile of 'tat' goes for a bit more than expected and that's a bonus. 

[MrWolf]

40 minutes ago, ianmacc said:

 

I have a lot of repeat buyers that Hoover up all the old triang etc stuff because I sell it for reasonable prices. They take a great deal of pleasure from fixing up old Jinties etc and enjoying our hobby on a budget. 
 

I also like the sustainable element of passing on cheap spares to resurrect old rolling stock rather than land filling it.  The chancers that ask more for parts such as motor bogies or body shells than the actual complete item is worth are deluded. 

Yes it is up and running. Complete is true in that I don’t need to do anything else; but no layout is complete. I need to swap out those nails for better fence posts at some point lol 

 

 

I didn't actually spot the nails! Anyway, several railway companies used old boiler tubes cut into spikes as fencing, (The Great Western springs to mind.) A lot of chain link or wire fencing was supported by 2-1/2-3" tube, so unless you want a specific type of fence, why not? Who hasn't pinched and used wooden coffee stirrers etc?

 

Complete, maybe, to your personal satisfaction, probably never. 

 

Sustainable has become a buzzword lately for people who assume that the rest of us have always been wasteful. Total rot. I've always believed that manufactured items should be repairable, not recyclable. You will never recover all of the materials and none of the energy that went into making something. 

It started for me as a child, building bicycles with bits and pieces I had scrounged up, because my parents couldn't afford to buy me new bicycles at the rate I was outgrowing them, or simply wearing them out.

That transferred to motorcycles and cars , to the extent that I now make a part of my living from vintage motorcycles. There's so much stuff just lying around, some of it over half a century old and never been used, that despite the fact that it's also stuff I like, I know that I am being a damn sight greener than someone who congratulates themselves on having paid £45000 for an electric car.

I also have an eclectic mix of model railway items, some dating back to 1961, others more recent but old school DC.  It's affordable and can if you so desire, be super detailed or modified into something else.

My old Tri-ang Dean Single has won the "Shiniest loco on RMWeb award". 

It was unintentional, but it's another one of those forgotten NOS  jobs!

 

Keep it up, it might be a source of amusement, but it means more cash for trains!

[Martin S-C]

I have a massive collection of Hornby (metal screw-on and plastic push-in types), Mainline (both push-in and twin spigot screw on), Airfix (super narrow) and the wider/older style Dapol couplings. A biggish pile of plastic wagon wheel sets since I pop these out at once and slip Bachman metal ones in. A good selection of the rubbish BR Mk.1 style bogies off Hornby clerestories that I replaced with 3D printed ones and a fair bundle of other things. To be honest I just can't be ar$ed to make the effort to put them up on e-Bay!

If anyone is interested, drop me a PM!

[Scottish-Exile]

 

 

If I were to sell mine along with my Harry Patch HST then I could probably pay off my mortgage!

 

 

[Northmoor]

57 minutes ago, andyman7 said:

I so completely agree. My goodness, I bet I've sold a whole heap of things over the years that the RMWeb ebay police would flag as 'only fit for the bin'; I assume that these are different to the RMWebbers who moan about how railway modelling is now only a rich man's hobby. But quite a lot of what I sell really just covers the cost of listing and packing it, on the basis that if something has a future use I don't like to bin it. Yes - I have sold empty boxes! Not for £15 or £20 but normally post included for a fiver which for anyone who knows how much postage is and ebay fees is actually me giving it away because I'd rather not bin it if someone else wants it. On occasion, an auction pile of 'tat' goes for a bit more than expected and that's a bonus. 

Hear hear and congratulations to @ianmaccon creating more model railway in the last two years than I bet most of the armchair critics on here have done.  We've been here before not so long ago; there are some genuinely bonkers prices being asked on eBay but for some it seems to be necessary to laugh and point ay any number of things at listings that they have no intention of bidding on anyway.

I'm with @MrWolf; eBay can be a pain but I'm there with not throwing stuff away and get very irritated by those advocating throwing repairable models in the bin.  The modern term is "Embedded Carbon" and is an issue getting a lot of attention in construction (think of all the concrete) but sadly not enough attention in motor vehicles, which require more energy to make than ever and while lasting longer, may not consume as much energy in their normal lifetime - so keep running older ones!

 

Some of my best eBay job lots have included:

• About 150 sets of mostly wagon transfers, about half part-used.  I flogged one-by-one those I didn't need, keeping about half of them which had cost me nothing in the end. 
• 40+ Airfix/Mainline/Kit-built wagons, all detailed with scale couplings and most with EM wheels, but the seller included the spare OO wheels.  Again I sold what I didn't want and kept the rest, which only cost me the £100-mile round trip to collect.

