Here's one you don't see everyday. How bout the no reserve? Should be an interesting auction to watch! Any predictions?

Dave
HL102 on ebay

I saw this listing this morning when I was checking out ebay. I knew from the forums and from the Official Guide it was a find.
I also knew it was rare to have low starting bid and no reserve.

Unfortunately also knew it was out of my price range at the moment.
I have put it on watch to see how it ends. Interesting indeed!!

Probably will end up out of my price range, but I will keep an eye on it.

Miracles do happen.

It is already out of my price range and besides...it looks funny! LOL

Take a look at the bidders. E-Bay is now hiding their identities.

ebay recently started hiding the identities of bidders once the bids exceed a certain amount. Not sure what that is, but the early bidders were identified by their usernames, but now that the bids have gone past that certain amount, all bidders, past and future, are anonymous.
(I think!)

Dave

My guess would be that ebay started to hid the bidder names because many of us will not bid if we recognize someone that we know that has all ready made a bid. Bidders use to be able to email back and forth. One bidder would back off letting the other take the bid and then next time it would be his turn.

This is just another scheme of ebay trying to control the board to make the bid go up.
Eventually ebay will learn all our tricks and loopholes for finding good ebay bids.
That will be the day we lose interest and will not collect anymore thru ebay.

Daniel, don't you suppose another reason is to keep another seller from trying to derail a bid and steal the sale away from the person who is paying eBay by offering the buyer a better deal on the same item?

Dave,

I think your on the right track. Private sales have always diluted profits.
That is probably more common than bidder collusion.

Yeah!!! It's already way past what I can spend.

Interesting logic everyone has for why Ebay is hidding the bidders user names.

DANIEL,

I firmly believe that you are absolutely correct.

bobo

That too.

I read on Ebay that they were going to start hiding the bidder's names due to the amount of private offers that were being made, cutting Ebay out of their due. The hiding has been going on for a couple of weeks now.

Anybody care to estimate what the winning bid may be? The scary part is shipping the piece securely so it doesn't get damaged in shipment.

Bob

The reasoning EBay has posted is this...
If you click on the history of bids within the listing, it will take you to that page with this info at the top.

This goes along with what Melody said.

Judy

I feel the market is a little tight right now. I think this very rare piece will sell well below its true value. I would guess it will go for around $2300-$2500.

Any one else care to guess?

Bob

You got to watch those last few minutes. This one doesn't come around too often. I say it hits $3000.

Too rich for me!

$1475 with 7 days still to go!

Numerous bids on that rare HL so far. There must be some serious collectors involved. I won't be bidding but if I was, I would certaily have the "hee-bee-jee-bees" (when is the last time you heard that expression?)about shipping the piece cross country.

The quality lives on long after the price is forgotten! (As long as it arrives okay!)

Bob

WOW! That is exciting! It is currently at $1475.01 with 6 days left....AMAZING!

Anyone else notice the bottom appears to have green suede-felt? Like the stuff from Malaysia? Thought these were all made in California and should have grey lamp base felt.

What we are looking at is a California mold that was shipped to Canada and then refurbished. The classification for this light would be a “Canadian HL-102 mold I”. Even though the mold itself was made in California the ownership was switched to Canada. It was then either painted or touched up to look like the standard Canadian version which is the Dark hunter green lighthouse tip and the gray base. The “Canadian mold I” will always have the green felt. As far as I know, you will not find a Canadian sticker on the earlier Canadian pieces either. The other foolproof sign that it is a Canadian ownership is Castle studios written on the box. A pure California made came with a plain brown box and the full gray felt.

Good catch John.
You are right about the felt. This one does look more like the Malyasian felt instead of The Flocking that is used with Canadians.
I am thinking that maybe some of the very early Canadian that had a California mold may have use a standard green felt. I do have a very early North head with the full green felt. Don't remember if it looked flocked or not.

Pretty exciting huh . I put the first bid on this baby . Just wanted to sayI made a bid on one. The first $100 was mine. It lasted all of about 2 hours I think :rolleyes: . But it was fun anyway.

Up to 30 bids now. Current price is $1,775.01.


And it still has 4+ days to go.

You guys are too low.
It will go for between $3400 to $3600

Only at $1875 with 22 hours left as of this post.

