.
-Kevin
I didn’t add it to my watch list and got the very same offer. It is a typical eBay ploy based on their algorithms. In a day or two you’ll likely get another email or two asking “Did you forget about this item of interest?”
Also, about having the “FSM” in the title it is all about being “visible” for searches. Many sellers throw out as many search catchwords as possible to generate hits.
Regards, Ed
.
-Kevin
I’m glad to know I’m not the only one with a stash of unbuilt structure kits. I’ve accumulated quite a few in the past 45 years that I’ve been involved in the hobby. Some I have plans for on my current layout. Some I planned to use but then found something I liked better. Some were bought for my previous layout in the home I moved out of 21 years ago. The prize is a craftsman 300 ton Fairbanks-Morse wood coaling tower which I believe I bought about 40 years ago. The proprietor of the LHS that sold it to me was anxious for me to build it and bring it in to show it to him. I told him I would but a short time later he sold his interest in the LHS to his partners. I never did get around to building it for the old layout and for the current layout I ended up buying the large Walthers concrete coaling tower (they offered two). I
I’ve build a few of these: Idaho Springs Mine, Seebold & Sons, and Picken’s Place, and I’ve used pieces of the Norm’s Landing Pier for my harbor (along with a Sheepscot Red Herring Packing Co). They are nice kits - a bit more “craftsman” than a FSM kit - more cutting and measuring involved as well as an ability to follow plans, with a bit less explicit instruction, templates etc. vs. FSM.
.
-Kevin
.
-Kevin
You got me curious about Barnstead Lumber so I went out to ebay and found three for sale. There was a completed kit asking $650. There were two in the box for just under $200 plus shipping. It looks like a nice kit. It seems to me it is configured very similarly to the plastic Walthers sawill kit but with obviously more character. I have the Walthers kit and just started the preliminary steps of assembling it. I’m going to see if I can add a little character of my own. I might use that built up one as inspiraction.
.
-Kevin
When I opened up my two stall engine house kit which is probably about the same age, I noticed the wood walls were very brittle from having dried out so much. One of the walls actual cracked lengthwise along the wood grain. Not a hard fix but you’ll want to handle those wafer thin walls with care and might want to consider doing the inside bracing first just to strengthen them up.
I misunderstood what that kit was about. I thought it was a sawmill but after reading the captions, I realize it is a building supply business.
.
-Kevin
.
-Kevin
Plus $9.50 shipping. That’s funny. I have two of those in my lumberyard. I didn’t realize what a treasure I have. I like the part where he describes it as RARE. That kit has been around forever and I don’t think Atlas retires a kit like Walthers sometimes does. There are dozens of them being offered on ebay alone with the average asking price being around $19. With shipping you could get it between $25-30. I wouldn’t even pay that much for one. The shipping cost is almost as much as the item itself.
I would bet this seller is liquidating somebody’s collection as part of an estate sale and didn’t know the value. He probably went out to ebay to find out what a lumberyard kit was worth and came across an FSM kit for sale.
I’m a fan of the Pawn Stars TV show and you see this all the time. Somebody will bring in an item they thinks rare and ask for thousands of dollars and they have to break the news to them that what they have isn’t all that rare and at most will offer them a couple hundred dollars. Sometimes they are aren’t interested in it at all.
As a kid I always loved looking at the FSM ads in the MR magazines. I loved looking at all the little details. I admire the kits and George for being able to make a living doing what he loved.
He is retired now from the kit buisness but I know they are working or have finished on a plan to perserve his layout.
.
-Kevin
I drooled over the brass but have only a few logging ones and a steple cab that needs repair.
I had always assumed that when George retired, he would be spending more of his time running his layout. Is that not the case?
I remember in the first Allen Keller video he had mentioned that the Smithsonian had contacted him about taking possession of the layout at some time but that it had become too big to make that feasible. Perhaps they will take a section of it someday.
.
-Kevin