Did I cause this?

[D_W]

Aldi chisels, £8 in shop... selling on eBay for £20 and tagged "As recommended by Paul Sellers". Seriously.
He's the reason why I still can't land a decent condition router plane for sensible money. I bid on a couple just the other day that were at £20, just like Paul buys all his for... Just to be absolutely sure, I bid £65, only to see them suddenly sell for over £80!!
At this rate a brand new Veritas one will be cheaper!

Trolling ebay yesterday to make specialty chisels for planemaking, I saw a seller who was selling a $7 set of HF chisels for $35 with some kind of creative name stamped on them.

(presumably, you guys don't have the magical cosmoline-soaked wonderland that is harbor freight over here).

I did buy a set of those HF chisels years ago, when they were a little less than a dollar each. They're actually not too bad, just oddly long and light. A little soft, but that's not terminal.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Trawling ebay? :lol:

 

[D_W]

Yeah, that. You know we don't speak English over here.

 

[nabs]

At this rate a brand new Veritas one will be cheaper!

even with the recently inflated prices the oldies are still good value compared to Veritas. I am not sure if Sellers has mentioned buying one of these too, but according to this ebay ad Vertitas prices* are shooting up also .

* to be fair postage is free. 66 sold!

 

[D_W]

At this rate a brand new Veritas one will be cheaper!

even with the recently inflated prices the oldies are still good value compared to Veritas. I am not sure if Sellers has mentioned buying one of these too, but according to this ebay ad Vertitas prices* are shooting up also .
View attachment 310240869289


* to be fair postage is free. 66 sold!

I wonder if they ran out , or if it's an automatic price escalator. One of the fairly antisocial new things on ebay now is for vendors to use an automatic price escalation. Stuff starts low, the vendor sells a dozen or two and then you go back to the item a week or two later and find that the price has gone *way* up, leading people just casually browsing to think that several dozen have sold at a high price. It's deceptive, and intentionally so.

Either something like that, a typo, or they're just out of stock due to a mistake quantity in the listing.

Five years ago, I sold a 10x2 escher stone on ebay. I did something wrong in the listing, and the listing said I had two. I didn't notice it right away, but when I did, I set the price for the "second" one to $4000 (ebay said it was an auction, so I couldn't end it early, it took a day or so for their CS to get the message that I didn't have anything and close the auction - thankfully, those rules have changed and you can end them sooner).

My listing popped up in the "wall of shame" in a shaving forum instantly, with several dozen posts talking about the "horrible guy trying to pull one over on people" until I said "that's mine, I made a mistake in the listing and don't have the quantity listed so I increased the price by a factor of 10 so that nobody would order it until Ebay CS takes the auction down". Sort of bummed everyone out that someone wasn't really trying to get $4k for a stone that should've been $400.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

The silly price just means the item is out of stock, afaik.

 

[paulrockliffe]

The silly price just means the item is out of stock, afaik.

That happens a lot as it's easier than taking a listing down and putting it back up again and you might get lucky....

 

[Tasky]

you can answer that question yourself by looking at sold (e.g) Record no 4s on ebay - all the ones for less that 30 quid that I just looked at seemed perfectly serviceable. Of course if you are not prepared to put in a bit of elbow grease and want a pristine one then you have to pay more.

Actually a good few of them in rather good condition... Didn't see much of that when I was looking a couple of months ago. £20 would get you one that was very rusty on the base. £30 was the absolute minimum if you wanted it simply clear of orange...
Saying that, there's not much between these £18 ones and the £57+ ones. I did lose a good number of bids to snipers, so maybe that's what's doing it... or could the variances be seasonal?

 

[D_W]

you can answer that question yourself by looking at sold (e.g) Record no 4s on ebay - all the ones for less that 30 quid that I just looked at seemed perfectly serviceable. Of course if you are not prepared to put in a bit of elbow grease and want a pristine one then you have to pay more.

Actually a good few of them in rather good condition... Didn't see much of that when I was looking a couple of months ago. £20 would get you one that was very rusty on the base. £30 was the absolute minimum if you wanted it simply clear of orange...
Saying that, there's not much between these £18 ones and the £57+ ones. I did lose a good number of bids to snipers, so maybe that's what's doing it... or could the variances be seasonal?