There will be a last minute rush near the end, and even though that piece is worth many dollars more than my estimate, I'll stick with my original estimate listed in the above quote.

Bob

With 11 plus hours to go it is $3,077.08 ....

This is getting SERIOUS now!

It looks like Bidder #10 and #11 are in a "winner take all -- fight 'til you're dead" race to the finish. It'll be interesting to see what the final outcome will be.

bobo

Well I got that right, but looks like they are going to go way over that.

Well, I stand corrected. The max bid is well beyond my guess. Now it will really get interesting!

Bob

Good Luck to the bidders...but there are several other purchases that I would put $3,000+ towards....

I like the little green note that says PayPal will cover this item up to $200.00. :rolleyes:

$3,177.08

Auction has ended, 41 bids. The high bid is listed in the post above. I guess you would say that's a bargain price for this very rare HL. Shipping and insurance is over $50. One would imagine the soon-to-be new owner is getting the hee-bee-jee-bees right about now as he or she makes out that payment wondering if the piece will arrive as one piece, and not more than one piece. I know I would be paranoid if it was me.

Bob

I think if I spent that much on a collectable, I'd have to go pick it up in person.

HOLY MOLY!!! And we think this is a deal???
WOW!!! I mean WOW!!!I guess that is part of the collectable game...

This is the eleventh CH-1 that I have tracked on ebay. The lowest price was $2100.75 and the highest $4309.59. There was a damaged one that had its top broken off and it went for $588. Because it was damaged its price will not be considered for tracking the CH-1 value.

The majority of the winning bids are between the $3000 and $3200 mark. If I were going to assign an ebay value to it I would have to say that price range. So looking at this bid we would have to say it went for the standard ebay value. The reason I thought it would go for more was that it has not been on the market for over a year and that usually stimulates desire when it comes to collectables. I also thought it was interesting that it had the full green felt and that would have stimulated its value.

The reason that one of the CH-1 went for as low as $2100.75 last year was that it went on the market right after another CH-1. It was the last one of four that was on ebay within a 6 month time period. This started to give the collectors the false image that the CH-1 was obtainable and wasn’t that rare. Hence a low bid.

Long-term value.

We have seen many Harbour Lights fall to ¼ to 1/10 of what there value was in 98 but not the CH-1. Granted it has fallen some (3/4 of what it went for in 1998) but I don’t look as it as fallen but as that its value has stabilized.

Daniel,

Thanks for the cogent analysis. I agree. Lets hope the rest of the Harbour Lights stabilize as well.

Could you share your thoughts on Split Rock MI?

Dan

I love to.

Make your request as a separate topic so it doesn't get lost in this topic. Post it under “secondary market information” if you want to talk secondary market or post it under “the limited edition locker room” if you want to talk about the variation.

I'll probably never get one of those and have to be content with my GLOW and Hatteras on the Move. Anyway I could buy a flat screen LCD HD TV with that kind of money!
Judy

Well that certainly puts it in perspective! Which would you get the most enjoyment out of?

Just picture yourself all alone in your living room. Now picture the extremely rare HL 102 sitting on the top shelf of your curio on one wall. On the opposite wall, picture your new flat screen LCD HD TV. Which wall would you rather be facing for the better part of an evening?

On the other hand, five years from now try and sell both the TV and the HL 102. Which one will bring the most money back to you as compared to the original investment?

Interesting....

Bob

Bob,

I was really leaning towards the flat screen tv until your last paragraph that addressed the investment issue! I love my movies though as much as the HL 102 so what can I say...? I want my cake and eat it too! Isn't there something about a champagne taste on a beer budget?

Judy

Bill, Judy and Bob,

I can go for days without looking at my HL 102. But to go without my TV? NEVER. I guess that describes what an active social life I have.

Come to think of it, if it weren't for the members of the Collector Forums and the folks I've met at lighthouse functions, I probably wouldn't have a social life at all.

bobo

Actually, Judy could probably arrange for someone to get some good pictures of a CH1, put them on a DVD and then display them on the new TV during commercials....

Rich
Told me he talked to the runner up bidder. He was going to bid more except his computer locked up.
So my $3400 to $3600 prediction might have been right-on if it wasn't for a technology problem.