I was at that auction in Tulsa a couple of years ago. That auctioneer did a fantastic job. These pins had been stored close to Oklahoma City. The auctioneer trucked them to Tulsa to a location he had rented for the purpose, and got some real good prices for his client. The pins were all set up and turned on and playable. The auctioneer had bidders on the phone. If you were out of state, he was set up that you had a week to make arrangements for shipping.

A local OP saw the success of that auction and put his own pins up for sale. This is the auction where a Game Plan Cyclopes sold for $5200.00 and shipped out of state. An EBD with the small back glass setup brought $2200.00 dollars. The prices were going for high dollars.

Although a number of pinsiders were 2nd guessing him ( is that a surprise?) this auctioneer did an excellent job at both auctions.

EDIT: Those pins in Tulsa were properly stored. They were not from some falling down, leaky-roof chicken shed.

I appreciate you thinking of us. But when the Tulsa auctioneer sold those pins in Tulsa and later Wichita, I met people from all over the country. At Tulsa, the Interstate highway system converges at Tulsa. Some prospective buyers were disenchanted because this auctioneer squeezed maximum value for his clients. The buyers' paid up. There were no deals.

I might know someone who might be interested in some pool tables. I'll make contact with him.

Yeah, but without the boards or back glass you will be in for the search of a lifetime.

You want all for free and will make it be gone by the end of the month? You give me a $5,000.00 deposit and when it is all gone in 30 days I will give you your deposit back.

That's the only way you could separate the real cleaner-outer from the wide eyed passer-by. Otherwise, you will cherry picked, half the stuff will be gone, you will have wasted a month and still have half the stuff to still deal with and you will have to pay to haul it off.

Sure, you could draw up a contingency plan, and then call the lawyers.

My pool table contact has not worked out so far. It would be sad to see the pool tables wind up in a landfill.

I'm local. I would like to have that neon back glass light setup for a project. If the price is right...maybe I could pick this up. But I have no interest in any Gottlieb parts. So.....

I counted 8 pins. Cyclopes is the only one you could argue any kind of value for. And a guy in Texas is going to drive all the way up and spend a fortune on gas.? Someone is going to have to have a truck big enough to haul all the unwanted stuff away. Truck rental, maybe. And then there are landfill fees. And in motel bills and that sounds like a money loser from the word "go".

A new Valley pool table is priced at $2800.00 dollars so if someone was needing some pool tables that could help make the money work out.

I know where the warehouse is at now. I'm less than 30 miles away. And there is no way I would take that on. I'd help by getting the pins out of his way and pay a few bucks for the privilege, and if he wants to rent the truck, etc., I'll help load the trash up to be hauled off.

But to come up all the way from Texas? I can't see it.

I understand you were just saying what you were told. If the seller has a buyer-for-it-all lined up he has to go with that. That is what I would do.
I have done a couple of pin chases that were a stretch to justify, but this one is way out there.

I see some value there because I am close. You are not that far away. Nice clean Bally stainless coin doors are getting hard to find. If these have not been vandalized then they are worth a little bit. It would be nice if the lockdown bars are in a bucket somewhere. Someone mentioned the drop targets on EBD.

But as you state, nothing is worth that warehouse full of nasty labor.

Like you, I see value in that EDB cab. I don't see any water damage and cab floors are easy to replace. And the play field on the LE looks like it might have some possibilities, and perhaps combine the two, but you will be hunting for a back glass.

I have a friend with a restored Cyclopes play field. So even with the crapped on play field, I think all of the other parts can be salvaged, such as the pop caps and plastics. But he would still be hunting for boards and that cool back glass will be a Holy Grail item. It still has the displays in the back box.

It is Asian. I worked with a Dung Le. It took me. awhile to figure out his name was not Dungle. It is sort of like Phuket Thailand.

I envision a bumper sticker saying something like this:
If you can't fix it then (in small letters now---take a vacation to ) Phuket.

Here is another one: " The Hungarian word for kiss is 'puszi' and it is pronounced very similarly to the English word 'pussy'".

https://www.reddit.com/r/FalseFriends/comments/20y0lf/the_hungarian_word_for_kiss_is_puszi_and_it_is/

So, imagine yourself sitting in your office next to the Hungarian immigrant telling his girlfriend " puszi puszi" on the phone.

Gee, your post generated a down vote. Raccoon lover, maybe?

No. It is still there.

Screen Shot 2021-01-08 at 7.31.04 PM (resized).png

Since Spangles is a local franchise and you are from Texas, a mere 700 miles away, would you care to regale us with your story of driving all those miles to clean up a load of raccoon crap and find value when us locals were finding it hard to even let go of a bag of quarters ? I can't speak the others, but I am the nosey type and would love to hear your trade secrets. Or read about them. You could probably sells tickets.

I already know about Spangle's French fries so you can keep that part of the story to yourself

PM sent.

I made a deal with dc2010 and salvaged a Stern coin door from some unidentified Stern video cabinet. There are some very nice Williams coin doors over there. Most of them are the black painted/power coated style. They look almost new so if your coin door has been trashed from vandal action you might be able to upgrade from his inventory.

This is what the Cyclopes did look like.

980fb0cfbbe2388e7f1716da95b1bd38278d6871 (resized).jpg

I just got back from salvaging a coin door. dc2010 did a little bit of clean up. Judging from this small area that cleaned up, it looks like it will clean up nicely. The inserts are not cupped. All of the parts are there; The play field is complete. The cleaned area shows no sign of planking. Maybe when he gets it all stripped down something will pop up and make it a complete waste. But so far, so good.

The plastics will clean up. They have some warp and will need straightened. The colors are still there.

