SuperAuctions Review: 1/11/08

[Flack]

If you can gauge the success of an auction by how sore you are the following day(s), then the Dallas SuperAuction was a success. Compared to some of the other SuperAuctions events I've attended I would say it was on the small side, but it still dwarfed all the Oklahoma City auctions I've been to. Your best bet of finding what you want at a decent price at an auction still seems to be in Dallas.

When I walked through the front door I ran into Oklahoma City locals Bricktop, Thomas and Mike. I ended up hanging out with Bricktop and Mike quite a bit during the auction. I can't believe how much those guys know about coin-ops, and I really enjoyed just standing near them, listening to them talk about machines or watching them work on stuff. Just when I think I'm starting to get the hang of these machines I watch the old pros dig in and I start feeling stupid again. Also there were Digital Press alumni 98Pacecar (who knows as much if not more than those guys), Steve W and Darth Sensei. Steve W has an uncanny knack of attracting the megaphone's attention. No matter where he stands the speakers get turned to face him.

I used to write down every sale price of every game, but due to all the buybacks it seems kind of pointless now. I do wish I had written down all the game titles because there were a lot of good games there. The front row had a couple of Ms. Pacs (one that went for under $200), Donkey Kong Jr., Jungle King (non-working), TRON (non-working, which Darren's buddy bought), Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Joust (board problem?), Donkey Kong (tube problem?), and some others. A couple of years ago at SuperAuctions the first row, maybe row and a half were classics. This past weekend, the first row was half classics and half Multicades/Ultracades. The Multicades were bringing in between $400-$800, although some of those lower ones may have been buybacks. There were a few shooting games, couple of older golf games, several old fighting games (MKII, UMKIII, Tekken) and at least three or four Sega Die Hards in those giant black plastic cabs.

There were lots of redemption games there and if you ever want a giant ticket dispensing game for your house, this is the place to get one. Some of them sold for pennies on the dollar. Hell, some of them sold FOR a dollar! There were a lot of Cherry gambling machines and jukeboxes which seemed to take hours to get through. If you wanted a broken jukebox, you missed out. They sold 11 of them in a lot for one dollar. You would have had to pay me more than that to drag them off. A real Double Diamond slot machine brought $700. The small skill-stop machines went for $40/each and $60/each in two lots.

Before the auction I bought a three-player Ironman Ivan Stewart's Super Off Road along with an additional Track Pak board in the parking lot (pre-arranged deal with 98Pacecar, and I still owe him the money -- do you take PayPal?). I took dad's trailer just in case I ran across anything else I wanted, but the problem with that is, when I take the trailer I have a tendency to fill it up. From the auction itself, I ended up with a non-working Buster Bros (power supply?), Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, Sunset Riders (4 Player), and a Scramble. While loading the games I discovered that most of the wood on my dad's trailer was rotten. When moving the first game up on the trailer, the dolly actually pushed down through the wood.

Of course, as is my luck, the UMK3 and Scramble were working fine at the auction and once I got them home they won't fire up. The UMK3 has no video and just randomly "bongs." The Scramble has a loud buzz coming from the monitor. I really hope the monitor's not hosed on it. Hopefully the jostling of travel just loosened some wires. I'll look at them this week and see what's up.

Preview was from 8am-10am, the auction kicked off around 10:30am, and the last item sold just after 7pm. I had planned on crashing at my friend's house in Dallas, but the wife "convinced" me I should come home Saturday night, so I did. Those wives sure are convincing sometimes. I threw a tarp over the games Saturday night and unloaded everything Sunday. I had to move games around for a couple of hours just to make room for everything -- something I'm sure a lot of you are familiar with. I also ended up pretty much destroying the trailer -- I put three or four more big holes in the trailer's flooring. That thing's done until I can replace the wood.

I had a good time at the auction, and a great time hanging out with everybody. 98Pacecar and I snuck away for lunch and had a good time hanging out. Sometimes I forget how much the guy knows about coin-op games, but he's a whiz. I had hoped to hook up with him later in the day but I didn't get my last game loaded until 7:30pm and so between the wife and how tired I was, I ended up cruising back home.

[MrSparkle]

I had no idea there were huge coin op auctions! Now i really want to go to one but dallas is a bit of a haul from new york/new jersey does anyone know of any in the tri-state area?

