# Some people really think they struck gold.....



## Cooter Brown (Sep 24, 2019)

This is one of the funniest ebay listings I've seen in a long time.....









						HUGE 544 Piece Industrial Wholesale Lot Machinist CNC Lathe Bits Various Sizes  | eBay
					

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for HUGE 544 Piece Industrial Wholesale Lot Machinist CNC Lathe Bits Various Sizes at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!



					www.ebay.com


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## mikey (Sep 24, 2019)

Like they say, if you're going dream, you may as well dream big.


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## BROCKWOOD (Sep 24, 2019)

Only the gold won't actually arrive until some sucke..... I mean buyer thinks it's a good deal.


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## higgite (Sep 24, 2019)

Aw, man! If they only weren't used, I'd be all over that. I sure could use that $3100 that I'd be saving.

Tom


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## grotto (Sep 25, 2019)

Hey but it’s free shipping!


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## ddickey (Sep 25, 2019)

I made an offer of one dollar. haha


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## projectnut (Sep 25, 2019)

I seriously wonder who in the company placed the listing.  Note just above the first picture the caption reads:
"HUGE 544 Piece Industrial Wholesale Lot Machinist *CNC Lathe Bits Various Sizes"*

It looks like a real mish mash of Morse taper drills, Silver & Deming drills, reamers, countersinks, and extended length straight drills.  Of the 544 pieces the vast majority are only 3 different sizes, 1/4", 5/16" and 1/2".  If you do buy them chances are you'll have a lifetime supply of those sizes.


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## C-Bag (Sep 25, 2019)

projectnut said:


> I seriously wonder who in the company placed the listing.  Note just above the first picture the caption reads:
> "HUGE 544 Piece Industrial Wholesale Lot Machinist *CNC Lathe Bits Various Sizes"*
> 
> It looks like a real mish mash of Morse taper drills, Silver & Deming drills, reamers, countersinks, and extended length straight drills.  Of the 544 pieces the vast majority are only 3 different sizes, 1/4", 5/16" and 1/2".  If you do buy them chances are you'll have a lifetime supply of those sizes.


That is the mystery,but then I took a look at the "company" Tin Can Industries. They are a stage lighting company and refer to the lights as gels or cans. So somehow I guess someone has decided to dump their spare drills and expect by saying machinist they are pitching to the deep pockets? More and more I'm seeing these weird names of supposed companies who don't provide any info and I can't tell if it's just somebody guessing or willfully ignorant of what they are trying to dump.

 I'm currently trying to get another couple of compact guided pneumatic cyls and the playing field on eBay has drastically changed since last I was looking. These folks obviously pull a obsolete machines apart and put the shiny bits on eBay. Which I think is great. I was able to get great deals on what I needed. Now the same cyls are sold separately for 2x's what I paid for a lot of 4! It will be interesting to see if they take ddicky's offer of $1  More and more I'm doing the same and more often than not my lo ball is taken as nobody takes the bait.


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## ddickey (Sep 25, 2019)

Here is their response to me,
I guess $11 per bit might be too much for moron like you.
Come on. Someone bid $2 now and we'll keep it going to like thirty bucks or something.


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## projectnut (Sep 25, 2019)

I agree the company selling these items is either clueless, or is using a bit of psychology to market their merchandise.  Anyone in the business and almost any hobbyist would know these are not pieces of lathe tooling.  However a potential buyer may think they can take advantage of the company's supposed "ignorance" and buy hundreds of drills for a less than new price.  However at an asking price of $10.00+ per unit I think they've priced themselves out of the market.

As a point of reference I was offered 1,000 MT3 & MT4 drills complete with a floor standing cabinet from a surplus vendor a couple years ago.  The sizes ranged from 1/8" to 1 1/2".  They were all in good shape & ready to use.  The asking price was $1,000.00 or $1.00 per unit.  I passed on the deal knowing I'll never see one like it again.  While they would be a "nice to have" item, I couldn't see the practicality of having them.  In all likelihood less than 10% would ever be used, and the collection would be taking up valuable floor space.

As for this lot of drills they seem to be either MT3 or MT4 which would require a fairly substantial machine to use them.  My JET 125VS-3 drill press has an MT3 taper, and can drill up to a 1 1/4" hole through mild steel.   It's a fairly large machine and definitely not marketed to the hobbyists.  In addition there's no guarantee that any of the drills. reamers, or countersinks are in useable condition.  If the reamers and countersinks alone had to be sent out for sharpening they would cost in the $5.00 range per piece.


