[Milsurplus] Re: kicking ourselves for what we didnt buy back then

[Bob Camp]

Hi

I think one notable difference then versus now is the amount of gear 
produced.

Except for the Viet Nam era we have really not gone very crazy making 
tons of radios since WW II. For one reason or the other a lot more 
electronics came back here after WW II than it did after 'Nam. Stuff 
like the ARC-5's came on the market almost as soon as the war was over. 
There was enough of it that it was still for sale NIB thirty years 
later. Things like the PRC-77 still have not shown up in volume on the 
surplus market.

That still begs the question of what is out there. The only point is 
that stuff like the ARC-5 and ART-13's was kept at an artificially low 
price for an awfully long time. Part of the "ramp up" in prices is 
simply that they were darn cheap to start with. Since we have less 
stuff going surplus these days the price isn't being forced as low by 
oversupply.

All that said here's what I would call "comparable" radios:

The Harris RF-550 and Racal 6790GM. Both are darn good radios. Both go 
in the $500 range. They are not $20 but twenty dollars doesn't go as 
far as it once did.

The long produced R-1051. Again a darn good radio, but not well loved. 
Currently $350 or so.

For that matter R-390's are still down in the $400 to 500 range. Again 
a darn good radio.

The only problem with all this is that none of them are "cheap". If we 
had made 100X as many of them and then flodded the market with new in 
the box radios I suspect they would all be down in the $200 range. At 
least in my book that would make them cheap. It would also put them on 
a par with the WW II surplus stuff.

Still does not answer your question though.

Here's my best guess - Tube based test equipment. This stuff *is* down 
in the $20 to $50 range for a lot of it. That *does* put it at the same 
price as the ARC-5 gear in the good old days. Right now there's an 
enormous amount of test gear on the market. That's pushed the prices of 
the older stuff into the basement. For that matter the prices of even 
the newer gear are amazingly low.

Just because the stuff is cheap today does not mean it will get more 
valuable as time goes on. An equal number of dollars put into BC-453's 
and ARC-3's in 1960 would not result in the same number of dollars when 
you sold the radios in 2004. The same goes for test gear today. One 
item in 10 will attract attention and the rest will go by the wayside.

So best guess:

Analog meters are cool = Volt meters, Power meters, Current meters

Name brands hold value = HP, Fluke, GR, Weston, L&N

My personal weakness are Weston meters ....

	Take Care!

		Bob Camp	
		KB8TQ






On Sep 15, 2004, at 7:02 PM, BOEING377 at aol.com wrote:

> We all kick ourselves for not having bought NOS ARC 5s etc when they 
> were
> dirt cheap, but what similar surplus opportunities present themselves 
> today? Are
> there any? Aircraft instruments are going to become rare as glass 
> cockpits
> become the norm. Are we going to kick ourselves for not having bought 
> some of
> these when they were relatively cheap and plentiful? What about 
> currently
> available radios? Somehow I don't see ARC 58s or ARC 102s becoming 
> highly
> collectable, and I don't think any NOS units were sold surplus, but 
> who knows? The cheap
> new PRT 4s and PRR 9s (squad radios) are largely ignored, but thats 
> just what
> we did with the cheap NOS ARC 5 stuff. We thought it would always be 
> there.
> Your thoughts on present opportunities that we will be kicking 
> ourselves for not
> pursuing if we live another decade or two?
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