Auction equipment.................discuss.

DMiller said:

MULTIPLE wash carts blasting away removing built up sludge and debris, those machines they do not want to be seen shipped away.

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That sounds like one of the auctions years ago near me at the State Fair grounds! Go by there during the couple weeks before and the steam cleaners and paint guys were fast at work!

DMiller said:

Been to a couple RB auctions, early on were not so bad, now its not so good.

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I agree. But isn't that typical of monopolies? Early days of consolidation they are usually OK, then when they have the industry sewed up they hang it in ya.

This thread seems mostly about buyers. Is there anybody on here who has experience selling stuff there?

I'm curious about what happens to the stuff that they shipped off because they did not want it in the auction. Must get sold somewhere, what happens to the seller of such a piece?

I've bought several things at RB auctions, some stuff from purple wave and iron planet also. If its a crane that I think is worth about $80,000, I don't want to give more than about $50,000 for it at a auction. That way I have the $ room to replace a engine, or a LMI computer, a new set of tires, or a rear axle assembly. I want a deal, and I want to be able to fix what's wrong with it and still have a deal. Or I'm not buying it.

I actually just bid on a crane at a rb auction in texas. I had a limit I was willing to spend, and it brought about $7,000 more than I was willing to give. If I would have been able to drive down there and look at it myself, I would have bid higher if the condition justified it. But without seeing it and running it, I've got a limit.

Cranes are typically a little different use than excavators/ dozers, they are usually not beat to pieces as bad, simply because of the work they do- less impact stresses. But if you bought a crane with a junk turntable bearing, you just bought scrap, because they are usually too cost prohibitive to replace.

I feel competent to inspect something myself that I'm looking to buy, but I'm willing to take my lumps if I get it wrong also. I usually figure whatever I buy for a crane, I'm going to spend $10-$15,000 on it in the first year to get it to what I feel is "operational" condition. To buy something at auction thinking "I can put it right to work" is foolish. If it was still perfect, they wouldn't be selling it.

I have also been able to buy some auxiliary equipment at really good prices on auction, but its stuff that is pretty specific use, that not everyone wants.

Birken Vogt said:

This thread seems mostly about buyers. Is there anybody on here who has experience selling stuff there?

I'm curious about what happens to the stuff that they shipped off because they did not want it in the auction. Must get sold somewhere, what happens to the seller of such a piece?

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Not really a reply to Birken, but his comment reminded me of something that gave my boss a bit of a sour taste regarding and auction and it wasn't because of the auction house. To set the stage the company I worked for was a very large company with many quarries and cement plants around the world. Well one time the regional manager asked for a list of surplus equipment that they would like to put in an upcoming auction. This got a pretty good response from plants in our area and a good number or machines went to the auction, at least a couple we had that my boss felt he could part with.

Well after the auction the story I got is the money the equipment brought at the auction did not go to the plants that put in the equipment, but instead went to the general budget of the company to be spent where ever they wanted it to go. I know my boss said if he had known that up front he might have held on to one old haul truck just to have a spare. It was nothing to write home about but started and would move stone when needed and passed the latest safety inspection by MSHA!

Another thing was the various plants did not have a chance to grab the equipment that other plants were submitting to the auction. So even if plant A was unloading say a surplus skid-steer that was in better shape than plant B had tough luck!

kshansen said:

Not really a reply to Birken, but his comment reminded me of something that gave my boss a bit of a sour taste regarding and auction and it wasn't because of the auction house. To set the stage the company I worked for was a very large company with many quarries and cement plants around the world. Well one time the regional manager asked for a list of surplus equipment that they would like to put in an upcoming auction. This got a pretty good response from plants in our area and a good number or machines went to the auction, at least a couple we had that my boss felt he could part with.

Well after the auction the story I got is the money the equipment brought at the auction did not go to the plants that put in the equipment, but instead went to the general budget of the company to be spent where ever they wanted it to go. I know my boss said if he had known that up front he might have held on to one old haul truck just to have a spare. It was nothing to write home about but started and would move stone when needed and passed the latest safety inspection by MSHA!

Another thing was the various plants did not have a chance to grab the equipment that other plants were submitting to the auction. So even if plant A was unloading say a surplus skid-steer that was in better shape than plant B had tough luck!

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Were the big wigs making the decisions planning to go into politics?

Welder Dave said:

Were the big wigs making the decisions planning to go into politics?

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I don't know about that but, at least the top guy always seemed to have it in for our half of the state but the half of the state he came from could never seem to do wrong in his eyes. And yes at one time there were two people running the state but someone higher up who was friends with "you can guess who" decided to "consolidate" the power structure for the state.

Mississippi Lime got bought out/up by Fruin Colnon, Fred Weber, became part of the Weber quarries, was not long before much of the old scrappers were either cut up and gone or buried in some pit to be forgotten. Was a Link Belt 50 tonner rubber tire lattice boom they used out of Warren County, scary POS, some days the operator would have to boom down to reset the sticky Anti 2 Block then go back to lifts, rust bucket I do not think most of the instrumentation Cab or House worked, separate Cummins up in back and a 1160 Cat up front. Air over hydraulic brakes that would slow it to a crawl on grade but was no stopping it so NEVER EVER went in the hole without a drogue drag machine to stop it cabled up. That one was left at the quarry when Weber took over, last I saw boom was on the ground, half the tires flat and much of the easy haul loose metal all gone. Weber as Mertens never sold a used machine, saved for spares or went to a dead line to rot into the dirt until scrap hit high marks then ALL the dead line left.