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## RJSakowski (Sep 25, 2019)

A machining ignorant company who got taken in by the original seller.  The list price of the taper shank drills, assuming name brand, probably goes into the multiple tens of thousands and they're figuring half price is a good deal.  The problem is that there is no meaningful itemized inventory and that the condition of the tooling is unknown. furthermore, they are apparently not capable of determining the quality of their offering.

Quite possibly if there were enough drills, reamers, etc. in good condition, it might be a good deal for someone but for most of us it would probably be some very high priced scrap.

It is obvious to me that the value is considerably more than $1, especially considering the free shipping.  The question is, how much would you be willing to pay?  Hypothetically, of course.  I will be interested in the responses.


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## RobertB (Sep 25, 2019)

I've seen lots like that at tool auctions go for as low as $50 and up to about $300, but that was on stuff that was able to be examined in person. Note also that the "free shipping"  is to a commercial loading dock, there is a $75 surcharge for residential delivery.


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## ErichKeane (Sep 25, 2019)

RJSakowski said:


> A machining ignorant company who got taken in by the original seller.  The list price of the taper shank drills, assuming name brand, probably goes into the multiple tens of thousands and they're figuring half price is a good deal.  The problem is that there is no meaningful itemized inventory and that the condition of the tooling is unknown. furthermore, they are apparently not capable of determining the quality of their offering.
> 
> Quite possibly if there were enough drills, reamers, etc. in good condition, it might be a good deal for someone but for most of us it would probably be some very high priced scrap.
> 
> It is obvious to me that the value is considerably more than $1, especially considering the free shipping.  The question is, how much would you be willing to pay?  Hypothetically, of course.  I will be interested in the responses.



I couldn't see paying more than a few hundred dollars.  A serious offer for me would be ~$250, and even that would be  a stretch.  Of the list, the following are basically useless to me:
Qty  50 - 1/2" tapered bits
Qty 133 - 5/16" tapered bits
Qty 134 - 1/4" tapered bits
Qty - 57 - 1/2" round shank bits

What the heck would I do with 134 1/4" bits?  Thats like 5 lifetimes at my uses.  I can at least use MT4 and down (in my lathe tailstock), but much of the stuff isn't very useful.

Out of the reamers, many look used, but I'd perhaps get some use out of them.  Admittedly, I don't really have any reamers at the moment, so I consider them less valuable to me.

In reality, for $250, I would be paying for "always having a drill bit available", and am pretty sure someone else here would get most of these at my estate sale.


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## mmcmdl (Sep 25, 2019)

If I had an extra $5900 laying around and an empty drawer I'de be all over this " deal ". But ,, I have neither so I'll have to pass on it .


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## C-Bag (Sep 25, 2019)

Contrary to the seller I see little advantage to multiples of the same bit. And here they can count accurately the number of bits but can't catalog what condition they are. I get so disgusted with these scammers who cherry pick new prices and then offer such a deal at 50% off. They have no idea if what they are selling is even the same thing they cherry picked, much less when it was bought or the condition. These mislabeled come ons are making it harder and harder to wade through the noise. I would think this would make it hard enough that folks will just quit buying this garbage and it will self edit the true morons like this seller.


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## brino (Sep 25, 2019)

There are more parts WITHOUT protective sleeves/coatings than WITH them.
So, I have to assume most are dull and or chipped.

It could be great sharpening practice for someone, but for me, I'm out!
(.....even if they did ship to Canada)

-brino


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## RJSakowski (Sep 25, 2019)

ErichKeane said:


> I couldn't see paying more than a few hundred dollars.  A serious offer for me would be ~$250, and even that would be  a stretch.  Of the list, the following are basically useless to me:
> Qty  50 - 1/2" tapered bits
> Qty 133 - 5/16" tapered bits
> Qty 134 - 1/4" tapered bits
> ...


My guess is that they are measuring the small end of the tapered shanks., Probably  MT1 and MT2.  Remember, the seller has absolutely no machining experience.


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## C-Bag (Sep 25, 2019)

brino said:


> There are more parts WITHOUT protective sleeves/coatings than WITH them.
> So, I have to assume most are dull and or chipped.
> 
> It could be great sharpening practice for someone, but for me, I'm out!
> ...


$5900 AND you have to sharpen them. I hope everybody is out. I guess these guys have been looking at those placeholder things like Shars when they are out of stock and the ad says $22,000 for a normally $24.95 arbor or something. Whatever they are smoking has also made them grumpy.