It's hard to get a decent deal on ebay if you're not sniping, too. I gave into it years ago. You can line up bids on ten different items all at once and turn them off once you win one. With ebay's bidding system, it's just a complete hassle instead. They *should* set that kind of bidding software up on their own page - it would encourage people to buy more because it would make it easier to line up purchases vs. getting sniped three times in a row and going somewhere else.

In Japan, the proxy services for external buyers automatically have that built in, and the auctions bump extra time on from each bid until the bid stops so that you can't just get sniped in 3 seconds by someone. It sucks if you think you've won and then time gets extended for 6 more minutes, but the overall result is much more fair. There are restrictions there on snipe bids, too, to prevent people from getting excited and overbidding.

 

[nabs]

agreed on sniping - it does work, although I am not sure if there is free sniping software available anymore (when I was buying the software I was using was free - with some limitations - no longer sadly).

The prices for second hand tools are indeed variable on ebay. As has been said earlier on it only takes a small number of people to be after something that does not come up every 5 minutes to raise the price significantly (particularly if they have not done much research and/or don't care about the price).

And of course it is true tha Mr Sellers has an impact if he posts about a particular tool, although in my experience it is temporary. For instance, in his latest workbench videos he has recommended using a router - even though he says they are optional it is not surprising that a lot of people new to hand tools and starting with his bench will now be looking for one. It should calm down again in a month or two when his series is complete.

What I found when purchasing my tools was the number one skill with ebay is patience. Since there are still a *lot* of old tools being sold on ebay uk, if you wait long enough and are prepared to regularly wade through poorly photographed/described listings (or to pounce on good BINs) you can generally get what you want at a good price. If you want absolute bargains, you may have to wait months though...

 

[D_W]

agreed on sniping - it does work, although I am not sure if there is free sniping software available anymore (when I was buying the software I was using was free - with some limitations - no longer sadly).

The prices for second hand tools are indeed variable on ebay. As has been said earlier on it only takes a small number of people to be after something that does not come up every 5 minutes to raise the price significantly (particularly if they have not done much research and/or don't care about the price).

And of course it is true tha Mr Sellers has an impact if he posts about a particular tool, although in my experience it is temporary. For instance, in his latest workbench videos he has recommended using a router - even though he says they are optional it is not surprising that a lot of people new to hand tools and starting with his bench will now be looking for one. It should calm down again in a month or two when his series is complete.

What I found when purchasing my tools was the number one skill with ebay is patience. Since there are still a *lot* of old tools being sold on ebay uk, if you wait long enough and are prepared to regularly wade through poorly photographed/described listings (or to pounce on good BINs) you can generally get what you want at a good price. If you want absolute bargains, you may have to wait months though...

I think the snipe programs now are about 1% or something of the winning bid. If you don't win, you don't pay. I know I save a lot more than the price of the sniping, but it should be built into ebay in the first place so that you can line up bids when you need something. Then it takes 2 or 3 days to get something reasonable, and you can go back and terminate the rest of the pending bids.

Sellers and Schwarz can both create problems. Several years ago, Schwarz posted glowing reviews of hand miter boxes. There were people asking (and getting) $400 for clean millers falls miter boxes. It was absurd. At the same time, you could go "off grid" and find one for $25 at some flea markets, but the online market was ruined. I'll bet there are a lot of those collecting dust in shops now, but people won't ditch them because they remember that a famous blogger said they were good (I already had one, so it was no skin to me, but I though it was pretty misguided).

Schwarz can be outright dishonest, too. He posted a blog stating that people should buy Lie Nielsen's $160+ draw knife because they are so hard to find here. I posted a response on his blog that they generally can be found in any place other than a brand new city with no history and no antiques - for $20 or so, and you repeatedly see them when you're trying to find things that are more rare. I accused him of just trying to manufacture a notion to sell tools, and he said something along the lines of "well, that's sort of the point" of it.

 

[Tasky]

It should calm down again in a month or two when his series is complete.

That's coming out one ep per fortnight, so probably not done until at least February... Been trying for a router plane since I started this. Not seen a single one with a BIN price. Marples chisels have gone the same way and I wonder how many have bought Irwin blue handle or Rhubarb & Custard sets...

I accused him of just trying to manufacture a notion to sell tools, and he said something along the lines of "well, that's sort of the point" of it.

What a complete ****.....!!
Well he's off my love list, then. He can go jogging on next to Rob Cosman™, if that's his attitude.