[dcescott]

Flack I would have been there, I couldn't due to a sick 7 month old daughter. Any good shilling for crappy games there? I am so glass-half-empty with the Super Auction people. I saw a dude jack up his Budweiser Tapper past 600 bucks last time. The buyer almost got it for 3. But I had a blast playing all those games for a couple hours for free and got to see some cool pinball games, one being a Dolly Parton pinball machine. How is 98pacecar? He sent me a couple common neo geo jammas to me and some joysticks, nice guy!

[jb143]

I had no idea there were huge coin op auctions! Now i really want to go to one but dallas is a bit of a haul from new york/new jersey does anyone know of any in the tri-state area?

http://www.superauctions.com

It doesn't look like they go too close to your area but certainly closer than texas.

It's comming to the St. Louis area in april and I'm going to try and go. I've always missed it in the past. For any of you guys that have gone before...what could one expect to get a decent non/half-working or maybe even gutted cab for?

[Flack]

I got a perfectly working 4-player Sunset Riders for $50, so I'd say a non/half-working or gutted cab would go less than that. I saw several broken games going for $25 or less, but you'll have to wait until the end for those deals.

I did see plenty of shill bidding -- it's funny, it becomes extremely obvious when you know who the sellers are!

[jb143]

I got a perfectly working 4-player Sunset Riders for $50, so I'd say a non/half-working or gutted cab would go less than that. I saw several broken games going for $25 or less, but you'll have to wait until the end for those deals.

I did see plenty of shill bidding -- it's funny, it becomes extremely obvious when you know who the sellers are!

Hmmm...I guess I can't say that I blame them but still.

$25-$50 is still pretty good though. I'm definatly going to have to check it out now. Too bad it's right before my wifes birthday instead of mine though.

[cityside75]

The UMK3 has no video and just randomly "bongs."

Flack, you may already know this, but since I just picked up a UMKIII recently myself I figured I'd mention it. That bonging is a test sound that the game makes as it tests chips on the board. If you let it sit for a few minutes, it should bong twice and then start with the game sounds, or you can hold down start to bypass the testing.

So, it sounds like your board is functioning fine, hopefully something with the video just got knocked loose on the way home.

[MrSparkle]

looks lik,e the closest they venture to me is georgia which is definatly closer than texas but still pretty far to go to pickup some broken down arcade machines hehe ill have to weigh the expense of driving a truck down their to just making one of my friends in the area ship it up to me via freight, anyway thanks for the info

[Kevin H]

auctiongamesales.com is another site for arcade auctions. Probably closer to NY.

[shawnbo42]

Flack,

As far as your MK3 goes, as was stated earlier in the post, the "bong is the board testing itself before loading the game. See if you can credit the game after the second "bong", the game SHOULD be loaded by then.

If you can credit the game and hear sound (hopefully you can) then you've got a monitor board issue. If that's the case (pray it isn't if it's a dedicated MK cabinet), time to pull the monitor. Yes, the monitor, not the board. Dedicabs usually use a Hantarex Polo monitor, and it's just-about-pretty-much-impossible to get to the board from the back because the back door is cut about 3 inches low to access the monitor board.

I had an issue a while back, shipped a MK2 box from Illinois to Connecticut by truck. When it got to me, the magnet had fallen off the speaker and sheared off the neck of the tube. (I really hope you don't have THAT problem!). It was good in a way, though. Got rid of the Hantarex and replaced it with a Wells Gardner K7000 tube (MUCH easier to service, IMO).

Anyways, good luck with everything, hope it's an easy fix for you!

BTW, that Sunset Riders...dedicated or converted?

[Flack]

The UMK3 is in a MKII cabinet. I glanced at it the other day and didn't see how to open the back door -- no locks! I assume there are clasps on the inside; I'll have to look closer tonight.

The Sunset Riders is in a dedicated, 4 player cab. Complete with 4 coin slots.

I left my camera at work over the weekend, but I have it now so I'll take some new pictures of everything tonight.

Thanks for the MK info shawnbo42 and cityside75!

[shawnbo42]

Flack,
Check for screws or the like holding the back door on the MK machine. There has to be some way that door is on there (unless somebody did some Frankenstein work to it). A lot of operators have machines w/no locks because the keys are lost, or they lose the keys, and then break the locks themselves to get in. Either way, the easy answer is just to jam a few screws in the sides of the door (or along the top) to hold it closed.

Looking forward to those pics as well!! Cheers!
-s