On Saturday I had the chance to attend a big auction a few miles from here where the previous shop owner had passed and his wife was selling the tools. On one hand there were some serious good buys and on the other it was sad to see some of the prices things were bringing.
There was a pretty good mix of small shop tools, stationary machinery, lumber, industrial equipment and even some finished work. The guy had been in business for just a few years after retiring from the auto industry. He did some cabinet work, mill work and entry doors, so he had a wide variety of stuff in his shop including some serious industrial stuff.
Half way through I really started hating my little shop and it’s lack of space. I saw some scary deals made like a 20″ Powermatic planer for $250 and a Powermatic lathe for $150. He had an almost new 2hp Delta 14″ band saw and it went for $250 and the Powermatic #26 Shaper I wanted only went for $500. The big stuff was even scarier, a 4 head moulding shaper only went for $800 and a sliding table shaper went for even less ( both were by SCMI and looked to be in like new condition). I even made out well getting about 400 bdft of walnut ( mostly #2 common) and 100+ bdft of poplar for $135 and a nice RAS for $80. One guy even walked away with about 1800 bdft of kiln dried poplar for $850 ( thats about .47 cents a bdft)
I am guessing that the low prices on some could be attributed to the shear size of the machinery and the fact that some of it ran on 3ph as opposed to 2ph. And there probabaly arent many woodworkers out there that need a 4 head moulding planer or a 48″ belt sander so I can see the big stuff going cheap. It was sad though to think that the guy had obviously spent a lot of time and money to set up shop all to have it sold so cheap.
Replies
Not sure where you live but it sounds like the auction was not well publicized. Around here in the Bay area a well done auction will sell stuff for way to close to new. Anyway glad to hear that you did well
Troy
KC , Well , did you buy the PM 26 ?
dusty
NO I didn't get the PM 26! There was a lot of lumber and I didn't want to kill the budget on machinery and not be able to get the lumber. The sale was not well advertised and the auctioneer didn't know squat about the equipment. There was a small add in the paper that referred you to the web site that had a lot of pictures but the descriptions were all wrong. The guy had a ton of tooling to go with his equipment but no one new what went to what. The poplar lumber ( most of which was bought I believe originally to be cut into moulding ) that sold cheap didnt even have an accurate bdft count. The add and the auctioneer swore that it was 1200bdft but they were way off (16' x 4' x 3' I get 2300 bdft ) which is really sad as the area is big in the hardwood business and I am sure that somebody could have done a better estimate for them.
The sad part is the fee that this company charges for an auction. 25% of the gross and an advertising fee on top of that.
Kelso,
That's a shame. I feel bad for the widow. And that auctioning company is downright RUDE!
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
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