 

[nabs]

Wade and Marples chisels always command a premium, but there are plenty of other makers from the same period that made good quality chisels too. You can look for chisels stamped 'cast steel' for a reasonable indication that it was a quality item when made, and if the the bolster has a series of flats (compared to a smooth round bolster) then it was probably hand-forged, in which case it was made in an era when high quality cast steel was a common choice for tools - no guarantee it was used, so you will have to look for other clues like how well it is finished.

 

[D_W]

I think he does have honest intentions, and that is that the people running those companies are his friends, and he feels some duty to support what is more or less a person to person boutique business environment.

I went back and tracked down the post. I thought his response back then was to me, but it was to the post above mine (the guy said the same thing, though - that this wasn't an area where the used market correlated with rare or high priced). His response was:

"I thought it was called Capitalism, Industry, Making Things, American — stuff like that.

Chris"

The quote I recall about "that's the point" is probably in another blog post, but he's saying the same thing in that blog. Over here in the boutique market, it's sort of presented as an obligation to support toolmakers, etc.

I couldn't remember what else rubbed me wrong about that article, so I went and re-read his comments (more on this same notion in a second). In his post, he said it took him 45 minutes to prep LN's draw knife. The vintage knife that he'd tried before took "a day" and he still couldn't use it with effect.

Maybe it's incompetence.

There was a separate post that he had about "false economy" of buying used tools, where he was trying to state as fact that it's much cheaper to buy a set of $350 chisels and a pouch from LN than it is to buy used chisels and use them. That may be where my stranded blog response is, but I can't find the post.

And another where he tells everyone that they should buy expensive shop clothes, because inexpensive shop clothes are false economy.

I didn't know that we need to buy "shop clothes". Is there a helmet or something? Cleats?

It's absurd. I can't think of anything that he's made that's notable, I can't think of a time that I went to find a drawknife and couldn't find one, and I can't think of the last chisel that I spent more than 20 minutes on. I know for sure that none of my drawknives took more than 20 minutes to prep.

it's his gimmick I guess, working with beginners and trying to avoid the inevitable skill of preparing or making tools. And trying to impress upon the market that we must support boutique makers as an obligation related thing. A bit too close to the handwringing of the wranglerstar types for me (he being the type who always gives you a link that refers a few bucks back to him if you fall for his foolishness - at least Chris doesn't do that).

(I wasn't aware that sellers was talking constantly about router planes now - I guess that market is ruined until a few months after he stops talking about them .Might be a good time to sell if you have an extra one, though).

 

[D_W]

Stanley 71s..... I bought my first one for about 40 or 45 bucks from walt quadrato over here a decade ago. Nobody was racing to buy it, it was an old stock item that he had. It came with two cutters.

I see that ebay now is averaging about a hundred bucks or a little more for a clean one. There are examples on the nicer side with one cutter (which look similar to the one I bought from a dealer) that sold for $130+ :shock:

that's the power of blogging, I guess.

 

[Tasky]

There was a separate post that he had about "false economy" of buying used tools, where he was trying to state as fact that it's much cheaper to buy a set of $350 chisels and a pouch from LN than it is to buy used chisels and use them.

Ah... I think I know where he's coming from in that respect.
He's American (or possibly Canadian, but both have the same problem) - There is very little in the way of second-hand tools over that side of the pond, compared to the UK. Most of what they do have is rusted up junk and you'd be hard pressed to restore them.
I pineappled of the Rob Cosman™ fanboys with my remarks about buying cheaper second hand tools, rather than dropping several hundred quid on the All-Singing™, All-Dancing™ Innovative™ Rob Cosman™ Dovetail™ Saw™... the supposedly new innovative features of which are all pretty much what's on my WH Clay saw from about 1870-something, that cost me £14 incl postage.
The early responses I got, including one from Rob™ himself, were all saying that restoring tools is not worth it. Seemingly second-hand is synonymous with 'rusted and wrecked' over there and it's only when I gave examples of UK 2nd hand tools in fine fettle with just the barest hint of patina, that an educated fella pointed out the difference - They don't have any original Stanley No 4 planes at sensible prices, or at least not enough for everyone in the country who wants one.
So assuming that is all true, their only choice is the Rob Cosman™ type new stuff generally.

And another where he tells everyone that they should buy expensive shop clothes, because inexpensive shop clothes are false economy.