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## stupoty (Sep 25, 2019)

I sometimes wonder if lots like this are some cunning money laundering scheme  


Stu


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## Suzuki4evr (Sep 25, 2019)

My wife just asked an interesting question. ..................."Does the workshop come with the few drills and what not?"


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## pdentrem (Sep 25, 2019)

For that much money, we would buy the right tool for the job, new and ready to go, and still have $5870 left for other goodies.
Pierre


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## jwmay (Sep 25, 2019)

I think the reason we see a lot more generic listings these days is because EBay has created listing functions that encourage it. I’ve recently been selling one or two items per week. (self induced purge).  EBay now gives me the option to pick from and copy any other listing that EBay determines may be similar to the item I’m selling.  They didn’t have that previously. I always had to make every listing from scratch.  But now EBay gives me a few different listed items to pick from, with the explicit recommendation to copy it. I even get suggestions for what to call it based on the few words I provided. This opens up the flood gates for people to cherry pick from high dollar goods and proclaim they have the same thing for sale. They also tell me what to ask for it, which, has been generally accurate in most categories. But only because I actually know what I’m selling. Many don’t know. They just sell whatever comes in the door, for however much they can get, with EBay “assisting” them to list their items efficiently.

As for the topic at hand: I’m not surprised by the listing. Even less so after reading the sellers response to you. While you did make a statement with your offer, any decent vendor would have declined to engage you further.  Low ball offers are expected, even on actual items of value. Hope springs eternal, y’know.


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## C-Bag (Sep 25, 2019)

Thanks, this explains a LOT! I wonder if the MBA geniuses will ever get their attempt at marketing greed has basically destroyed what was good about eBay eventually. I can only hope so. But probably not.


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## Cooter Brown (Sep 25, 2019)

Ooops.....


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## alloy (Sep 26, 2019)

ddickey said:


> I made an offer of one dollar. haha


So did I 

We should all make the same offer.


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## ddickey (Sep 26, 2019)

Alright.


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## alloy (Sep 26, 2019)

Well my offer was declined. Imagine that.  I was going to submit a $2 but the seller is not accepting bids from me.  So everyone else will have to step up and bid


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## RobertB (Sep 26, 2019)

A little more digging and I think this seller just honestly doesn't know what they are worth. It appears when they got this lot they had a few "new in box" items in the lot that they picked out and listed separately. They have a half dozen or so like this:




I think they looked up the list price of these and having no machining experience or knowledge just figured the rest of the items had a similar value to these. They have sold thousands of items on ebay with no negative feedback, so it doesn't appear that they normally  misrepresent things they sell. I think they just ventured into an area they had no knowledge of.


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## stioc (Sep 26, 2019)

Around where I live this is a daily occurrence on Craigslist to the point I rarely even check there anymore. Looks like ebay is becoming like that too. With all the brand new offshore made products that are good enough for my purposes I see very little value in paying 10x the price just to have old name-brand stuff that's been used and abused. Sure there are good deals to be had and some stuff really is well kept and quality but that's not often what I see.


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## C-Bag (Sep 26, 2019)

For me this just raises more questions. I have a somewhat mechanistic view of the world and process and procedure often indicates outcome. What has changed if they have no negative feedback? Did they go belly up and some clueless liquidator get this lot and is either trying to cover his reckless investment, or have they been hijacked by some unscrupulous troll who doesn't care about how they appear to other potential ebayers? Rep is EVERYTHING on eBay as its getting tougher to virtually weigh all the details of whether something is a good deal or not. I constantly more and more see where some guy on CL is selling off tooling. Usually huge lots and literally for penny's on the dollar. And if you think about it logically if it was in a job shop, it should be. They have already made their investment back potentially and it's now just about clearing stuff out so they don't have to invest time and energy to move it. I have bought huge lots of tooling this way on CL.


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## cjtoombs (Sep 27, 2019)

They seem to have started from the wrong baseline on the prices.  They seemed to have looked up new prices and assumed that the used ones would go for some fairly large multiple of that (like 50%).  The problem is that there is a glut of these types of items, so they don't go for very much, even if sold per piece, and the larger the lot the less per item they go for.  They should have looked up sold listings for large lots of drill, reamers, etc which would have given them a good baseline.  If they really wanted to maximize their profit on this, they would need to sell the items separately and provide better descriptions.  For a lot like this, with a lot of items that are the same size this wouldn't even be that difficult, maybe 20 listings instead of one.  It would take much longer to sell, though.


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