I have NEVER complained that model railways are expensive.  You just have to put the time in.  Some traders can't apparently even be bothered to change wheels on a wagon.

[MrWolf]

Model railways can be expensive, but they don't have to be. There's plenty of chancers on eBay who regularly ask ridiculous sums for junk, or items available for a fraction of the price elsewhere. My inner cynic tells me that they might outnumber those who are genuinely misinformed. 

 

One thing that has helped me to progress my own layout is posting regularly on my thread here. Can't go talking about building a layout and not demonstrating what you're doing. It's also very handy for those moments when I realise that I haven't a clue what I'm doing!

 

Unfortunately you get armchair experts in every walk of life, I've had it at vintage motorcycle meets, which I usually counter with: "Where's your bike then?" That gets met with "Oh, I'm having it restored at the moment."

Really? The expert not doing the job himself?! 

 

[chuffinghell]

4 minutes ago, MrWolf said:

Model railways can be expensive,

 

 

shhhhh! You’re gonna get some of us in trouble

 

No dear he’s joking model railways are not expensive at all

[Paul H Vigor]

20 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

I did like this part of his description ... " I cannot guarantee other parts are missing".

So some of them might be there.  How many more bits did he lose when he tried picking it up from the garden?

 

 

Stolen by voles! 

[MrWolf]

Unfortunately,my other half knows exactly what model locos can cost, but she still bought me them!

[Andy WD]

9 hours ago, ianmacc said:

Dear all

 

I wasn’t going to resort to defending myself but in answer to recent posts.

 

Thank you. The layout is my own work. It was a lockdown project that doubles as therapy for a traumatic personal event. NW England c1990 as I remember from my childhood if anyone is interested, including the road vehicles and shops etc  Named after my daughter. 
 

Money is tight. I buy job lots to either cherry pick the bits I want or to fund the layout directly as it’s the only available means that I can do so. As a result all sorts of odd bits surface in my listings. 

 

I am not a chancer. All my start prices are very low indeed as I’d rather that bogie sold for a couple of pounds and made someone happy than went to landfill. 
 

I could have ironed those shirts but hey Ho. 
 

Thank you for the free publicity. I have sold a few BINs off the strength of this thread literally now. 
 

PS see my newest listing to show I’m not devoid of gentle self deprecation.

 

stay safe 

 

Firstly, apologies if any offence caused by the original post @ianmacc.

I'm fairly certain I've bought from yourself previously!

 

And yes, it was bound to happen that somebody mad enough to follow this topic would eventually be mentioned. And many thanks for being so magnanimous in your reply.

 

It has been interesting to see the responses though, and some of the reasons why we use Ebay.

 I think we all work on a budget, just some are larger than others, rather like Formula 1, and some of us have a buy it and fix up attitude, (I liken myself to an F3 team, I haven't made it up as high as F1 yet!), so I can fully understand why parts are snapped up. As I'm sure that many people with families, or other financial commitments, find some of the prices charged for new models are way out of their pricerange.

 Personally I enjoy buying a mixed bag, (or box), of damaged stock or parts and then spending the time repairing, re-building for my own use.
Are they Museum quality? No. Just the enjoyment of creating something, which I hope is better than originally purchased and I take some pleasure from.

 

It takes all sorts, and railway modelling in general, certainly seems to generate all sorts. It could be called a madness in it's own right, and if I recall it, has been previously many times. It can be all consuming, or something to dip into.
Currently into year 5 of a 1 year build of a layout!

Let the madness continue!!

(There isn't a pushing a train around emoji...)

 

Andy

 

Edited October 24, 2021 by Andy WD
spelling

[Ruffnut Thorston]

14 hours ago, John Besley said:

Looks like hes fitted the injector pipework off a 9F on the side of the firebox upside down....

And the rear pony truck is on backwards! 

[John Besley]

I have picked up 3 bargains from Ebay this week for specific projects either on the bench at the mo or in long term planning

 

1. a set of wheels for a R1

2. a Airfix BofB kit to experiment with

3. a chassis kit to build a Tinkerbell on

 

All of these will become 7/8ths miniture railway Loco's in due time

 

I put my max bib in and sat back to see how it went and was pleasantly supprised

Edited October 24, 2021 by John Besley

[Michael Hodgson]

4 hours ago, cessna152towser said:

Some years ago I spotted a huge bargain job lot on eBay buy-it-now, "collection only". Day one I drove all the way from Scotland to buy the stuff in Taunton, two nights in a hotel, West Somerset Railway trip to Minehead on the middle day, then drove home on the third day with a long break in Kidderminster to allow for a round trip to Bridgnorth on the Severn Valley Railway.   By the time I had resold all the items I didn't intend to keep I just about covered the cost of my three day trip.