Cor, flippin' Americans.... It's a WORKshop, dammitt!!
A workshop is where you do work, such as woodwork. A shop is where you go to buy things... although I can see why there is some confusion with remarks like, "Hi, I'm Rob Cosman, welcome to my SHOP - Here's a video on how good the expensive carp that I sell".

And yes, I've developed a real hatred of Cosman™. The more he talks about the wonderful work he's doing, the more he sounds like he's quite openly ripping people off.

I didn't know that we need to buy "shop clothes". Is there a helmet or something? Cleats?

Based on what I've seen of him, such outfits look to comprise Ben Sherman shirts and Chinos... maybe some jeans, if the Smart Casual look is too formal, but certainly nothing that looks even vaguely workshoppy.

It's absurd. I can't think of anything that he's made that's notable

A profit from advertising? :lol:

I wasn't aware that sellers was talking constantly about router planes now - I guess that market is ruined until a few months after he stops talking about them .Might be a good time to sell if you have an extra one, though.

He's used routers ever since I've been watching his vids. Both Workbench projects make use of it. A couple of times he mentions that you can easily find these on eBay for about £20... Not seen any good ones for less than thrice that.

 

[D_W]

lots of things...

Chris S. would've had some obligation at the time (implied or otherwise) at PW to avoid saying things that would slow the sale of advertisers' tools.

We *do* have a lot of vintage tools over here, probably nominally more than you do in the UK, but they are in spots, because not all of the country is old. For example, if you go to flea markets in Connecticut, you'll probably have no problem matching or beating boot sales in the UK. If you go to phoenix, you'll probably find a lot of sand while you're looking for tools that aren't on the ground there.

Chris and others will often talk about how important receipt of a perfectly ready tool is because they are dealing with the most incompetent segment of the woodworking population. Beginners and repeat class takers. The competent woodworkers have their face in their work and they're not really interested in being told what they can and can't do. Class woodworkers often want to be told what to do, and an instructor is going to do two things:
* try to figure out the path of least resistance to having ham handed users holding tools that can work
* ponder then who to send those folks to, and that's going to be friends that they meet at trade shows

I have said a couple of times in the past that I make my own infill planes because paying someone $3000 to make a nice hand finished plane makes little sense from a functional standpoint. I've also criticized $60 marking knives that have $1 of materials in them, and in both cases, I received (on US forums) a rash of PMs saying that "you can't say those things, they're just your opinion". In both cases, they were from vendors who attend the same shows as the folks sending me irate PMs. The way they went about minding my own business was particularly offputting - first pretending to offer a "friendly suggestion" and stating that I probably just didn't know what I was talking about, and then throwing a fit when I said I'd rely on my own opinions.

I am not a "comptent woodworker" compared to any real pros, or super intense amateurs, but I'm far enough along to realize that sooner or later, unless you're just building plain tables or something, you'll have to make or restore some tools. It takes less time to get good at restoring tools (quickly) than it does to puzzle about which premium tools to get.

I'm also far enough along to realize that I prefer vintage tools to new ones, because the aspects of them are slightly better for actually getting work done if you're working mostly with hand tools (the weight, the principles of sharpenability of the irons, the lack of machining perfection on their soles - which means less friction than the premium planes).

When Rob and others make tools (my opinions) and push them, it's certainly good for their pockets to some extent (Rob started out selling his dovetail saw for $699 in the US, and lobbied the other makers to increase their prices, which didn't work, of course - it's not like others hadn't thought about their own businesses), but I'm sure it's also a matter of predictability of what the ham-handers are doing in class. They also have captive audiences in those classes with a me-too kind of thing going. If someone shows up with a saw that's out of nick, they see 10 people around them using the patented class saw, such a person is an ideal candidate for an impulse purchase.

Chris could be worse by miles. I hear he's a nice guy, and I'm sure he is. He also isn't as competent as he's made out to be, but most of his audience doesn't know the difference between him or Alan Peters or George Wilson. And Chris (sometimes referred to as "saw jammer") doesn't handle technique critiques from George very well.

 

[D_W]

In terms of tools on the ground, there are two things that we don't have here that you have there in droves...possibly three:
* very good wooden planes (you can find one from time to time, but not like you can in England). You can find gobs of auburn and ohio tool wooden planes here, but they are the end of the line for wooden tools, and they're made like it. Hollows and rounds tend to be rarer in organized sets, and many also have the characteristics of extreme labor minimization, which results in banana shaped planes, etc.
* we don't have the supply of good tang chisels and carving tools that you have over there, and same with paring chisels. Those are fairly rare.

