Fest Giveaways

[KA3EKH]

Have to wonder if anyone wants junk anymore? I was at the MAARC swap fest and auction in Davidsonville yesterday. That’s primarily an antique radio show but Ham and other stuff shows up to, I had a couple items there to try to sell and also had to pick up a bunch of stuff that’s coming into the shop for work.
The interesting thing to me is that there were two Heathkit transmitters there for free, old Seneca two and six meter transmitters and no one would take them.  I did not drive over but went with a friend and he had a truck load of junk to sell and I already was dragging back a bunch of crap, couple 51S1 receivers, a German Torn receiver and a HRO-500 that somehow got thrown in to the mix so although I thought that the heathkits would yield up some fun parts like power transformers and chokes and the like did not want to outweigh my welcome but have to wonder why no one else would take them. Couple weeks back up at the Gilbert MVPA show saw an old 100 watt VHF military transmitter that was up for sale but later had a free sign on it and that went but figure the Heathkit junk got taken back or thrown in the trash.

[KD1SH]

  Sometimes people buy boat anchors in haste, with grand plans, and then later on realize that they'll probably never do anything with them, and decide that the space those things occupy would be better used for something else. Yes, this is an "ask me how I know" thing. I bought a Seneca myself, a few years ago, and a B&W 5100B, a DX-100, and two nice looking HX-30's. Great plans for all. A few years passed, my AM goals shifted to a more home-brew strategy, and those big boxes sitting on my storage shelves looked more like space-wasters than future projects. Off to a hamfest they went. I didn't give them away for free, but I sold the whole lot for less than a quarter of what I'd paid. Even then, I was amazed that it took me most of the day to move them, especially since the B&W was a very fine looking example, and the DX-100 not far behind.
   As much as I'd be saddened to see a good Seneca ripped apart, there's a lot of good iron in those things—just lift one up sometime. No mod-iron, since it's controlled carrier screen-mod, but the power iron is impressive.
   There's very likely a buyer somewhere for every old clunker you'd like to sell, but sometimes reality just gob-smacks you, and you start wondering just how many hamfests will you need to shuttle this stuff to and from before you're relieved of it.

[KL7OF]

Yeah....The same experiences here on the west side...Old rigs going in the trash.....Couldn't give away rigs at the last hamfest.  I have always used old rigs for parts.  Little twinges of guilt when scrapping a nice one.  I recently cleaned out the pile of electronic junk in the hanger.  lots went to the recycle and some to the landfill....The recycle just about paid the landfill fee.  So far I like having a clean building .  Steve

[KA3EKH]

A friend of mine is in the surplus business, has huge stock piles of inventory. Recently he scraped all of the old WW2 ARC-1 stuff along with all the hacked and incomplete ARC-5 command stuff along with a bunch of other junk. See attached picture, think he got around $150 for that lot. We did take a load of ARC-5 sets to Hamvention this year and we were selling them for $5 each or three for $10 and ended up with a stack that would not sell so gave them away all day Saturday and before we left still had two or three that I dumped in the trash can, oddly although they sat there all day with a free sign once they were in the trash can they went fast!
Though the power supply transformer, filter choke and things like knobs on the HeathKit would be useful but like I said too much already going on. It appears to me that no one wants any of that huge green Indian tribe stuff from heathkit, see the big receivers and transmitters in the $100 price range all day long and don’t recall ever seeing one sell.

[KD1SH]

  A couple of years ago at a local hamfest, someone was selling one of those very old—early 80's vintage—Compaq portable PC's; the "suitcase" kind with the integral monitor and the keyboard that mounted to the front as a cover. A friend and I both remarked that it was ridiculous to even bring something like that to a hamfest—it was surely nothing but dumpster fodder.
  About a half-hour later, as I was walking by that same table, a buyer came over and told the seller, "sure, I'll gladly give you seventy-five bucks for that!"
  Sometimes it seems like one could pick up a roadkill possum beside the road on the way to the 'fester, and find a buyer for it, but, realistically, sellers have to face the prospect of loading the same heavy old boat-anchors into the their vehicles, and then unloading them again when they don't sell, rinse-and-repeat, over and over and over. So, either it finally sells for a loss, or it kisses the bottom of the scrap metal bin. It's a shame, and it saddens me to think of so much cool vintage stuff going to waste, but it's just the way it is.

[Jim/WA2MER]

I try to look practically at such things. Take the Senecas, for example. How many of us live where there is 6 or 2 Meter AM activity? Not many I would guess, based on the relative lack of activity in the 6 & 2 Meters Band Watch section of this forum. If someone takes them for parts all well and good, in which case the carcasses will eventually end up in the scrap yard anyway. Some things are just not worth preserving unless you're one of the few who can actually use them on the air or as organ donors, you're a hoarder, or are running a museum. Most things you can have for free are worth every penny you pay for them. I launched lots of unused stuff over the years to avoid clutter and to spare my survivors the burden of disposing of it all. A shame? Yes, but I prefer it to be someone else's shame.

[W2JRO]

It's interesting to me when I look at pictures from a Hamfest like Shelby, NC, that there is still a ton of good, vintage gear for sale. Then, I compare it to Nearfest, which don't get me wrong, I love going to, there plain isn't as much of that gear for sale.

A few reasons explain why:
1. Older hams retire to the southeast and bring the gear with them.
and/or
2. They stay in the Northeast, pass away, and their family dumpsters the gear because they don't know what to do with it.

I noticed recently that an entity is specializing in selling estate gear for survivors.. pretty good idea. I've already let my wife know about it because when the time comes, there is no one in my family that has a clue on what my gear..vintage or modern, is worth.