Trust a canny Scot to use resale of the dross from a job lot on ebay to justify a trip to the West Somerset and Severn Valley! 

[ianmacc]

1 hour ago, Ruffnut Thorston said:

And the rear pony truck is on backwards! 

Yes it is! And it has been b*ggered about with to the extent it can’t be swapped back as the chassis has been ground away! Otherwise I’d have chucked in a tender from the Spares stash!

[MrWolf]

Never ceases to amaze me what people do with things mechanical. I have numerous bits of motorcycle that would be quite valuable if somebody hadn't sawn a bit off or drilled extra holes for reasons unknown.

But, as they're never going to make any more, every so often I will set to and put it right. 

Then of course use / swap / sell it. That's my kind of recycling!

[Esmedune]

£77 for two empty boxes...
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Hornby-Empty-Boxes-For-ADVANCED-PASSENGER-TRAIN-APT-amp-HST-125-/313715089356?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2047675.l2557&nma=true&si=laNsXbzwEZOPoEoYi1ArIhKqEdw%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc#viTabs_0

[Ruffnut Thorston]

That’s the 1980s APT-P Train Pack Box.

 

Really useful for those with an unboxed set to sell off now the new sets are coming…

[SteveyDee68]

3 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Never ceases to amaze me what people do with things mechanical

 

Reminds me of the story a late colleague and friend related ...

 

She was a peripatetic music teacher, and at the start of the new academic year she had a crop of new primary age starters learning to play brass instruments. For the first few weeks, whilst the kids were settling into their instruments (and perhaps changing them due to suitability) they kept the instruments at school, until the day finally arrived when she was confident enough that if an instrument was taken home that it would come back again.

 

The following week, one of her young trombonists turned up to lesson, and before even opening his case excitedly informed her that his father had "fixed" his trombone. As all instruments were checked annually for faults before use, she was quite surprised to hear this, and immediately started to wonder what damage might have happened since the previous week that might require a repair... had he dented the bell (common amongst young brass players), or perhaps the water valve spring had broken (also quite common on learner instruments)? He opened the case, but on first glance she could see nothing amiss; whatever had been repaired, it had been done to a good standard.

 

Only when the boy assembled the instrument did she spot the new addition and the full horror dawned upon her as the boy explained ...

 

"I was going to show my dad the note you were teaching me but my finger slipped and my slide broke, so my dad fixed it for me"

 

From the "repair" and his description she realised that what the boy meant was that the outer slide (the bit that is extended) had slid off the inner slide and (probably) fallen onto the floor. Dad's solution?

 

He had carefully drilled through both inner and outer slides approximately half way down the slide, and then put a nut and bolt straight through both parts  and tightened them up, to stop the slide from falling off. She explained, through tears of laughter, that Dad had made an exceptional job of the repair, not only putting rubber washers where the bolts went into/through the slide to stop air leaking, but also trimming the excess length of the bolts away to avoid anything snagging on them. She also explained that she was so in shock that she allowed the boy to demonstrate his first few pieces, which were all rhythmic variations on the note F, which was played in closed position. She then turned the page of his tutor book, and demonstrated how to play Eb in 3rd position, showing him how far to move his slide out to do so. The boy, so she said, looked at her doing so, then at his own slide (now permanently fixed in closed position due to his father's 'repairs'), and with sudden realisation simply said, "My dad's not fixed it, has he?" 

 

She sent him home with a note explaining that his instrument would need to be sent off for professional repairs to the damage caused by the father's well-meaning but ultimately misguided attempt to stop the slide falling off!

 

What is it that they say? When making something idiot-proof, never underestimate the idiot?!

 

Steve S

 

 

[John Besley]

2 hours ago, Esmedune said:

£77 for two empty boxes...
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Hornby-Empty-Boxes-For-ADVANCED-PASSENGER-TRAIN-APT-amp-HST-125-/313715089356?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2047675.l2557&nma=true&si=laNsXbzwEZOPoEoYi1ArIhKqEdw%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc#viTabs_0

And they sold for £77! I don't get it ...

[Ruffnut Thorston]

2 hours ago, Ruffnut Thorston said:

That’s the 1980s APT-P Train Pack Box.

 

Really useful for those with an unboxed set to sell off now the new sets are coming…

 

4 minutes ago, John Besley said:

And they sold for £77! I don't get it ...

 

see the above…a pretty rare APT set box…

 

The HST box, I don’t know about that…

Edited October 25, 2021 by Ruffnut Thorston
Typo

[MrWolf]

Clearly, some people have far too much money....

[The Johnster]

Including me, apparently, at least according to my ex-wife who once told me I had more money than sense.  'But I've only got 20p', I answered. 

 

'Exactly', she said.