All I can say is the machines we ever bought at auction or otherwise all got major restoration before we use them. Out of the 10 or so I can think of atleast 7 had rods out the blocks or other troubles. Most are train wrecks. D5c I bought a few weeks ago for example.

Tyler d4c said:

All I can say is the machines we ever bought at auction or otherwise all got major restoration before we use them. Out of the 10 or so I can think of atleast 7 had rods out the blocks or other troubles. Most are train wrecks. D5c I bought a few weeks ago for example.

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Yes, but you went in there with your eyes wide open and you KNEW they were train wrecks before bidding on them. You didn't buy any of them on the basis of an inspection report from the auction house saying every last one of them were "in great shape" or "runs good" did you..?

Tyler d4c said:

All I can say is the machines we ever bought at auction or otherwise all got major restoration before we use them. Out of the 10 or so I can think of atleast 7 had rods out the blocks or other troubles. Most are train wrecks. D5c I bought a few weeks ago for example.

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Yes as long as you assumed they were more or less just a foundation on which you could build a good solid machine and set you top bid price with that clearly in mind and had the skills to do the work there can be many good buys to be had.

kshansen said:

Yes as long as you assumed they were more or less just a foundation on which you could build a good solid machine and set you top bid price with that clearly in mind and had the skills to do the work there can be many good buys to be had.

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Yes pretty much the line of thought we have.

Birken Vogt said:

This thread seems mostly about buyers. Is there anybody on here who has experience selling stuff there?

I'm curious about what happens to the stuff that they shipped off because they did not want it in the auction. Must get sold somewhere, what happens to the seller of such a piece?

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They sell EVERYTHING.
The standards are that it's equipment. Not that it's good equipment. Not that it's running equipment. Just that it's equipment.

xr4ticlone said:

They sell EVERYTHING.
The standards are that it's equipment. Not that it's good equipment. Not that it's running equipment. Just that it's equipment.

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My question was about these rumors of the same junky piece getting bounced from place to place. People saying RB owns it or did not sell high enough. Is any of that true?

If they have a reserve on something then it could show up at another auction.... but I have seen hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of machinery get bought at an auction and then get scrapped all because the buyer didn't realize his 'good deals' would cost more to move than they were worth...

Birken Vogt said:

My question was about these rumors of the same junky piece getting bounced from place to place. People saying RB owns it or did not sell high enough. Is any of that true?

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It could be that some pieces get bought at one auction and when the buyer figures out what is wrong with it after running it a couple hours, takes it to another auction a couple weeks later.

RB makes a ton of money on seller fees and buyer fees. They have a lot of overhead associated with moving their crews all over the place. Cheaper help follows procedures and policies, more expensive help makes judgement calls, as needed to wheel and deal. It just seems to me that they would not bother buying and selling much equipment themselves when so much easier money can be made with their auction monopoly. I remember when they didn't have buyers fees. A monopoly gets greedy as they gain market share. Now they make about 20% on each little piece they sell. Ridiculous.

RB does buy some smaller items to sell like diesel pressure washers and water pumps. They buy a lot of them and get a good deal. The kicker is they have no warranty. As far as equipment it can be anything from used parts to brand new and never used. They have a 5 day auction in Nisku starting tomorrow that has some good newer equipment. I have seen the same item sell at more than one auction. I don't know if RB wanted more money for it or the winning bidder backed out. I've seen bidders at farm auctions back out of items they won. It's also possible someone bought it, couldn't move it or found a problem so just left it there and listed it for the next auction. I think RB added buyers fee's because all the smaller auctions added them. I don't think the crews move around to different auctions that much. I think each auction site has some full time employee's and hires local people to help out on auction days. A guy I went to school with who was a farmer worked at RB on auction days. RB doesn't have reserves for sellers but they do have minimums if the seller has enough machines in the auction. I think you need 6 items minimum to get a minimum guarantee. If 1 or more of the items doesn't bring what RB guesstimated I wonder if that could be why a machine shows up at a later auction???

https://www.rbauction.com/brochures/2019149.pdf

I think there is more than enough opportunity for every auction company to be nefarious...even more so in the massive machine that is RB / Iron Planet.

But given the number of uniformed buyers at most RB auctions the past few years...it's hard to know what's crazy and what's crooked.

Meh........I buy most of my junk from auction.......only because I can't figure out how to afford new stuff. I bought a 2001 JD 120 excavator with about 9 million hours on it a couple years ago. That thing works everyday and all I've had to do to it is clean the fuel tank out. It cost me $13k. I knew the company that owned it and they take decent care of their junk.

I picked up a 2002 F250 service truck with a 7.3 in it 11 months ago, put a battery in it and have been running it everyday since......it doesn't even look like a piece of garbage either. It a pretty respectable looking rig......I gave $1200 for it.

I figure anything I buy at auction I'll need to work on so when something goes wrong I dont get too freaked out about it. Maybe if I can figure out how to get rich I'll start buying new. But I don't think I'll ever stop going to the auctions.