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Look what the cat dragged in (two Garrards)

sonddek said:
The architect got permission from the owner for me to remove the kit. She said that he might be interested in "buying" some of it back once restored on account of the 'provenance'. The house and equipment was previously owned by someone who was quite well-known in the 80's.
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That suggests to me that he owner DOES care - not because of it's value but on account of its provenance.

Now, if the owner may want to "buy it back" they're not going to give it away for free and then buy it back at cost are they?

No. They will "buy it back" on the understanding that it some work has been done on it and they'll be paying for just that because they own the rest.

Perceived value doesn't count any more because eBay is here - just put it on and it will find a price. Done like that, you'd easily get over £1500. Sold in a way to make maximum profit, more like £2500. The owner will care and want their stuff back once they find out, even if they don't realise the value right now. They'll want it back anyway when they start thinking about the provenance of the house itself..

So, unless you have clear, direct instruction to take ownership of it, without ANY doubt and either straight from their mouth or in writing, then you have possible accusations of theft on your hands. Unless you can proove they gave permission you're stuffed..
 
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Please drop this aspect of discussion now, it's becoming utterly tedious as any points have been made and repetition achieves little. This is the classic room, it's about classic kit, maintenance, restoration etc. Any content about the technical legalities of ownership belong in off topic.
 
OK - I was just concerned that the guy would spend time and money restoring with the idea he'd be keeping it only to get a call later demanding it back.

Would be a downer of a thread in that case and we'd all feel guilty for egging him on.
 
Looking at the condition of the 301 and the SME, there's nowt there that you can't clean up and get to a working order.
You have two choices, the first is to clean them up, get any relevant parts so that they are in a saleable condition and bang them onto Ebay.
In a clean condition the oil bearing 301 with faint dustbug mark will go for £600 + each.
The SME 3009 with split weight and complete with early raised logo headshell will sell at £260+ each.
With the right photography and wording the arms could reach £300 - £400.
The second choice is to get them up to a good working condition and enjoy (you only need one but your argument to the wife is that you need spares for old kit like this).
Dave
 
nat8808 said:
That's fine if you're happy to stump up a few thousand on the off chance that some guy you've not met might or might not want to pay you for them.

I doubt he would once he'd found out the cost.
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Trust me, when I said "independently wealthy", it was an understatement of vulgar proportions. Perhaps I should have said a household name on account of eye-watering personal wealth. I seriously don't think he's going to come after his insignificant neighbour with a court case for a couple of grand of old shit that was going to be thrown on a skip until someone spotted it was worth saving, especially when I (a) asked if I could have it and (b) was given permission, as a response to that request, to enter the premises and remove it.

Uploading more picture shortly.
 
That DustBug mark looks as if it has corroded the steel. It looks pretty horrendous to me. Surely that'll need a serious refinishing which will necessitate a complete stripping down - which sort of indicates a complete refurb.

For me, the damage of this thread has now been done and I'm on the trail of a 3009 to somehow mount onto my AceSpaceDeck. How it'll work out I don't know - it'll probably lead to a 2nd deck I guess. It was Tony's photo of the refurbed 3009 that finally did it.
Damn! It just looks like the most beautiful arm ever. Design perfection.
 
Rasher said:
That DustBug mark looks as if it has corroded the steel. It looks pretty horrendous to me. Surely that'll need a serious refinishing which will necessitate a complete stripping down - which sort of indicates a complete refurb.
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I suspect it may be glue, which should come off, at least to a degree, with the right treatment. It can't be corrosion that colour as the chassis is some kind of cast alloy, not steel. The main problem with 301s and Dustbugs, which many don't understand, is that you can never remove all trace as the 301's paint fades in daylight, so a patch covered by a Dustbug will always be a little darker. Nothing bar a full respray will fix this.

Rasher said:
For me, the damage of this thread has now been done and I'm on the trail of a 3009 to somehow mount onto my AceSpaceDeck. How it'll work out I don't know - it'll probably lead to a 2nd deck I guess. It was Tony's photo of the refurbed 3009 that finally did it.
Damn! It just looks like the most beautiful arm ever. Design perfection.
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It is such a pleasure to use too. I'm a big fan of the 3009/3012, they represent the exact point when tonearm design all came together for the first time and they set the parameters for the following two decades. No arm previously had everything e.g. calibrated tracking weight, calibrated bias, removable shell, integrated cueing, easy alignment, adjustable VTF, adjustable lateral balance, azimuth adjustment etc etc, and many arms to this day still miss some of that lot. On the TD-124, which has a similar level of ergonomic and aesthetic purity, it makes one wonder where it all went wrong in later years. My final deck for sure, it is just so 'right'.
 
Pictures of all but the Stereo 30 and 70's style Trough Line:
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Very high resolutions images here for the dedicated:
http://cyberphotographer.com/garrards/highrez/
 
All looks good to me, nothing looks badly damaged. Leaks look real nice too, in fact I'm rather envious as I'm kind of on the lookout for a good Stereo 20!
 
