Insane!!!!!!!!!!!

[central.vermont]

Insanity or just two bidders with some disposable income!!! equals one happy seller. ;D ;D

Jon

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rt=nc&nma=true&item=200578413180&si=VmZ0L4xkpGxwBhp%252FgGlrS09Mc3c%253D&viewitem=

[bigford]

he has or had a NS boxcar going for the same price.
  i can not belive somebody is willing to pay that much for a car!!
i think something is funny with the bidding

[Ian MacMillan]

Hey, you get what you pay for. Not unreasonable for a nicely weathered car. Some people just dont want to try on their own, so you get RTR beat to $hit!

[FloridaBoy]

I think there is more to the story.  Read the description and it will describe the conditions in which the car was weathered, while the owner/seller was deployed and serving our country in Iraq, and now he's home, he is selling one of the cars he did in those nights out there. 

Second, the car is actually very realistic. At first, when he called them G cars, and with the extremely detailed grafitti, I thought it was a G scale car, but it is N.
 
Even if I had that much disposable income, I would never pay anything close to the ending price, but to me a part of that exhorbitant price is the buyer's appreciation for the circumstances and thanking the vet for being over there.

Just my two cents worth, but eBay is one funny place.  This is like the grilled cheese sandwich that sold for thousands of dollars because the grille marks resembled someone. I also saw first hand a few years ago, a routine N scale stock Pullman sleeping passenger car made by Lima, probably worth at least 4 or 5 bucks max back then, go for 1500 bucks, and when the board I was on teased and commented, the buyer responded and "justified" buying it at that price, in a way saying it was his money and he could do with it what he wanted.

mature

Ken "FloridaBoy" Willaman

[ArtinCA]

Griff started not too long after Mellow Mike. He does nice stuff and does some interesting pieces.

But I still like rolling my own, so Mr Mann's book is not too far from my bench when I weather out my stuff..  This magazine article is another favorite.. http://www.trainlife.com/magazines/pages/138/9962/june-2004-page-28

[Puddington]

This gentleman is a "pal of mine".... his work is outstanding; you might think the price is "insane" but you didn't have to pay it so let's just calm down and back off a wee bit with the sniping shall we. As previously stated, this gentleman was defending our freedom while he produced this; that notwithstanding; let's end the crap of "something funny with this bid" shall we. You wanna question the guy who produced and sold this; PM me and I'll set you on the right track............

Man; are we getting "big in the boots" and full of ourselves or what. - lighten up; you ain't got nothing on Griff............

[bigford]

hey pudd
 you might want to check your self. last time i checked there
is freedom of speech. you dont like it to bad!! as i stated i think
something if a little odd about a $320.00 box car who cares where
it was painted

[up1950s]

Could be the guy or guys that bid high were war buddies and want it as a memento .

[Puddington]

hey pudd
 you might want to check your self. last time i checked there
is freedom of speech. you dont like it to bad!! as i stated i think
something if a little odd about a $320.00 box car who cares where
it was painted

Ok; here's "freedom of speech".............

Who the H E Double Hockey Sticks are you to question what someone else spends on an E Bay bid ? If you have evidence of wrong doing; bring it, otherwise, "stow it"............

Clear ?.....Good.

[daniel_leavitt2000]

OK, I think there are two things going on... We are talking about the person who bid that much on the car, not commenting on the car itself. Now this guy does know how to weather. No question about that. He is much more skilled than me.

I think the comments made are why someone would pay that much for a weathered car. The Tom Mann/ESM car didn't go for that much. Its just strange that someone would bit that much on a painter who by his own admition only sold a few cars in the past. I guess my point is, its insane to bid that high on a plastic car. I understand someone might bid that much on a work of art, but he isn't well known.

I tell you something. If he keeps doing work like that, and keeps getting prices this high. He will establish himself very quickly.

[flight2000]

Griff has been doing this type work for awhile, just not in N Scale.  He may not be well known to this little circle, but he is well know on the HO side where many of his pieces have sold in this price range before (eBay of course).  I've noticed all of his auctions start at the same price point as well and sells for what the market will bring.  He has a definite gift for making the grunge look very realistic.  He started doing N Scale for his own layout and has moved up to selling those as well now.  He had a website, but decided to take it down when he deployed.

Not the first time this has been discussed either...

http://www.modelrailroadforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8439


Brian

[SkipGear]

We have a gentleman in our N-trak club that has started weathering cars and putting them on E-bay. He can't believe himself what he gets out of them. He has had $3 swap meet cars go for $80-100 with an evenings worth of weathering and some MT trucks added to them. He doesn't set the price but he sure doesn't complain when a bidding war ensues. He told me recently there have been two or three guys that repeatedly bid on just about anything he puts out there, cars that he thinks are worth $30-40 go for close to $100.

[lashedup]

Ok; here's "freedom of speech".............

Who the H E Double Hockey Sticks are you to question what someone else spends on an E Bay bid ? If you have evidence of wrong doing; bring it, otherwise, "stow it"............

Clear ?.....Good.

Sorry Puds, but I think you are getting a little worked up about this. Someone stated they thought it was a lot of money to pay for something like that. No need to get wound up and take shots at people over it.

Group hug?

[central.vermont]

Wow.........didn't think I would start such a ruckus on this one!! I think the guy does great work, just thought
the bling he was getting was the insane part.  : :

Jon

[John]

Ok, lets all calm down ..

I admire Grif - he does great work weathering work, and as others have said, is also on active duty. When you are deployed overseas, taking your mind off the environment is important, especially when you are away from family and friends. Even with today's communications capabilities, you still need the distraction to keep sane. 

I built a model of the USS CONSTITUTION once while on a Med deployment - it helped me keep my sanity.  I had my own stateroom on my last deployment in 1994 - and had a little 6"x2" switching layout inside my desk .. my room mate always laughed when he saw me driving my GP40 back and forth shoving a couple of boxcars around ..

As far as the price of the auction - if someone is willing to pay $300 for this model, that's their business - it seems that maybe the collector market has shifted into this sub category - weathered and grimed up cars - look at what Mr. Mann has done - a NY Times best selling weathering book, custom cars based on ESM models, and another book in the works .. there is a market .. you have to look at it as art .. I would never buy a Picasso - even if I could afford it - they are just plain  ugly .. but someone is willing to pay .. the same with these little train cars ..