He will need a lockdown bar, the circuit boards, one more score display, and a back glass. The cabinet is in good condition and need 2-3 minor touch ups. And one of 400 units can live again.

For the squeamish among you, get a paint mask with vapor filters, a heavy duty set of rubber gloves, a pair of disposable overalls, a shop vac, and go to work. I spent some time growing up on my grandparents farm where shoveling shit happened from time to time. This will take some work but it is quite doable.

IMG_5444 (resized).JPG

You bring up a real possibility. My first pin, A Bally Playboy did that. All this powder started showing up. By the time I was finished, that black area with the rabbit looked like whitewood. The only history I had on that was that there was a mud dauber's nest inside the back box.

I bought a Gottlieb Target Pool that had been living in basement. I had to knock the floor out and there were nests on the play field, but that play field cleaned up nice and held up after the Novus clean up.

There is that risk of paint/ wood separation but that will be his risk. All I can say is that the area that was cleaned up looks good enough to do the labor of love and proceed. It is not something I would consider with an average pin. But Cyclopes, IMO, is worth the risk of giving a clean up for a good look-see. The cabinet has a home with someone else in the wings if it does not work out.

DC told me someone was buying the EBD cabinet. You probably got there right after I left with my coin door.

I made another trip to the warehouse to pick up the Game Plan Agent 777 cab and play field for a friend. This play field was fairly clean because the back glass was just laying across the top and offered some protection. The back glass itself was trash.

A little more of the poop was cleaned off of the Cyclopes play field. It is going to clean up nicely so far as I can tell, at this point in time.

IMG_5483 (resized).JPG

IMG_5484 (resized).JPG

I do see some small areas up in the upper left that have some moisture ( urine ) damage but nothing that Keith in Ft. Worth can't fix.

IMG_5485 (resized).JPG

Perhaps when DC2010 gets it all cleaned up something ugly will rear its head, but right now, it is still worth the elbow grease needed to clean it up. None, not one, of the inserts are cupped. I wish he did not want keep it. For 400 units produced it is worth the time to try and save it.

For the pinballers, this warehouse is a good exercise in the relative value of an item. We have heart attacks when we see pics of pinballs turned into coffee tables or worse, seeing them sitting out by the dumpster, etc. I went to the for the pins only.

I am not a video game person. I played them a little bit in their day, but was not good at them and had little interest in going broke trying to learn them.

So, while I would shudder upon seeing a pinball out by the dumpster, I couldn't care less about a video game. I do not know their value or their worth. And some people have the same knowledge about pinball machines; Not working---trash it.

It is all relative.
==============================================================================

There is a Gottlieb Bounty Hunter pin in the warehouse that is going to go begging. Nice solid cab and back box. The play field is OK. But no back glass, no boards. Only 32 pinsiders own a Bounty Hunter and only 38 want a Bounty Hunter. If someone does not go buy it, I may be tempted to have another look. There might be enough similarities in cab design that I could convert for use on in a classic Stern build. this would leave me with a play field that would have no useful purpose other than being a wall hanging or a coffee table.

Someone needs to go buy that pin so I won't be tempted. The same goes for an EM Chicago Coin pitch-n-bat. It has a decent back glass and a decent play field and good solid cabinet. But it is dirty and there is a minor bit of poop to scrape off.

If no one steps up, these will go to the crusher.

Sad part is that Bounty Hunter looks like it would be fun to play. But the Pinside price of $800.00 does not leave any room to fix it up without being buried in it.

Thanks for warning me off of that cabinet. I loathe MDF and Walmart loves MDF for use in its furniture. This one looks like a good candidate to be a coffee table.

BG Resto makes the Black Pyramid repro back glass and the one in the warehouse does have a decent play field.

But City of Gold and Bounty Hunter have no such option.

If I knew how to work on EMs I might try to save the pitch-n-bat. But it would be a labor of love only. And my hands are full with the direction that I am already going.

I'll talk to my cousin again and see if he will change his mind since you got it to work.

Always the problem. You are here. The parts are there. The parts have value but not enough value to get them from here to there. The warehouse is located about 5 minutes from I-35. Michelle at STI could get some one to ship it but shipping cost eats up the value.

I did not look closely at City of Gold but what I did see looked solid. It is in a dry area of the warehouse. As mentioned in another post, the warehouse is located 5 minutes from I-35 with Wichita on one end and Kansas City on the other. KC will get you to anywhere on the east coast. Wichita will get you to Oklahoma City and Denver and to anywhere on the gulf coast and west coast.

When dc2010 gets back with me we are going to try and scan the Cyclopes cabinet and back box for the cabinet artwork. Pinball Pimp has cab stencils for 3 Game Plan pins, but Cyclopes is not one of the three.

Gottlieb produced 905 City of Gold's.

IIRC, the COG play field looked to be in good condition. As noted, this pin lives in a dry area of the warehouse. I also do not recall seeing and poop on this one. But I did not go over it with a fine tooth comb. I don't know if the displays are there, or not.

If you have a back glass, then all you would need are the boards and a play field glass.

Not my kind of pin and I am out of room or I could consider it.

No.

dc2010 found out that some lady from nearby was feeding a bunch of cats at some point in time. So it is cat poop instead of coon poop.

I have a cat and the daily chore is emptying the cat box. Cleaning off the play field is not much different.

The El Dorado City of Gold and Bounty Hunter have found new homes.

A back glass for the City of Gold has been located. This one will live again. The Black Pyramid is gone; Since BG Restso makes repro backglasses for BP, it will come back to life as well.

A back glass for the Bounty Hunter has been located. This pin will also live again.

IMG_6760 (resized).JPG

IMG_6761 (resized).JPG