I'm amazed by how clean and new the insides of the Garrards look. Considering they've been sitting there for half a century the lack of soot and dust on the inside is surprising. I've had to do a fair bit of cleaning/wiping to the exposed surfaces, but it seems that the grime there must have been very recent.
 
The dust bugs are glue. I fancy my chances of getting most of it removed. It's not the kind of detail that bothers me, to be honest. I'm more interested in getting it back to immaculate mechanical health. With a deck this old, and with a well-known historic reason for the dust bugs, I think they just come with the territory. If either of these decks doesn't stay in my possession I would like it to go to the kind of collector who wants to listen to it lovingly rather than gaze at it lovingly.
 
sonddek said:
Trust me, when I said "independently wealthy", it was an understatement of vulgar proportions. Perhaps I should have said a household name on account of eye-watering personal wealth. I seriously don't think he's going to come after his insignificant neighbour with a court case for a couple of grand of old shit that was going to be thrown on a skip until someone spotted it was worth saving, especially when I (a) asked if I could have it and (b) was given permission, as a response to that request, to enter the premises and remove it.

Uploading more picture shortly.
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In that case it sounds like you're ok.

It might not be worth restoring the 3009s as when parted out they fetch about £350 when added up. To get £350 as a whole, it would have to be in superb condition..

Even an SPU needing a re-build I've seen sell for £150 with the same seller parting out the bits of the ortofon headshell too £35 for the guard, £30 the grey bit, £80 the headshell - all sold.

In my personal opinion, I'd restore the lesser of the decks, perhaps try out the valve Leak amp for yourself too and sell the rest as is..

The transformers look pretty interesting too - what are they?
 
nat8808 said:
In that case it sounds like you're ok.

It might not be worth restoring the 3009s as when parted out they fetch about £350 when added up. To get £350 as a whole, it would have to be in superb condition..

Even an SPU needing a re-build I've seen sell for £150 with the same seller parting out the bits of the ortofon headshell too £35 for the guard, £30 the grey bit, £80 the headshell - all sold.

In my personal opinion, I'd restore the lesser of the decks, perhaps try out the valve Leak amp for yourself too and sell the rest as is..
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Interesting advice - I'm sure you're right that asset stripping them is more lucrative than spending money to revive them and then sell. You have to have the time and want to do a restoration for it to make sense.

The transformers look pretty interesting too - what are they?
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I haven't a clue. They're Danish though. I was hoping a resident walking audiopedia would know.
 
sonddek said:
I paid nothing. The architect said the owner of the house might want to buy it back from me once I had restored it, and was interested in the provenance/history, so we'll see what happens, but as it stands I have it all in my hallway and need to decide what to do with it all.

I suspect the arms and tuners are the least valuable and probably not worth rescuing. The SPU G must go to ESC, I suppose, if you think that's worth it. The decks are clearly worth restoring properly. How much should that cost if I get an expert to do it? Should I attempt it myself?

I'm in two minds about the amps. They seem to be of interest on ebay, but only in good shape, and it will no doubt be quite expensive to get them up to spec, what with replacing valves and so on. How good are they once restored?
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I would try and have everything restored. It's a classic British system of a certain epoch, and could have some surprises in store for the owner.
M.
 
Maxbertola said:
I would try and have everything restored. It's a classic British system of a certain epoch, and could have some surprises in store for the owner.
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It's a tough decision - what to sell and what to restore. I am very curious to hear the whole system as it should sound, but that's going to take quite a lot of money to achieve, I suspect, and I already have two pretty decent systems. I'm certainly going to get whatever I can into working order just to try it out. I can't see myself spending days of time and a small fortune rebuilding the Leak 20 though.
 
I wonder if a kind pinkfisher in the London area has a properly fettled Garrard/SME3009/SPU or Leak Varislope/Stereo 20 to which I could listen.
 
Glad to hear you aren't interested in stripping them for parts, i hate to see good gear go that way.
 
I really wouldn't jump to any decisions about parting with any of it. It doesn't owe you anything, after all.

I'm sure that you may be excited by the Garrard/SME combos for now, but you don't know where that may lead you. It may be that you'll want to eventually reintroduce it back to it's life-partners once again, just because it feels the right thing to do. And if it was me I think that's what I would do most certainly. These guys have been holding hands for 50 years and it just doesn't seem right to not respect that. I'm not saying that they shouldn't be used with anything else, but they do belong together in some way.

Even the Leak speakers. They may be last on the list, but they deserve the same respect.

I wouldn't see this in terms of cost and worth. Something happened to make these items sit there forgotten avoiding the builder's skip until you came along to rescue them. Maybe I'm over-sentimental about these sorts of things, but they waited until they could be found by someone who could give them life again, and against all the odds they managed to find you. You have to accept that responsibility and parting with any of it, at least until it's future is assured, would be tragic. It shouldn't have anything to do with money/assets/cost. They are your children now.
 
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