Line boring equipment

I am looking into buying a guys bussiness. He is in his mid 60s and is looking to retire. We haven't gotten to the price of it yet but he did say in would have to buy new equipment. He wont sell me his old stuff.

He runs an older climax setup now and is suggesting I go with a new climax unit and their bore welder. I have looked into the Elsa system and talked with the guy at Bore America. I like the Elsa SC2 60/1 unit for the price and what you get. The climax seems like it would be a lot easier to get into tighter areas though. But for a comparable setup to the Elsa I'm looking at $10k more right off the bat. Has anyone on here ran the SC2 60/1?

These are going to be User preferential, and use agreeable to what you do with them as far as heavy enough or too light. Having only used a small few Home Made's Climax looks the better choice to what I used to do.

What’s his reasoning behind not selling you his old stuff? If he’s getting out of it I would think he would sell the equipment too. I’d hate to buy him out and he then turns around and goes back at it.

Your choice in equipment will be based on budget and application. You can get by for a reasonable cost or spend a small fortune. I always leaned toward the smaller and less expensive setups tooling wise because that’s easy to add or change. I had planned on spending the bulk of the $ on the bore welding setup.

Junkyard he told me he didn't want me to have problems with his old equipment. He said I would be pissed if he sold me his stuff and ended up having problems because it's old equipment. I kind of thought it was weird but I can see his point of view . inwould have him sign a non compete if the deal were to go through.

I could spend the money on the climax but they quoted me $40k for the bb5000. Both systems will do the same work on paper. I guess I'm not sure why such a big price difference. $27500 for the comparable Elsa system. Sounds a lot more palatable. I can have the engine driver welder and suitcase welder to go along with the Elsa various other tools for the price of the climax system.

I plan on repairing bores on equipment as big as a 992h and I guess as small as I can go with the tools I have. There is a lot of heavy equipment in our area from wrecking yards to dirt moving equipment.

What is it you're buying?
A business with no tools is just a name. And his old customers want him, not some new guy showing up in his place.
Small one man businesses ARE the man, you aren't him so there's no guarantee they will be your customers.
If there's work to be had start your own business.
If you have to buy the equipment either way, what are you getting you can't do on your own?
If you do good work word will spread.
Joe H

joe--h said:

What is it you're buying?
A business with no tools is just a name. And his old customers want him, not some new guy showing up in his place.
Small one man businesses ARE the man, you aren't him so there's no guarantee they will be your customers.
If there's work to be had start your own business.
If you have to buy the equipment either way, what are you getting you can't do on your own?
If you do good work word will spread.
Joe H

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I'm leaning towards starting it on my own. Figured if he wants 50k for his clients and business name it might be worth it. Otherwise I'd start out part time until I get busy enough.

If he is retiring clients will be a few looking for a replacement, if he was just looking for a relief as to level of work to Semi-Retire then you could sneak some of his more impatient business away but not all. Biggest potential is he has a client he promised the machinery to as he retires where the business itself will already be hamstrung when sold off. Using a business name for a retirement account is not the wisest move as you still have to sell it, if he is saving the machinery back for a rainy day or should retirement not be what hoped for he could also hamstring the replacement no matter if has a signed Non-Compete.

Buy your equipment and work into the market, if he is overwhelmed you will do well around him.