Anything that occurs due to industrial practice rather than trade skill (stanley planes, construction chisels, etc), we've got lots of those things. The hand-wringers are usually those who believe in England, you have a supply of planes that are already fitted despite 75 years of disuse, or folks who think someone should provide a website with links of cleaned and prepared $10 metal planes.

Care for older items tends to have been better in England, too. The push for modernity in the US resulted in "throw it away" for nearly all tools. Even valuable tools, as they were seen as valueless until very recently, except for the few that are rare enough to have had collectors' eyes (stanley 1s, narrow stanley 750 chisels, miller patent planes, etc).

A coworker of mine had a grandfather who was a lifelong collector of planes. He had 1600, never woodworked, just liked to buy the planes. He had two number ones, a couple of other valuable planes and mostly common stuff. At his estate sale, the planes were auctioning for a quarter each by the end of the day (even the dealers had enough and didn't want anything that wasn't great).

 

[AndyT]

Dave, thanks for those posts. To this amateur woodworker with an interest in old tools, they make a lot of sense.

It's a bit galling to see the volume of old UK tools still getting bought by US makers - I guess it's a combination of rarity on your side, plus the presence of all those obedient beginners with deep pockets and a favourable exchange rate. On the plus side, as more people realise that some old tools are worth a bit, the number who just throw tools away might diminish.

But it still rankles to watch Patrick Leach gathering up a truckload of goodies at any David Stanley auction. :evil:

 

[Tasky]

Chris S. would've had some obligation at the time (implied or otherwise) at PW to avoid saying things that would slow the sale of advertisers' tools.

Ugh, more marketing...
That's something I quite like about Paul Sellers - He's not really beholden to anyone, that I know of, so is free to point out for example that Bahco saw files are excellent but Bahco sliding bevels are utter gash.

We *do* have a lot of vintage tools over here, probably nominally more than you do in the UK, but they are in spots, because not all of the country is old.

Exactly - Spread those tools between every seeking woodworker across the whole country and, as I understand it anyway, it will probably work out to fewer choices for the average Joiner-Joe than in the UK for Cooper-Colin.

Chris and others will often talk about how important receipt of a perfectly ready tool is because they are dealing with the most incompetent segment of the woodworking population. Beginners and repeat class takers.

To begin with, maybe. People are more likely to stick at something if they start to see some kind of result or product fairly early on, I suppose... But they will seemingly forever remain beginners - The Rob Cosman™ Dovetail Saw™ means you can cut perfect dovetails straight out of the box, assuming you also use the Rob Cosman™ Saw-Trainer™ so you know when you're cutting plum as well as being one... There's no development of any actual skill, it seems, because the tool (according to the marketing blurb) replaces or replicates the need for it.
I guess that's how you capture the market?

I received (on US forums) a rash of PMs saying that "you can't say those things, they're just your opinion".

You can, as it's Freedom of Speech stuff, backed up by your own findings and experiences, which is kinda the point.

It takes less time to get good at restoring tools (quickly) than it does to puzzle about which premium tools to get.

Don't even need to ponder - The Rob Cosman™ video will tell you... I'm starting to see that 'being told' aspect you mentioned!

Rob started out selling his dovetail saw for $699 in the US

:shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :roll:

but I'm sure it's also a matter of predictability of what the ham-handers are doing in class.

They also have captive audiences in those classes with a me-too kind of thing going. If someone shows up with a saw that's out of nick, they see 10 people around them using the patented class saw, such a person is an ideal candidate for an impulse purchase.

As I'm reliably informed by the man Himself™, his classes are mostly 50+ males, usually retired or on their way, who "don't have time to restore old junk and learn skills"... so retired, ie lots of money to chuck and (potentially) not much time left in which to chuck it... Yup, captive market ripe for ripping off.

As for the "restore", that was just because of the Throwaway mentality you mentioned, meaning most of what's left probably is utter junk, especially if not looked after.

Not sure if Chris is any good at all. I do hear his name a lot, but having watched some videos mostly about him plugging "Lee-Nelson", there is a certain something about him that just doesn't ring completely true.