Car boot sales

Hi Sean,

My wife and I hit at least 4 or 5 a week down here in Dorset and Devon, they supply most of our 'stock' and have done for about 6 years now. We go less and less to auctions because of the high costs.

You will often find all sorts of smaller bargains but obviously not large machinery.

Thye best stuff (cheapest) seems to come from sellers with normal household stuff and kids toys, cltohes etc who have no idea what is in the box of rust on the ground at their table!

Recently we looked at a huge selection of very posh china and glass on a nice table cloth held down at the corners by 4 chunks of steel. The guy was gobsmacked when I asked if he would sell me the steel bits which he did for £4; got a really nice set of 4 chairmakers adjustable spindle rounders by SWAN which went back to the USA for £100+!

Your local paper will list local boot sales in your area, usually on a Friday.

Cheers, Martin

I stock the workshop from three or four benevolent boots that I attend in a week. . A lot of the stuff in my shop was bought in a field!, I even bought my Alba shaper from a car boot sale. The 6” vice on my milling machine would not have been there if I had not “fielded” it from one of my more productive venues. The list is a long one.

I first met Martin at a car boot down his way but as we spend less time down there these days he is probably quite please that one less bod is “nicking” his stuff – good morning Martin, enjoy the weekend.

Rik

Sean, it is a bit far south but have you been to Thainstone ? North of Aberdeen. Car boot on Sundays, sometimes some good stuff. Also auctions about once a month, look it up in google to see what's on, everything from combines to drills via machine tools.

Sean, if going to an auction beware the 'helium balloon' attached to your bidding arm, very easy to get carried away with 'just one more bid'; then a serious shock when you pay and remember the commissions etc!

Cheers, Martin

I don't go to many car boot sales but go to a couple of autojumbles,years ago they was loads of engineering stuff [where I got lots of my gear from] but not so much now, why do we keep going? because there's allways that chance of a "scoop" from someone who doesn't know what it is or it's worth,of course your'e up against the regular dealers who like to " hoover up" before putting their stalls out to sell at a higher price, There's the"wire brush" men who buff everything up [& ruin good tools], then there's the "blue paint" men who paint everything with the 10 gallons of paint they've bought cheap ages ago, then there's the "they go for££££ on ebay" men to which I say well sell it on ebay we.re not on ebay here, then there's the dealers who have a cromwell tool catalogue to show you how much tools are,it used to be machine mart catalogue, If I spot something I want & I know the price is cheap I just buy & don't insult the seller trying for less but If I think it's a bit high I allways try to knock them down,this doesn't work early on at the start but does later on.

Dont know what bootsales are like over your way,but over here,the few I,ve been to had nothing only junk to offer. I dont know how they thought anyone would be foolish enough to buy it,in fact I dont know why they even bothered to bring it there to sell,such junk you never saw ! I still believe that little of any value ever ends up in a boot sale,if it was any use, it would not be there in the first place. Nothing only clapped out drills,hedgetrimmers, lawnmowers,chainsaws ect.

Sean and Larry - Buying successfully at boots for our type of stuff is a lesson in patience. Bargains come over a period of time. Advice like “Softly, softly catchy monkey” and “Everything comes to him as waits” apply in a search for “hits” as corny as it might sound. My weekly trawls are just another branch of my hobby of model engineering providing exercise, sunshine (this time of year) and frequent booty at ugger all money.>>

Rik>>

I have almost fully equipped my workshop over the past five years or so by going to Saturday morning garage sales, our Aussie equivalent of the boot sale. Got some very good stuff over that time, even an ML7 lathe albeit in not great shape. But you do have to look at a lot of junk to find the good stuff. Probably a 1 in 10 strike rate, or even less, I reckon.

It seems to have tapered off teh last couple of years though. Maybe because I now have almost everything I need and so have become more picky. But I think more and more people are using Gumtree etc to advertise anything that is likely to be worth anything so they can get top dollar for it. Garage sales are getting more and more of the leftover junk where you think people really should learn where the tip is and how to load their car up and take it there. Maybe a lot of them do it for the same reason I do now: it's a social thing -- and you never know your luck, Eldorado may be just around the corner.

Edited By Hopper on 09/07/2017 00:24:41

I’ve just been sorting out booty buys from this morn – rain stopped play - and found this in a box of bits. It is 5” long by ¼” square. The interest is in the use and history and googling “tam o’ shanter hone” reveals its “secrets”.

Example:

**LINK**

Rik (nearly dry!)

Is Newark auto jumble far enough north?

There used to be car boot sale where one stall who sold tool room type goods, had a notice which said " I've I've not got it I can get it. There is another car boot where a stall has lawn mowers, strimmers, spades and forks etc. My cynical mind thinks; garage break ins

Roy

Edited By roy entwistle on 29/04/2018 13:32:24

Our so called local papers don't list car boots and I wouldn't know where to find them to visit.

Martin P

I bought most of my woodworking kit from boot sales, never had much luck with engineering tools though. The best I've got is some Moore & Wright mics.

.

Nice find Rik

They haven't been available for years.

MichaelG.

Rik, Nice find, would do very well on EB, they love them in Russia!

Martin

I think small village or charity boot sales are OK but they are few and far between in my area, (Doncaster). There is a huge commercial one very week at Donny Rovers stadium but most are professional sellers disguising themselves as amateurs, (no questions, no tax). It starts early and my experience is the dealers get round before it opens to the public and get all the bargains to resell.